A free giveaway of the History Channel’s documentary ‘Inside the Body of Henry VIII’ is available for teachers. The DVD explores life in Tudor Times and is aimed at upper KS2 children, although it also works well with secondary students.

Image – Henry VIII miniature

To receive your free copy, please email thepeoplespeak@iamtomorrow.co.uk by 17th July with ‘DVD King Henry Order’ in the subject line. Also include your name, school, school address, postcode and telephone number. Only 1000 copies are available and postage is free.

Twitter is an amazing way to discover new and interesting information. Here are links to some of the things that I have found recently:

• Design 2010 – An online exhibition celebrating the achievements of students in Design and Technology. Shared by Gareth Davies.
• Aviary Education – Aviary, who produce lots of fantastic online tools, are now offering a free service for education users. Shared by Paulo Simões.
• History Pin – A digital time machine that allows users to pin their own old photos onto modern Street View scenes. Shared by Claire Jones. Here’s a Youtube video which explains more:

• Diary of an Ofsted Inspection - Michael Shepherd recalls his recent experiences with Ofsted! Shared by Simon Haughton.
• Open ClipArt Library – An archive of clip art that can be used for free by anyone. Shared byProfteresa.
• Augmented Reality – If you’ve heard what augmented reality is, but you’re not quite sure what it does, watch this Youtube video, shared by CommonCraft:

What have you found on Twitter recently?

Image – Run!

Channel 4 have been busy working on a number of education projects with free resources for schools to use. The sites feature videos and games and are becoming popular with young people. They span a range of curriculum subjects and key stages (they are aimed at 10 – 19 years) and are all completely free.

Current projects include:

• ROUTES – A set of minigames, a documentary and a murder mystery which explore the fascinating world of genetics.
• Science of Scams – A set of 7 hoax videos which appear to demonstrate paranormal phenomena. However, they’re all based upon real scientific principles which cover physics, chemistry and psychology.
• Bow Street Runner – An interactive game which deals with the crime and history of London’s Covent Garden in the 1750s.

• Trafalgar Origins – Take control of a ship during the days of Nelson and Napoleon. Improve your crew and upgrade your ships using the prizes you plunder from enemy ships.
• 1066 Game – A historical game in which you get to control the English, Viking or Norman armies, with the aim of defeating the enemy by killing or scaring off as many as possible. Here’s a video which introduces the game:

• Battlefront – A look at campaigning, allowing people to get involved with (and set up) campaigns to improve the world.
• Smoke Screen Game - Smokescreen is a cutting-edge game about life online, on a new social network called White Smoke. Explore websites, search for clues, receive phone calls, chat on IM, and tackle puzzles and minigames. Learn how to stay safe online and deal with issues like cyber bullying and data privacy.

• Insider Job – An engaging look at careers, encouraging young people to find out about a range of jobs.
• Pressure Comics – Graphic novels which explore how two 19 year olds have set up a successful business.

StoryVault, which launches soon, is an online video library that allows people to upload – and preserve for future generations – their own remarkable stories and memories of friends and families. The site is aiming to become an invaluable resource for students of history all around the world.

The site has launched with over 250 diverse stories already saved for posterity. Celebrity followers include historian Dan Snow, comedian and Oxford History graduate Al Murray and clinical psychologist Professor Tanya Byron.

StoryVault encourages users to interview a friend or family member, usually on video, and to upload the content to the site. Content can either be marked as “private” so it’s accessible only for chosen friends or family, or it can be made available publicly.

www.storyvault.com

StoryVault also gives users the opportunity to store their memories as part of a family-tree. For instance, clicking on the name or picture of “Grandma” will immediately take the user to a set of all the clips of interviews she has given. This can then be shared on a personalised family tree with other family members, so they can add their own content – effectively capturing all the family’s important memories in one place. The structure of StoryVault’s family tree can also be used as an organiser for other groups of people such as clubs, society-members or companies.

Examples of some of the content on the site at the moment, includes:

• Former boss of Phonogram Records Tony Powell telling how his world was turned upside down when Bob Geldof came into his office one day and said “we’re going to make a charity record…..”
• In 1966 Derek Cattani was working as an FA photographer and had already spent a lot of time taking photos of the England World Cup Squad training in the run-up to the finals tournament. He recalls hanging out with the team in training and early matches and playing tennis with Geoff Hurst
• Henry William Allingham was born 6 June 1896 and was, at the age of 113 when he gave this interview, the oldest verified living man in the world. Allingham is the oldest ever surviving member of any of the British Armed Forces and the oldest surviving veteran of the First World War. He is the last survivor of the Battle of Jutland of 1916. Here he describes (as best he can!) his remaining memories of the Battle of Jutland (now deceased)
• Roger Fuller was a 30 year old constable with the Metropolitan Police at the time of the riots. In this interview he talks about events of April 1981 – the Brixton Riots and how the police tried to handle the situation.

How could you use this new resource in the classroom?

The Jewel of Muscat is a reconstruction of a 9th century trading ship that sailed the Maritime Silk Road from Arabia to China. The Jewel is currently recreating the spirit of naval adventure by sailing from Oman to Singapore. You can follow the journey of the ship and find out all about it’s creation on their website which has lots of videos, daily logs and photos from the ship, a real-time route map, and interactive games for children.

www.jewelofmuscat.tv

The site also features free lesson plans and fun class activities covering geography, history and technology for students aged 6-16 (appropriate for KS1, KS2 and KS3).

Heritage Key allows users to explore virtual reconstructions of great historical sites from around the world. At present, Heritage Key features a highly accurate 3D reconstruction of Stonehenge and the tomb of the Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun. The site also provides a wide range of educational resources and community tools for those interested in learning about history.

http://heritage-key.com

I’ve just spend some time wandering around the environments within Heritage Key and I’m impressed so far. It’s great to be able to walk (virtually) around these different locations, whilst learning the history behind them. This is something that could definitely be of great value in the classroom.

Percy Parker is a groovy grandad who has been popular in schools for many years now. He sings songs which help children to learn their times tables and there are some free downloads from Percy’s CD on Teaching Ideas.

Percy is now back with a brand new cross-curricular resource called ‘Percy Parker’s Flying Bathtub’. There are songs and resources covering a wide range of history, geography, science and other curriculum topics. If you’re studying the Tudors in class, for instance, there’s a fifteen-minute scene (including two songs) based on the Tudors that you can read through in your classroom and perhaps perform simply in an assembly. If another year group is studying Food Chains or Vikings or Outer Space, there are scenes for them too. And if you want to put on a full-scale school production, just put everyone’s scenes together and hey presto – a musical!

Andrew Holdsworth, the creator of Percy Parker, has kindly allowed me to have a look at the resource and I’m extremely impressed. It includes:

• A folder full of scripts, musical scores, lyrics, costume ideas, production and choreography advice. There is also background information about the curriculum area that each scene relates to.
• An audio CD containing all 15 tracks from the production (with and without vocals) as well as relevant sound effects which you can use.
• A CD-Rom with teaching ideas, choreography ideas, editable scripts, projectable backdrop images and lots more.

Percy Parker’s Flying Bathtub (Tudors to 20th Century) is available now here. Two other packs have also been produced:

• ‘Ancient History and Invaders’ will be available from May 2010.
• ‘Science and Nature’ will be available from September 2010.

FREE DOWNLOAD – You can also find out more at Teaching Ideas and get yourself an exclusive free download from the resource.

Here are details of two fantastic resources for those teaching Literacy / Music / History linked to the topic of Ancient Greece:

‘Heroes of Troy‘ is a music resource for school children aged 9 to 11 and offers 7 songs to learn, each linking to an episode of the Trojan War. The website is audio-based, but also includes Teachers’ Notes, words and music for the songs, backing tracks…and well-known music presenter David Grant is on hand to teach all of the songs.

www.bbc.co.uk/schools/troy/

It’s intended to target a range of music objectives at Key Stage 2 but also links to the history topic Ancient Greece while offering opportunities to link music with literacy and performance.

Winged Sandals offers animated versions of different Greek myths, along with games and other online activities to try. This has always been popular with children whenever I’ve used it at school.

www.wingedsandals.com

A new series of virtual field trips is being distributed over the Internet as video podcasts on the web site www.meetmeatthecorner.org. Each video is linked to fun websites and a Learning Corner of questions and extended activities. New episodes are uploaded every two weeks.

This week you can take virtual field trip to San Diego. The young host Robert interviews and tours the USS MIDWAY and learns what life was like aboard a city at sea.

Here in the UK, we have a special day this week. It’s on Thursday 5th November and it’s called Guy Fawkes Night, also known as Bonfire Night. Here are a selection of links that might be useful for schools who are celebrating the event.

Interactive Fireworks – This is a popular site which has been online for years. Just click on the screen to set off a firework! For best effect, show it on an interactive whiteboard with your classroom lights turned off and the volume turned up!

History of Bonfire Night – Some wonderful child-friendly information from Woodlands Junior School.

Welephant – This site tells the story of how Welephant and his friend Spikey enjoyed a safe bonfire night and firework display. It has many fire safety messages particularly to do with fireworks and the firework code.

Have a safe and enjoyable Fireworks night if you’re getting involved!