learntowriteablog

Blogging for Education

homeschool10x — Mon, 24 Oct 2011 00:53:23 +0000

In addition to my own education, I hope others read my blogs and learn. Two other blogs that I support:

http://homeschoolcurriculumcity.wordpress.com/

http://learnseowithme.wordpress.com/

Blogs can serve many functions and support many causes. For instance, I’m trying to help Mr. Google find the very best educational games and I feel that the Big Mr. G might be confused. Here are my recommendations:

Google, please check these out and see if you should be paying more attention to them!

Unscramble
Word Search
Hangman
Crossword Puzzle
Latin Learning
Phonics Games
Homeschool Curriculum and I will quote a little:

Homeschool Curriculum – Many Choices…Many Challenges

One of the challenges of homeschool education is selecting curriculum that meets the needs of each child. Many families find that what fits one child, may not fit another, or that what worked well one semester, may feel stale and stop working the next. Or in some cases, what works for one child in one subject, does not work for the same child in another subject. Well, nobody said it was going to be easy.

What most families discover is that their family’s educational needs cannot be met by a single curriculum… and that blending several homeschool programs and approaches can increase effectiveness. This eclectic homeschool approach allows the optimal education for children being homeschooled.

Student Record keeping

homeschool10x — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 08:10:41 +0000

SpellingCity provides a way for teachers and parents to automatically track students’ spelling test results on their tests. The automated grading improves learning by saving the teachers time required to manually grade and record the tests and by providing immediate feedback to students so they can continue their study of the word lists. Like many of our features, this idea was suggested to SpellingCity by our users.

Time4Learning has automated student record keeping for homeschool records.

What is Time4Learning, exactly?

Time4Learning is a technology-based online educational program that teaches preschool to eighth grade curriculum using a combination of animated lessons, interactive activities and reinforcing worksheets.

A top selection of the Homeschool.com “Top 100 Educational Websites” list year after year, the Time4Learning program has been refined through years of feedback from educators, parents, and students. The lessons are presented at the student’s pace by an automated system in a sequence designed to build strong subject literacy.

Time4Learning is a great curriculum for families who homeschool. It is also a great after school skill sharpener and is often used for remediation and test preparation. Whether mainstream, gifted, or special needs, Time4Learning provides a flexible, student-paced approach.

Can I use Time4Learning as a homeschool program?

The majority of our users are homeschoolers. Some choose to use Time4Learning as their core curriculum; others use it as a supplement. Although our program correlates to state standards, we recommend that you review your state’s legal requirements before choosing any program. If you are new to homeschooling, we recommend reading our free “

Welcome to Homeschooling Guide

“.

Blogging about Words

homeschool10x — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 07:46:36 +0000

I am very interested in blogs and words and tools for better teaching of words. So, when I created SpellingCity, I felt it was just too cool. I’d like to draw more attention to some of the resources.

What are the Most Popular?

	Dolch Words - This collection of Dolch or Sight words is perennially useful. There is both background information and lists ready-to-use.
	Compound Words – Kids love studying compound words. Teachers love teaching them. Does your school have a Compound Word Day? It should!
	Literature-Based Word Lists - Over fifty popular books so far. Email us if you have a list to add.
	Sound Alike Words – All students and many adults benefit from practice distinguishing the right spelling and usage of its and it’s; they’re, there, and their; and to, too, and two.
	Homophones, Homonyms, and Homographs – This article reviews homophones, homonyms, and homographs. Need a quick reminder? Here it is.

Contractions – You can build lists using words like: I’ll, we’ll, shouldn’t, and they’re. There are lists of what contractions SpellingCity.com supports.
Abbreviations - You can build lists using abbreviations such as titles (Mr. Dr, Mrs.), measurements (oz., pt, qt.), and geographic terms (Blvd., Pkwy., and Rd.)
Possessives - SpellingCity has added some sample possessive forms of nouns, both plural and singular, for spelling and grammar practice. For example: aunt, aunts, aunt’s, aunts’, boy, boys, boy’s, boys’, lady, ladies, lady’s, ladies’, doctor, doctors, doctor’s, doctors’. As background, SpellingCity has always included both the singular and plural forms of nouns and the the forms of verbs (ex play, playing, played).
Any other ideas for resources that we should post? Send me an email or suggest it on the forum.

SpellingCity provides a way for teachers and parents to automatically track students’ results on their tests. The automated grading improves learning by saving the teachers time required to manually grade and record the tests and by providing immediate feedback to students so they can continue their study of the word lists. Like many of our features, this idea was suggested to SpellingCity by our users.

Read a blog about Google Instant

homeschool10x — Fri, 08 Oct 2010 07:45:33 +0000

I read a blog post about google instant and frankly, I thought it was about coffee. Had I learned that Google was going head to head with Starbucks or Maxwell House?

In fact, Google Instant is a little noticed but dramatic technical change in how Google works. Specifically, when you type into the google search book, it now suggests the most likely term that you are looking for. Frankly, to users, it’s almost invisible, it feels like the caching-based suggestions that are provided on many fill in the blank spots on webforms including the URL address.

But this is different since in making suggestions, its shapes the searches that you might otherwise have written free form. There is an entire industry of SEO people with blogs written to do well on certain long-tail terms that now might find that people accept the suggestions and do not type in anymore all those long obscure terms. This is a radical change.

For PPC, it’s also revolution. An impression, for purposes of figuring out CTR, is deemed to have happened if a suggested term was number one and was on the screen for 3 seconds. Yup, thats right. Big and weird stuff! Many thank-yours to the intermediate seo online marketing blog people for making me aware of this.

Oh, and here’s some irony, Google Instant does not function if you are on Chrome using the url as the search box or inside the igoogle search box.

Blogs get more and more interesting

homeschool10x — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 19:32:35 +0000

I’ve been chasing around trying to find how to improve the blog course. Haven’t found a way. thats it!

Education and blogs – wikis and lense and so on!

homeschool10x — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 10:45:25 +0000

I started thinking that blogs were the ultimately simple content management system. Blogs could exist by themselves on their own URL or as a collection on them on a sort of blog appartment building (like wordpress.com, homeschoolblogger.com, Parents Online Community and about a thousand others). The advantage of being on a community of blogs is the community that comes with proximity. The best explanation of these different ways and places of blogging is on the free blog writing course.

I’m now looking at different CMSs which include wikids (like wikipedia) and a hybrid called squidoo. Weird name, yes. I work with Sandra sometimes who has set up several pages or LENS, in their vernacular. They are do far:

Homeschool Materials
Homeschool Literature
Preschool Homeschool Education and I quote:

School Readiness

Preschool Learning

Kindergarten Readiness Skills
The preschool years are educationally the most important years of children’s lives. Research demonstrates that in the first three years of life, participating in a lively language-rich environment with plenty of adult interaction and attention are vital to building foundation skills. From ages three to five, the stimulation should start to include some preschool learning activities focused on building specific skills in language, math and fine muscle control. These are the primary areas where an online preschool program can contribute to children’s development.

Social media jargon Game

homeschool10x — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 20:20:00 +0000

I just tested my mastery of social media jargon with this social media vocabulary game. Do you want to test yours? Do you know the difference between a facebook like and share?

Facebook Share, Facebook Like – Huh?

homeschool10x — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 18:27:02 +0000

Facebook Icons on non-Facebook pages.

I’m still not satisfied that I fully understand the issues of putting Facebook icons on a NON-Facebook page. I see two possibilities:

1- Like (previously friend) – makes the visitor a fan of OUR Facebook page. Can this only be used if the webpage has an associated Facebook page. It’s done with an iframe. I was just reading a post about Facebook Like discussing its awesomeness from the aspect of making the likes visible.

2 – Share (previously bookmark) - creates a link to the webpage on the user’s profile page. Perhaps preferable for SEO. http://www.addthis.com/bookmark.php?…

Once I get this sorted out, I’ll try figuring out the difference in icons between tweeting and retweeting….I got started on pondering this from this confused post on social media icons.

Guest Blogging

homeschool10x — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 00:02:42 +0000

Here’s a good idea from the Blog Writing Course people:

One of the great ways to build traffic for your fledgling blog is by both BECOMING a guest blogger and HOSTING a guest blogger. If you have already made connections with bloggers in your genre, or have been reading a blog with a theme similar to yours for some time now, this may not be too difficult to set up.

Of course, we’re all waiting for the Time4Writing folk move their Lapbooking Writing course into the digital realm with some sort of blogging course!

Blogging is changing so fast

homeschool10x — Sun, 16 May 2010 16:51:56 +0000

Three years ago, I had a blog about my experiences in the martial arts. It was cool and exciting that I could post pictures and videos on the web.

Now, with Facebook, everyone can do this. So why do I keep blogs like Homeschool Curriculum, and homeschool software review, and homeschooling online?

I personally still find it a very convenient way to collect my thoughts and keep notes (that I can find again). That’s all. In terms of sharing with friends, Facebook has totally won. In terms of saving assets in their original quality, Shutterfly or …