Website

One of the assignments for this class is to create a website. I used Google Sites. Here is a link. Check it out!

My Personal Learning Network (PLN)

For those of you unfamiliar with what a PLN is, Wikipedia provides a good explanation of it. The way that I have decided to establish a personal learning network is by searching out educational blogs and websites and subscribing to them using Google Reader. I am a big Google fan--it's just so easy to use--and since I already use things like Gmail and Google Docs regularly, adding Google Reader to my repertoire of tools simply seemed logical. I also try to add links to useful blogs on my blog so that others can access my network.

I looked up other avenues for establishing PLNs like Delicious, but did not really want to sign up for yet another internet service. Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Playlist, Pandora, and other sites are enough for me.

95 Theses Rap

I took a history of the Reformation class this past Spring and my teacher showed us this video. I thought it was incredibly creative. At the same time I took a class all about assessment in the classroom. We talked particularly about authentic assessment and when we did, I thought of this video. I think that this would be a really fun assignment, and would show you, the teacher, that your students really got the material you covered. The guys who made this video were college students at Yale I believe. They used to have a website on which they discussed what was factual and what was not--most of the lyrics are factual--but I couldn't find it when I went to post this. Anyway, I think that something like this would be a really good project for students to tackle, even if it was just writing a rap or song or something.

History Teaching Video

I thought that this was a really funny video about teaching history. Besides the snakes!

There's A LOT of Stuff Out There!!!

My technology teacher sent me on a hunt to find websites/blogs/RSS feeds that I think I could use as I teach. I simply typed in "Russian blogs" and "history blogs" and found a bunch of great stuff.

One of the websites that I think will be good to look at is the White House website. It has information about what the current presidential administration is up to.

Another history related site is USHistoryBlog.com. Like the title indicates, it contains a ton of information about U.S. history.

While I was checking out that last blog, I found US History Teachers Blog. Probably one of the cooler websites I have found. This blog is designed to show history teachers some of the resources out there on the Internet that are available to them.

Finally, I found Russian Word of the Day, which basically teaches a little Russian mini-lesson every day. I am really excited about this one, as I myself will be able to learn from it.

Education Websites

Here are some really cool websites that have a number of ideas on how to enhance your teaching/parenting/role-modeling.

Check them out!

Teachersfirst.com - A website for teachers "designed to save teachers time by delivering just what they need in a practical, user-friendly, and ad-free format."

KidsSource Online - A website made by parents to share "[their] values and goals in raising, educating, and providing for our children."

Listen to Carbon Leaf

You are now listening to Carbon Leaf. Carbon Leaf is my favorite band. My wife introduced me to them. Check out the playlist to the right.

First Post

Here is a little about me. My name is Wesley Grant Stoddard. My parents were mean and decided to call me by my middle name, Grant, making applying for jobs, filling out medical forms, and even taking classes difficult because nobody gets my name right. I am a student at Brigham Young University. I am majoring in history teaching, and minoring in Russian teaching and TESOL K-12 (TESOL is an acronym for Teaching English to Students of Other Languages and is sometimes interchanged with ESL or TELL). I am married and have a son, who is 15 months old. We are a happy little family trying to survive while I finish up school.

I think that blogging could be an extremely useful tool in the classroom. There are a number of websites that I would love to share with my students but probably won't have time to in class. A few examples are Learn Out Loud (this is a link to their "Free Stuff" page) and RusUSA.com. The former is a website that offers free audio clips of famous speeches from history, and the second is a page linking the viewer to a number of Russian radio stations. I think that they are worth checking out. Let me know what you think.