Did You Know?/Shift Happens

From Shift Happens:
Did You Know? originally started out as a PowerPoint presentation for a faculty meeting in August 2006 at Arapahoe High School in Centennial, Colorado, United States. The presentation "went viral" on the Web in February 2007 and, as of June 2007, had been seen by at least 5 million online viewers. Today the old and new versions of the online presentation have been seen by at least 20 million people, not including the countless others who have seen it at conferences, workshops, training institutes, and other venues.

This version, updated to early 2012, was created by David S. Rose (@davidsrose) for use in the Finance, Entrepreneurship and Economics program at Singularity University (singularityu.org). All of the contributors to this presentation believe that it is only through conversation, and subsequent action, that we will achieve the best possible education for our children. You are encouraged to download and share this video, and help keep it current by contributing updated versions to the ShiftHappens Wiki.

Google World Wonders Project

Imagine taking your students on a field trip to Stonehenge... or perhaps to Independence Hall... maybe Pompeii? What, no time or funds to make such a trip? Well fortunately for us the folks at Google have applied their Street View technology to many important world sites making them available for virtual field trips.

Choose your destination from the drop-down menu at the top of the page and Google flies you in for a closer look. You can walk the site using your mouse to look up, down, left and right as well as to zoom. Google also offers teacher's guides under the "Education" tab at the top of the page.

Classroom Application: Use the site to lead students through an investigation of sites relevant to classroom instruction. Consider using it instead of static images to increase interest and engagement. You might also pose a set of questions to your students about a certain location, asking them to find and justify their answers by searching the site.

Link: Google World Wonders Project

The Periodic Table of Videos

Here is a terrific website that links each element on the periodic table to an informative video about that element. The explanations include history, stories, and experiments and would be a perfect compliment to classroom instruction. Provide links via MyBigCampus or Angel/Blackboard to have students view them at home.

Classroom Application: Have students watch specific videos at home before classroom discussion. Incorporate the videos into lessons to demonstrate elements you are unable to show in the classroom.

A Step Further: Ask students to use these videos as a model to create similar explanatory videos on other subjects. As they work to explain what they know in a concise and understandable way they will be engaging in Understanding, Applying, Analyzing, and Creating as defined by Bloom's Taxonomy.

Link: The Periodic Table of Videos