As a former teacher and someone who works in the field of education, I know how important it is to keep up-to-date on the latest trends. One of the perks of my job as Behrman House’s facilitator of social media is that I get to surf the web for interesting articles, blogs, tweets, and facebook posts. I’ve come across many terrific articles for teachers and educators in both the secular and Judaic realm and have kept a collection of these resources. I thought that you might enjoy them as well.
One of my favorite Jewish resources is www.G-dcast.com. This site gives a short (under 5 minutes) animated video on the weekly Torah portion. Each portion, or parashah, is narrated by a different person, providing a variety of Jewish thought (rabbis, educators, musicians, celebrities). I look forward to each video. I’m always wondering who is going to narrate it and what will it focus on. G-dcast reaches out to all Jews—reform, conservative, reconstructionist, orthodox—as long as the narrator provides interesting commentary. G-dcast even provides complimentary teaching guides for their videos, which adds to the value of the video. I’ve used these videos to expand my personal knowledge and also to share in class with elementary and middle school children. It’s a great way to use the computer in the class to begin discussing the weekly Torah portion.
I was reading some blogs on the Scholastic website and came across a great article about creating a folder for a substitute teacher (it’s the 2nd half of the article). There is also a page-by-page view of the substitute folder. As a former teacher (and substitute teacher) I thought this was a great resource for any teacher to create. It doesn’t have to be as complex as the sample, but would give any substitute teacher all of the information they might need to run a class. This is a great idea to build into your back-to-school planning.
I hope you find these resources useful. Keep checking back for new blogs (about every two weeks) with additional articles, websites, and other items of interest. Please email me with any comments. What are some of YOUR favorite sites?
Cheers!
Jess Gurtman
