Free Technology for Teachers - 2 new articles

AI search tools like ChatGPT infused into Bing and Google's Bard are getting a lot of attention right now. But when it's time to search most students still default to Google.com. Unfortunately, by relying on just and trendy AI search tools students are ...

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"Free Technology for Teachers" - 2 new articles

  1. Search Tools Your Students (And You?) Are Probably Overlooking
  2. Three Self-paced Courses You Can Start This Weekend
  3. More Recent Articles

Search Tools Your Students (And You?) Are Probably Overlooking


AI search tools like ChatGPT infused into Bing and Google's Bard are getting a lot of attention right now. But when it's time to search most students still default to Google.com. Unfortunately, by relying on just Google.com and trendy AI search tools students are missing out on a lot of excellent excellent and helpful material. That's why we need to introduce our students to lesser-known search tools and databases that they're probably overlooking. 

There are many alternatives to Google.com, ChatGPT, and Bard that students can try. One that I'll always make a case for is Google Scholar. Here are some others that I frequently recommend and teach students and teachers to use. 

Your School Library!
There’s a good chance that your school library and or local public library pays for a subscription to a database of academic articles. A few examples of those include JSTOR, Academic Search Premier, and ScienceDirect. The librarians in your school and public libraries will be happy, perhaps thrilled that you asked, to show your students how to access those databases through a library login.

In addition to the aforementioned subscription-required databases, there are free databases that your students can use in their research processes. Some popular choices include ERIC and Semantic Scholar

Wolfram Alpha
Wolfram Alpha bills itself as a computational search engine. It’s probably best known for helping students solve math problems as they can enter a problem and be shown the steps to solve it. An often overlooked aspect of Wolfram Alpha is the ability to enter a query and see a fact sheet displayed about the subject of the query. For example, entering “Martin Luther King” into Wolfram Alpha will result in seeing a fact sheet containing a list of key biographical facts about King’s life. Enter “Martin Luther King” and “John F. Kennedy” as part of the same query on Wolfram Alpha and you’ll see a side-by-side display of fact sheets about each man and see a timeline of where their lives overlapped. For students who need to quickly find just the basic facts about a topic, a query on Wolfram Alpha often leads them to the information they need faster than entering the same query on Google.com

Get The Research
Get The Research is a fairly small search engine that is focused on helping people find academic articles. A search on Get The Research will yield a small summary of the searched topic and a list of published academic articles. The articles in the search results will be a mix of open-access articles and paywalled articles. You can filter results to show only open-access articles.

DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo is increasing in popularity because of its claim to offer private, untracked searching. Whereas Google and Bing will track your search history (through users’ Google or Microsoft accounts and or via browser settings), DuckDuckGo doesn’t track search history. There is a potential benefit to students using DuckDuckGo in addition to the privacy aspect. By not tracking search habits, DuckDuckGo’s search results are not influenced by a user’s past search and click histories. This has the potential to break students out of a bubble of results that are influenced by their past actions.

   

Three Self-paced Courses You Can Start This Weekend


Spring in Maine means a lot of cold and wet weather. We have a bit of a reprieve today, but tomorrow we're back to cool and rainy weather for another five days (if the forecast is correct). This pattern puts a damper on many outdoor spring activities. I’m using this time to work through an online course. You could do the same.

I currently offer three professional development courses that you can start today and complete at your own pace. And from now through the end of May when you register for one course, you can register for a second course at 50% off.

Animated Explanations!
This five-part course teaches you everything you need to know to create and teach with your own animated explanations. In the course you’ll learn why the process of creating animated explanations is valuable to your students and to you. You’ll learn how to make everything from a simple one-frame animation to a complete animated video. Click here to learn more and get started today!

How to Create & Sell Your Own Digital Products
In this four-part course you’ll learn how to create and sell eBooks, webinars, video courses, lesson plans, and more! And I’ll help you promote your new products! All of the course material is delivered in a series of four weekly emails. Each lesson includes written materials, templates, and video tutorials. You can email me all of your questions as you go through the course. And at the end you can book a one-on-one Zoom call with me! Learn more here and get started here!

Five Video Projects for Almost Every Classroom
In this five-part course you’ll learn how to create and conduct video projects in almost any K-12 classroom! You can do these projects on Chromebooks, iPads, Mac, and Windows computers. Highlights of this course include making green screen videos, creating animated videos, and a variety of ways to create instructional videos. Learn more here and get started here.

If you’ve already taken one of these courses, thank you! Your support makes it possible for me to keep creating resources for teachers.
   

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