A Guide to Online Educational Magazines for K – 12 Educators, Teachers, Parents and Students
A search of available educational magazines in the K – 12 area of interest yielded 12 online magazines on 8/28/06. What follows is a summary of each of these magazines and how they could benefit your family.
American School Board Journal – www.asbj.com
This publication offers articles informing the public concerning school board policy changes, management, a school student report card, and how the schools are doing in the area of leadership. The magazine features departments with articles telling their readership about current educational news, school law, research and new books. The issue online on August, 28, 2006 had a selection of articles about: “New strategies for helping all students learn”, and “Advancing student learning through school board leadership” as well as “U.S. Schools in facts and figures”. An interesting topic I found was “Food, fitness and learning for life – what your schools can do”. This publication is ideal for an overall view of schools and the leadership that makes that manages the staff and students.
Catalyst: Voices of Chicago School Reform – www.catalyst-chicago.org/
This publication though geared for the city of Chicago has a national perspective on what is happening in schools around the nation in relation to how the schools in Chicago measuring up. This is an independent news magazine writing on the issues that affect the schools in the Chicago area with the goal of school improvement. The goal is to educate and inform in a way that helps to “bridge the gap between parents, teachers, administrators, community activists and business leaders”. A noble educational purpose for any city. Links at the top of the page take readers to the following topics: Catalyst Guides, Chicago Public Schools, Research, Grants, Organizations, and Reform History.
The Catholic Teachers Gazette – www.e-ctg.co.uk/
This is a weekly publication with the main goal of listing job postings for teachers and other related occupations in the areas England and Wales locations. There is also a spot on the front page that features “Educational News Headlines”. Some of the articles listed on the day I landed on this page were: “Money ideas for children in care”, “Close Extremists Schools”, and “Drop in Student Loan ‘Bankrupts'”. During the school year apparently this publication also offers “initial teacher training”. This publication would be useful if you are living in or will be spending a portion of the school year in England or Wales.
The Concord Review – www.tcr.org/
This publication founded in 1987, seems to be centered on proclaiming and encouraging academic excellence in the area of secondary education by publishing the works of secondary students. According to the publication, the students can submit history papers and expect them to be evaluated by “independent academic expository writing standard endorsed by such colleges as Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, Yale, and many more”. You can find links to sample essays, an index for submissions from 1988 to 2005, as well as Reviews and letters. There is also a link to the $3,000 Emerson Prize, where winners are listed with the schools they attend and a link to their winning submission.
Education World – www.education-world.com/
This is a publication that I am familiar with as a homeschool parent. The publication is a cornucopia of educational resources for teachers and parents. The magazine also addresses current educational worldwide issues. Education World is both an online publication and a in print version. It would require that I take up an entire article to list and expound on all the topics covered in this publication. I will instead give you a brief outline of what you will find in this magazine. The links on the day I visited (8/28/06) were on the following topics: Lesson of the day, Survival kits, First year teachers, EDScoop of the day, site review, September 11, Grandparents Day, Urban Schools’ Advocate, Are Schools Safe, Tech LP – A spelling game, Tech Team, Publishing Student Work, The Principal Poet. There are also tons of links to Lesson Planning Resources and Professional Development Resources including an article library.
Electronic School – www.electronic-school.com/
This is an award winning technology magazine for K – 12 School Leaders. This magazine used to be available in print form and is currently only available online. This is an excellent archive of educational resources for educators and is updated from the American School Board Journal: NSBA’s monthly magazine. Links are provided to take readers to: Special Reports, Technology Focus, A search function and Archive, and School Board Corner. If you are a school leader, educator or teacher this is an excellent resource magazine. The technology Focus articles alone are worth the visit to this site.
E School News – www.eschoolnews.com/
This is a companion to “K-12 decision maker’s technology & Internet newspaper.” Here I found quite a few categories including: Searchable Archives to the magazine, current and past news issues, resources and services and sponsored white papers. This is an excellent place to search for educational articles as the magazine is broken into “centers” to aid in finding what you are looking for. The centers are: Educators Resource, Conference Information, Media Arts Resources, and Grants and funding. They suggest that you register on the site for full, free access to all the resources they provide.
From Now On – http://fromnowon.org/
This online magazine has been encouraging the exploration of new educational technologies since 1991. According to the publication, the purpose of this ezine is to make the argument “for increased commitment to professional development along with networks to support student exploration and reasoning.” Not only will readers find great educational articles but they will find poetry, cartoons, art and photography too. There is a subject index and a link to recently submitted articles that makes locating something of interest easy to do. This site also has a bookstore where authors’ works can be found. This is a site worth further exploration by this writer.
Kid’s Crosswords – www.kidcrosswords.com
This is a member site that offers tons of fun and learning for the K – 12 group and there is even a grown-up puzzle section. The site offers the following fun categories: Books and Book vocabulary lists, strategy games, animated dictionary, picture puzzles, screen savers and wallpaper, Kid outdoors, and a Electronic Classroom. The site comes in a Spanish version in edition to the English one. The educational value in this site is in the atmosphere of fun that is part of the draw of games and puzzles.
Schoolhouse – www.worldvillage.com/wv/school/html/school.htm
This online magazine offers reviews on educational software, articles, cartoons, links to other interesting educational sites, downloads and much more. This site is worth some time exploring especially if you use educational software as we do in our homeschool.
Teacher Magazine – http://tm.edweek.org/tm/
This is a fantastic resource for the issues and needs of teachers. This magazine also comes in a print version. I found the following categories in the online version: Web Watch, News and Developments, Research, Best Practices, Interview, Blogs, Ask the Mentor, News from Readers, and Interactive chat and chat achieve, and a community board. This is a very comprehensive site that has a pulse for education in the U.S.A. today.
4 Teachers – http://4teachers.org/
This online magazine has tools for teachers, Academic skillbuilders, Technology information, Professional development, and site of the week. This site not only gives information concerning new technologies in the field of education but also is a forum for teachers and educators to share with others in the field of education. There are web lessons and surveys available. Archives are linked for teachers to search past issues for more information. Information on this site is updated weekly.
My exploration of online educational magazines yielded many useful resources for educators, teachers, parents and students. I found many resources that help us understand how students learn and what will give them better tools to open the doors to their educational future. Many sites included articles, news stories, and a chance for students to show what they are achieving in the school environment. The magazines also gave us a look into the administrative responsibilities faced by those who steer our schools in the communities we live in. Several of the sites encouraged teachers to share their opinions and offered surveys, polls, and forums to discuss issues they faced in their classrooms. Quite a few sites included lesson planning and archived articles, and one had a chat and chat archive. Education is an important springboard for student success. These magazines provide a necessary avenue for educators, teachers, parents and students to find information that is not only relevant, but also current and up to date regarding technology, curriculum, and extra curricula activities. Other topics like school safety, academic achievement and teacher preparedness were headlined in the magazines I looked at. Online magazines, also called ezines, can be a great benefit to those who educate our children. Students can also find value in these online magazines for after school activities, for help with homework, or for fun with a learning twist. Homeschool families will also find many useful resources in online educational magazines. I hope this guide is beneficial to those who care about education. Education is the power that runs the minds of our nation. The Internet is rapidly becoming a useful resource for educators, teachers, parents and students.
