We have a new feature on http://www.infotopia.info.  Today, we added “Our Virtual Globe” on the lower left hand corner of the web site.  It will tell you where people live who are logged into Infotopia.  You can zoom into to see specific countries or you can zoom out to see the revolving globe.  How many continents and countries can you identify?  How many people are logged in at one time?  What is the most interesting place that you see?

Send your comments to  bell@infotopia.info

Have you ever clicked on About Photo on http://www.infotopia.info?  You can learn amazing things about the world we live in.  Today’s photo includes a mother and baby flying fox which are really giant fruit bats.  If you click on About Photo, you can see videos about these incredible giant fruit bats and see videos about their life in Australia.

Every day, there is a new public domain photo on Infotopia, and there is always something new to learn!

Send us your comments and feedback.

Do you students really know how to distinguish authorative, quality web sites from some of the slanted or really untrustworthy web sites for their research?  We have posted an original video called “It’s a Jungle Out There” on YouTube at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sKV0Hi47bhs

that can be used by librarians and/or teachers to teach students the eight critical attributes of a trustworthy, authoritative web site.  If you can’t used YouTube in your school district, I have also posted it at

http://www.infotopia.info/jungle_out_there.mov

so that you can download it and use it whenever you need it.  Finally, I posted the “video” as a PowerPoint, but the music doesn’t accompany the Powerpoint.  The advantage of the PowerPoint is that you can change the slides at your own pace.  It can be found at:

http://www.infotopia.info/jungle_out_there.htm

Feel free to share our first published video with your friends and colleagues.  You are also welcome to post the video on your own web site as long as you keep the attribution to the original creator (found on the last slides.)

Let us hear from you.  What kind of videos or PowerPoints would you like us to produce for your classes?  We are both certified classroom teachers with backgrounds in science and foreign languages, and we are certified professional librarians with experience ranging from K through college level.  Contact us at bell(at)infotopia.info

Have you subscribed to our Infotopia Newsletter yet?  Our newsletters are published in PDF format so they can be downloaded by all computers without worrying about software compatibility.  It is published monthly for K-12 students and teachers and has all sort of recommended teaching and learning web sites that are recommended each month.  Just go to

http://www.infotopia.info/newsletter.html

to find our newsletters.  If you prefer, you can send an email to bell(at)infotopia.info and we’ll send you an email each month as the new newsletter is being published.

http://www.infotopia.info/newsletter.html

Do you need some new ideas for great educational websites for your students?  Our January 2012 Infotopia newsletter has links to great websites as well as excellent teaching and learning ideas for students and teachers in grades K-12.  Just go to the following link to download the PDF.  Our newsletter is published monthly at:

http://www.infotopia.info/newsletter.html

If you’d like to subscribe to the newsletter, just send an email to bell@infotopia.info and we’ll put you on our monthly mailing list.

This afternoon, I was working on AcademicIndex.net, our college search engine and web directory, when I discovered a great new resource for teachers and college students.   Funded by a grant from the California State Library, it provides lists of books available on a variety of topics.  It can be found at:

http://openlibrary.org/

The exciting part of this web site is that many books are available for a free download as a PDF, ePub or in a Kindle version.

I was researching Thomas Jefferson, for example, and there are 928 works listed, with 156 ebooks published between 1792 and 2012. Many of the eBooks are available for free download.  What a great resource for students and teachers!

Another directory of free books is manybooks.net if you haven’t tried it yet.

If you received a new eReader as a present, be sure and check out a great web site–www.manybooks.net.  You can go through all the public domain FREE books that are available and select one that is compatible with your eReader.  You can search by author, title, genre, etc.  Then, select the type of file that you need.  Download the file to your computer and then transfer to your eReader.  For the Kindle, for example, you can email the file to your Kindle or you can connect the Kindle via USB and drag the file to your documents folder.

What a great way to read Jane Austen or Agatha Christie for free.  Try it out and let us know what you think.

Hello everyone.  I hope you had a great holiday with your family.  It seems everyone is getting e-readers.  Now, to figure out how to use them….that is the fun part.  Our local public library in McAllen, Texas now has Overdrive, and we can check out ebooks online.  One only needs a library card and a PIN and the rest can be done online.  Actually, you never have to go to the library again.  (What a terrible thing for a librarian to say.)

You can check online to see if your local public library has Overdrive or any access to free eBooks for check out.  You can go to http://search.overdrive.com/ to see if your public library has free books for you. Hint:  You might also check other public libraries close to you.  Some allow all residents of the state to check out books for free.

Next post—Exactly how easy is it to check out a book online????

Have a great New Year’s and be safe.

Have you checked out an eBook from your local public library yet?  I have been checking out books from the Philadelphia Public Library after joining for only $35 a year.  When I joined, I didn’t have access to free eBooks from my local public library.  I find that the Kindle books are the easiest to “download” because they use a system called “Whispernet” and download from the “cloud.”  That means you never have to connect your device directly to your computer.  The books get checked out from the public library and you are immediately switched over to Amazon.com.  At Amazon, you log in to the account that is connected to your device(s).  You are immediately asked if you want to download your book to your Kindle.  After a few seconds, the checked-out book is available on all devices where you have a Kindle app.  It only takes access to wireless Internet and the books are on all your devices.  I love it!  More later…….

Have you tried out Kidtopia.info yet?  Elementary students and their teachers all over the world are discovering that they can do basic research on Kidtopia and find relevant information at their grade level.  Kidtopia.info was created by Mike and Carole Bell, a husband-wife teacher/librarian team who have over 35 years of experience each.

Students love Google and Kidtopia is a custom safe-search engine powered by Google and customized by the Bell’s in that it only searches web sites recommended by teachers, librarians, and other educators.

Your comments and input are appreciated.  If you find a great web site that needs to be added, let us know and we’ll review it to be added to Kidtopia.info