Middle+School+Links

This page is for links to websites that would help teachers (or students) in middle schools.

Altered Books Gallery: Examples of altered books that could be used for lesson ideas. http://karenswhimsy.com/altered-books/

FLIPBOOK!: Use this nifty web tool to make digital flipbooks online. http://www.fabrica.it/flipbook/index.php

History of Animation: Somewhat incomplete, but this still has some nice details. http://animation.filmtv.ucla.edu/program/anihist.html

History of Animation: Somewhat incomplete, but this still has some nice details. http://animation.filmtv.ucla.edu/program/anihist.html

History of Animation: Before Disney: A short illustrated article with some very useful vocabulary. I recommend you do google searches for the words "thaumatrope," "phenakistoscope," and "zeotrope." http://www-viz.tamu.edu/courses/viza615/97spring/pjames/history/main.html

How to make a concertina book: I first saw this project in room132.com's video podcast and was able to figure it's construction out then, but for anyone who hasn't been doing paper folding for over two decades this tutorial should help. http://lizplummer.com/blog/2005/12/20/how-to-make-a-concertina-book/

Jack and Beverly's Persistence of Vision: Lots of pictures of collectibles that use the principle of "persistence of vision" to create the illusion of movement. http://brightbytes.com/collection/per_vis.html

Lesson Plan: Focus Down Colored Pencil Drawing - Non-Objective Art: A lesson where students select a composition using a small viewfinder and enlarge it to a 10" circle. The result is somewhat abstract but still cool to look at. http://www.princetonol.com/groups/iad/lessons/middle/Andy-Circle.htm

NOVA: Watch NOVA programs for FREE. PBS rocks once again. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/programs.html

Room 132: "This is the classroom blog of room 132 where students post their work." Their teacher also has a cool weekly video blog on the site where he talks about what the kids are doing in his Language Arts and Visual Arts classes. ... Awesome stuff, I must say. http://www.room132.com/

SciQ - Science Revealed: Science themed video via RSS. It's even formatted for the iPod. http://www.sciencerevealed.com/

Twelve sided calendar: Everyone needs a 3d calendar, don't they? http://www.ii.uib.no/~arntzen/kalender/