websites – Page 3 – Montessori Muddle

In-credible sources

Screen shot 2010-11-18 at 9.21.12 PM — All About Explorers (be careful).

All About Explorers is a wonderful site if you’re interested in talking about the credibility of sources. It looks real, is well organized, well written and could easily pass for credible to the uninitiated. The article on John Cabot starts with:

One might wonder what John Cabot and Christopher Columbus have in common. Both were born in Liverpool, England. Cabot was born in 1405, but his birth certificate was lost at sea and no one knows for sure.

Now, there are more telltale clues that everything is not on the up-and-up, particularly where they mention Cabot’s cartographic exploits on his ”alleged” return to England from growing up in Italy:

In 1484, John Cabot moved back to England with his wife and eleven sons. This was a great career move for John. He developed his own website and became quite famous for his charts and maps depicting a new route to the Far East.

I find sites like these delightful. To think that someone spent the time, energy and intelligence to create this particular little snare, says something wonderful about way the human mind works.

Nicely, the “About This Site” section notes:

All About Explorers was developed by a group of teachers as a means of teaching students about the Internet. … Because we wanted to make a point about finding useless information even in a site which looked at first to be fairly well put together, all of the Explorer biographies here are fictional. While many of the facts are true or based on truth, many inaccuracies, lies, and even downright absurdity are mixed in indiscriminately. As such, it is important that you do not use this site as a source of reference for your own research!

The site also has a set of lessons, handouts and other stuff on its “For Teachers” page.

Mariner AO: Discovering the Americas

Bobert_II — The route of the good ship Bobert II.

We just used my sailing game, Mariner AO, to help wrap up the group presentations on the European exploration of the Americas, and it worked wonderfully!

The small groups did their presentations timewise, starting with the Vikings (don’t ask me about Leprechauns), then the Spanish, the French (don’t ask me about giant sharks and flying pigs), and finally the English. At the end, we had half an hour left, but instead of just tying it together with a graphic organizer, I wanted to show them Mariner AO because the North Atlantic wind circulation ties in so wonderfully well with the pattern of colonization.

I started trying to show it off as a group, having them tell me which direction to sail the ship to get to the Americas. As you could probably predict that didn’t work particularly well. Everyone was yelling out directions at cross-purposes; however, it did give me the chance to show them all how the game worked.

Even with all the confusion the group seemed to like the game. Someone even suggested, “Why didn’t we do this for group work.” And I though, “Why not?” So the class broke apart for 25 minutes to see who could discover America first.

There was a lot of excitement in the room. I offered them extra points for the team that reached America first. They all know how empty that reward is by now so I think most of the excitement really came from being able to play a game with a little bit of competition.

playing-mariner-ao-adj — Building a ship to try to discover America.

The website still has a few bugs, especially on our older computers, but it worked. Three of the four groups reached the Americas, though two of them landed on the Canadian coast. The third group may well have ended up there as well, but I dropped a hint about Columbus’ route that sent them sailing into the Caribbean.

At least two kids planned on trying it at home. I had to pry one of the groups away from the computer so they could get their end-of-the-day jobs done on time.

We took screen captures of routes they took, and tomorrow we’ll put it all together, talk about the trade winds, what Columbus knew, and why the Iberians colonized South America while the French and English ended up mostly in the North.

More mitosis resources

onion-root-tip-cells — Onion root tip cells, with chromosomes stained to show cells in different stages of mitosis. Image from uafcde.

One of our small group activities is to look at mitosis in onion cells. Anna Clarke, recommended the University of Arizona site which has an Online Onion Root Tips activity for those without access to the slides or microscope. It also provides a good review even if you do have those resources. Dr. Paul’s page on onion cell division is a good supplement to the Arizona site because of its great cell images.

If you’re feeling ambitious and want students to make their own slides, you can try the SAPS page on Mitosis in root tips.

Little Red Riding-hood

And, saying these words, this wicked Wolf fell upon poor Little Red Riding-Hood, and ate her all up. — Perrault, 1922, p. 25..

One of my students chose to do their first writing assignment in the mold of a classic fairy tale. So, as part of the revision process, I suggested they read the original Little Red Riding-hood to get away from the conventional, Disneyfied storylines. The Guttenberg Project, which aims to make available all the books that are now in the public domain as free ebooks, has Charles Perrault’s original book of fairy tales.

The student was somewhat surprised that Little Red Riding-Hood was eaten by the wolf in the end. They shared this with the rest of the class quite loudly.

John Quincy Adams’ Tweets

John_Quincy_Adams_1824 — Slightly disturbing daguerreotype of John Quincy Adams. Image from Wikipedia.

Exactly 200 years after he wrote them, the Massachusetts Historical Society is posting John Quincy Adams’ diary entries as Tweets. By posting a sentence or so with every tweet, the diary works very well in the new format. It makes for a fascinating read.

8/16/1810: Letter to Secy State sent to Hixon. Captain Delano here. Note to Balacheff for Everett and Gray. Dinner. – from JQAdams_MHS

Optical Illusions

smudge-illusion — Look at the figure on the right. Stare at the black dot without moving your eyes. The smudge will miraculously disappear! Try the same experiment again with the smudge on the left. This time the smudge does not disappear. What is going on here? Why does the smudge disappear in one instance and not the other? (Illusion from the Wilderdom Store. Use under Creative Commons Attribution License)

Wilderdom has a wonderful set of cooperative games and icebreaking games that they share for free. They also have a book of optical illusions that would work well for a challenge during morning community meetings.

Their material is copyleft so as along as you attribute them and use the same licensing terms (and cite their Creative Commons License) . You are free to use their stuff as you like.