August 1998	EDO-IR-98-05

An Introduction to Internet Resources for K-12 Educators
Part I: Information Resources, Update 1998

by:
Nancy A. Morgan, updated by Steven Batovsky

The Internet is an international computer network composed of thousands of smaller networks. Recently, through state and regional education networks and commercial providers, the vast resources of the Internet are increasingly available to administrators, school library media specialists, and classroom teachers. This Digest lists a sample of no cost Internet resources of special interest to K-12 educators. Readers should be aware that the resources and their Internet addresses below are subject to change.

• The Argus Clearinghouse: A large collection of guides to Internet resources categorized by topic.
  • http://www.clearinghouse.net/

• AskERIC InfoGuides: Topical guides to Internet, ERIC, and print resources.
  • http://www.askeric.org/Virtual/InfoGuides/

• The AskERIC Virtual Library contains hundreds of lesson plans, including, but not limited to, language arts, mathematics, social studies, and science. Also included are lesson plans from School Library Media Activities Monthly, Newton's Apple Educators Guides, and Crossroads: K16 American History Curriculum.
  • http://www.askeric.org/Virtual/Lessons/

• The Gateway to Educational Materials (GEM) is a "virtual card catalog" to lesson plans, activities, project, and curriculum found all over the Internet.
  • http://www.thegateway.org

• IECC-Intercultural E-mail Classroom Connections maintains a suite of listservs that facilitate international and cross-cultural classroom exchanges via e-mail over the Internet. Archives and general information can be found on the St. Olaf's WWW server.
  • http://www.stolaf.edu/network/iecc/

Many schools which provide Internet access to students and staff have created policies and agreements for the appropriate use of Internet accounts. Samples of agreements, policies and opinion pieces have been collected at:

• Armadillo's WWW Server.
  • http://chico.rice.edu/armadillo/Rice/Resources/acceptable.html

• The National Center for Technology Planning collects technology plans and makes them freely available over the Internet. Guidebooks and articles for developing technology plans are also included.
  • http://www.nctp.com/

Examples of telecommunication projects that incorporate the use of the Internet in the classroom can be found on the following sites:

• Global SchoolNet Foundation: Internet Projects Registry Archive Service:
  • http://www.gsn.org/project/index.html

• Pitsco Online Collaborative Projects:
  • http://www.pitsco.com/pitsco/collab.html

• U.S. Department of Education Grants & Contracts Information: Includes current grant application announcements.
  • http://gcs.ed.gov/ Select "Grants Information"

• Foundation Center: Provides a searchable database of funding activities as well as links to private or corporate foundations' Web sites.
  • http://fdncenter.org/

• E-Rate Hotline: The E-Rate Hotline provides answers to questions about how the universal service program works, how you can take advantage of the discounts and which services are covered.
  • http://www.eratehotline.org/

• Louisiana State University Libraries U.S. Federal Government Agencies Page:
  • http://www.lib.lsu.edu/gov/fedgov.html

• The Federal Web Locator, from the Villanova Center for Information Law and Policy.
  • http://www.law.vill.edu/fed-agency/fedwebloc.html

• FedWorld Information Network
  • http://www.fedworld.gov/

The following sites provide links to the State Education Departments:

• U.S. Department of Education Links and Addresses of State Education Agencies
  • http://www.ed.gov/Programs/bastmp/SEA.htm

• Links to State Education Agencies from The Council of Chief State School Officers
  • http://develop.ccsso.cybercentral.com/seamenu.htm

• The Mid-Continental Regional Educational Laboratory (McREL) is recognized for its work in standards-based education. This Web site includes several full-text online resources that will assist educators to develop their own standards based curriculum.
  • http://www.mcrel.org/standards/

• The Libraries of Purdue University: The Virtual Reference Desk: An extensive collection of online ready reference resources, such as dictionaries, thesauri, phone books and zip codes.
  • http://thorplus.lib.purdue.edu/reference/index.html

• Internet Public Library Reference Center: Another excellent collection of reference sources, also allows patrons to ask reference questions through e-mail or on the Web.
  • http://www.ipl.org/ref/

• webCATS, from the University of Saskatchewan Libraries is a directory of library catalogs which can be searched via the Web. webCATS is organized for searching geographically, by type of library, and by library catalog vendor.
  • http://www.lights.com/webcats/

• Library of Congress: Provides access to the holdings of the Library of Congress, U.S. Government copyright files, federal legislation, foreign law, and gateway access to many other library catalogs.
  • http://lcweb.loc.gov/catalog/

Hundreds of resources covering almost every subject imaginable exist on the Internet. Here are some additional ones that would be of special interest to K-12 educators.

• ACCESS ERIC: Gateway to the Internet sites of the Educational Resources Information Center (ERIC).
  • http://www.aspensys.com/eric/index.html
• Consortium for School Networking (CoSN):
  • http://www.cosn.org/
• Education World: A searchable database of 50,000 education links for teachers, parents, and students. Includes lesson plans, education news, an educators forum, and more.
  • http://www.education-world.com/
• NASA Spacelink: Information about NASA, including the space shuttle program, and science curriculum activities.
  • http://spacelink.nasa.gov/.index.html
• Roadmap: An Internet Training Workshop.
  • http://netsquirrel.com/roadmap96/index.html
• Web 66: A K-12 WWW Project from the University of Minnesota.
  • http://web66.coled.umn.edu/
• Yahoo: A hierarchical subject-oriented catalog for the World Wide Web and Internet.
  http://www.yahoo.com/

AskERIC Toolbox: Favorite resources of AskERIC's Question-Answering service: http://www.askeric.org/Qa/Toolbox/

Junion-Metz, G. (1996). K-12 resources on the Internet: An instructional guide. Internet workshop series, number 5. San Carlos, CA: Library Solutions Press. (ISBN-1-882208-14-5). (ED 389 316)

K-12 computer networking. (1995). The ERIC Review, 4(1). (ED 392 413)

Lankes, R. D. (1996). Bread and butter of the Internet. ERIC Digest. Syracuse, NY: ERIC Clearinghouse on Information & Technology. (ED 402 925, IR-97-02)

Miller, E. B. (1996). The Internet resource directory for K-12 teachers and librarians, 95/96 edition. Englewood, CO: Libraries Unlimited, Inc. (ISBN-1-56308-366-3). (ED 389 330)

Serim, F. & Koch, M. (1996). NetLearning: Why teachers use the Internet. Sebastopol, CA: Songline Studios, Inc. and O'Reilly & Associates, Inc. (ED 396 700)

Tennant, R. (1996). Internet basics: Update 1996. ERIC Digest. Syracuse, NY: ERIC Clearinghouse on Information & Technology. (ED 392 466)

Valauskas, E. J. & Ertel, M. (1996). The Internet for teachers and school library media specialists: Today's applications, tomorrow's prospects. New York: Neal-Schuman Publishers, Inc. (ISBN-1-55570-239-2). (ED 395 594)

ERIC Clearinghouse on Information & Technology, 4-194 Center for Science & Technology, Syracuse University, Syracuse, NY. 13244-4100; (315) 443-3640; FAX (315) 443-5448; e-mail: eric@ericir.syr.edu

This publication was prepared with funding from the Office of Educational Research and Improvement, U.S. Department of Education under contract no.RR93002009. The opinions expressed in this report do not necessarily reflect the positions of OERI or ED.

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