RefDesk.com: This site
bills itself as "the single best source for facts." It offers just
about everything you can imagine in the world of reference.
Lesson Plans for all Subjects
New York
Times Learning Network: Offers pre-constructed lessons for all
topics in grades 3-12; very easy to search, updated regularly. Explore
this site and you'll save yourself a lot of work! http://www.nytimes.com/learning/index.html
Gateways
American Memory
from the Library of Congress: American Memory is a gateway to rich
primary source materials relating to the history and culture of the
United States. The site offers more than 7 million digital items from
more than 100 historical collections.
NetLingo Dictionary of Internet Terms:
NetLingo is a dictionary of Internet terms containing thousands of
words and definitions that describe the online world of business,
technology and communication.
The Gateway to
Educational Materials: "The Gateway to Educational Materials is a
Consortium effort to provide educators with quick and easy access to
thousands of educational resources found on various federal, state,
university, non-profit, and commercial Internet sites. GEM is sponsored
by the U.S. Department of Education. Teachers, parents, administrators
can search or browse The GatewaySM and find thousands of high quality
educational materials, including lesson plans, activities, and projects
from over 320 of the 438 GEM Consortium members."
Today in
History: Offers three ways to view the 365 pages in the Today in
History archive. Visit Today in History every day to see updated
versions of these archived pages.
On
This Day: This New York Times site lists significant historical
events that have occurred "On This Day" for every day of the year.
Enlargeable graphics, too.
Almanac of Disasters:
Disasters categoried by type and date, complete with discriptions and
some graphics.
Information Please: "Find
answers to your questions in this wide ranging reference work, which
includes an almanac, encyclopedia, and dictionary-- plus lots more."
--Peter Milbury, Chico High School
Biographical Dictionary:
"This dictionary covers more than 28,000 notable men and women who have
shaped our world from ancient times to the present day."
yourDictionary.com: A
dictionary/thesaurus search engine that links to many other online
dictionaries for other languages.
Cambridge Dictionaries Online:
Combines three Cambridge dictionaries--International Dictionary of
English, Dictionary of American English, and the Learner's
Dictionary--into one easy-to-use word definition search engine.
Encyclopedia of Western signs and
ideograms: "SYMBOLS.com contains more than 2,500 Western signs,
arranged into 54 groups according to their graphic characteristics. In
1,600 articles their histories, uses, and meanings are thoroughly
discussed. The signs range from ideograms carved in mammoth teeth by
Cro-Magnon men to hobo signs and subway graffiti."
Columbia Encyclopedia, 6th
Edition, 2001: Containing nearly 51,000 entries (marshalling six
and one-half million words on a vast range of topics), and with more
than 80,000 hypertext cross-references, the current Sixth Edition is
among the most complete and up-to-date encyclopediæ ever produced.
Glossaries
NetLingo Dictionary of Internet Words:
NetLingo is a dictionary of Internet terms containing thousands of
words and definitions that describe the online world of business,
technology and communication.
Sports Glossaries:
Just click on a sport--ice hockey, football, basketball, or soccer--for
definitions of its most important terms and phrases.
The Acronym Database: An
acronym "is a special type of abbreviation, made up from the initial
letters of the words of a phrase, like FBI for Federal Bureau of
Investigation (the word acronym itself comes from the Greek for ‘head’
and ‘name’). Modern acronyms sometimes also use capitalised letters
from the middle of a word as well, like XML for eXtensible Markup
Language." Search here for explanations of hard-to-figure-out acronyms.
Acronym Search: Go
here if you're wondering what an acronym (a sequence of letters that
stand for the entire phrase) stands for; for example, this website will
tell you that "CIA" stands for Central Intelligence Agency."
Greek Mythology:
Includes origins of Greek mythology, Greek names vs. Roman names, Greek
mythology immortals, more.
Chiefs
of State: Searchable index of chiefs of state and cabinet members
of foreign governments. Compiled by the CIA.
Cliche Finder: Have you
been searching for just the right cliché to use? Are you
searching for a cliché using the word "cat" or "day" but haven't
been able to come up with one? Just enter any words in the search
engine and it will return any clichés which use that phrase.
Over 3300 cliches indexed.
The CIA for Kids:
All about the CIA, designed especially for kids with fun-filled links
such as "Try a Disguise" and "Break the Code."
Diversity Calendar: This
website tells what months and days are important from four
perspectivies: ethnic, National Holiday, religious, and other. A quick
way to find out why a particular month or day is important to various
peoples/ethnicities.
Ethnologue: Languages of
the World: A searchable index of a huge variety of languages across
the globe. For each language entry, its alternate names, number of
speakers, location, dialects, linguistic affiliation, multilingualism
of speakers, availability of the Bible, and other demographic and
sociolinguistic information is given if known. The information is given
in concise form rather than in detail because of limited space.
How far is it? This service
uses data from the US Census and a supplementary list of cities around
the world to find the latitude and longitude of two places, and then
calculates the distance between them (as the crow flies). It also
provides a map showing the two places, using the Xerox PARC Map Server.
World Flag Database: Searchable
index of most--if not all--of the flags of the world, complete with
valuable country information.
Atlapedia Online:
Contains full color physical and political maps as well as key facts
and statistics on countries of the world.
American Memory
from the
Library of Congress: American Memory is a gateway to rich primary
source materials relating to the history and culture of the United
States. The site offers more than 7 million digital items from more
than 100 historical collections.
Primary Sources
National Archives and
Records Administration: NARA, an independent Federal agency, is
America's national recordkeeper. Our mission is to ensure ready access
to the essential evidence that documents the rights of American
citizens, the actions of Federal officials, and the national
experience. We strive to make it easy for citizens to access these
records anywhere at anytime, and we hope that by providing electronic
public access to more and more of our records and services, we will
better meet your records and information needs.
NAIL
Digital Images Search: Search the National Archives quickly and
easily with this powerful search engine.
SunSITE Digital
Collection: The Berkeley Digital Library SunSITE builds digital
collections and services while providing information and support to
digital library developers worldwide. Offers a plethora of valuable
digitized primary sources.
California Heritage
Collection: The California Heritage Collection is an online archive
of more than 30,000 images illustrating California's history and
culture, from the collections of the Bancroft Library at the University
of California, Berkeley. Selected from nearly two hundred individual
collections, this unique resource uses the latest online archiving
techniques to highlight the rich themes of California's history. The
California Heritage Collection is part of the Online Archive of
California, a compilation of finding aids, or guides, to archival
collections at more than 30 institutions.
Making of America: Making of
America (MOA) is a digital library of primary sources in American
social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction. The
collection is particularly strong in the subject areas of education,
psychology, American history, sociology, religion, and science and
technology. The collection currently contains approximately 8,500 books
and 50,000 journal articles with 19th century imprints.
Documenting the American South:
DAS is an electronic collection sponsored by the Academic Affairs
Library at the University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill, provides access to digitized primary materials that offer
Southern perspectives on American history and culture. It supplies
teachers, students, and researchers at every educational level with a
wide array of titles they can use for reference, studying, teaching,
and research. Currently, DAS includes six digitization projects: slave
narratives, first-person narratives, Southern literature, Confederate
imprints, materials related to the church in the black community, and
North Carolina.
Repositories
of Primary Sources: A listing of over 4900 websites describing
holdings of manuscripts, archives, rare books, historical photographs,
and other primary sources for the research scholar. All links have been
tested for correctness and appropriateness. Those added within the last
thirty days or so are marked {New}.
Online Archive of California: A
core component of the California Digital Library, the Online Archive of
California (OAC) is a digital information resource that facilitates and
provides access to materials such as manuscripts, photographs, and
works of art held in libraries, museums, archives, and other
institutions across California. he OAC includes a single, searchable
database of "finding aids" to primary sources and their digital
facsimiles. Primary sources include letters, diaries, manuscripts,
legal and financial records, photographs and other pictorial items,
maps, architectural and engineering records, artwork, scientific
logbooks, electronic records, sound recordings, oral histories
artifacts and ephemera.
Primary
Sources: Second to None on the Web: Article written by Chico High
School Librarian Peter Milbury about what primary sources are, where to
find them on the Web, and why teachers shoulld be using them.
Web Searching
and Researching: Compiled by Chico High School librarian and school
website guru Peter Milbury. Logically arranged and user friendly.
From Now On: The online journal by
Jamie McKenzie devoted to educational technology for engaged learning
and literacy.
Communication Information
Sources: "This document [website] has been known worldwide as "The
December List" since 1992 and is a comprehensive collection of
information sources about computer-mediated communication and the
Internet. A popular resource for Internet trainers and students to
learn about the Internet, it is updated continuously. This document
remains one of the most widely known Internet reference documents ever
created."
Origin of
the Internet: Provides a text-only, concise, easy-to-read history
of the Internet. Very good background information.
NetLingo Dictionary of Internet Words:
NetLingo is a dictionary of Internet terms containing thousands of
words and definitions that describe the online world of business,
technology and communication.
Free
File Hosting: Connects you to the Yahoo directory of free file
hosting services. Files stored on the Web allow access from anywhere
there's a computer with Internet connection.
Teachers.Net Website Handbook:
"This manual was written for one purpose - to help teachers like you to
master web page authoring in as short a time as possible. If you read
it from end to end, and bookmark a few essential links, you will find
yourself well equipped to create masterful web pages in no time at all.
This manual benefits from my hard-fought battle to master the most
basic concepts of web-site management, and assembles these in a simple
to read book you can download and store on your desktop."
Web Page
Development: From Chico High School's Peter Milbury, a compilation
of helpful websites to help webpage designers of any level do a better
job. Includes tutorials on how to use Netscape Composer. (Back to Top)