SchoolNets and projects in other regions

For a more global view of online connections between schools, online materials for schools etc. and all the many activities that can be encompassed by the term "SchoolNet", check the links below.

4Kids.com
A fun, safe place for kids to be on the Internet, this is an excellent site providing links to sites for children organized by topic - entertainment, activities, reading, science, social studies and general study skills advice.

www.4Kids.org
Run by a team of educators, writers, artists, technology specialists and students, this site aims to pursue more effective ways of creating learning environments for all children regardless of gender, race, ethnicity or disability, particularly through advancing technologies such as the Internet. The interactive site includes top sites for kids, a discussion board on emotive issues in cyber-space, games, a question and answer function, and a handy guide on how to surf the web safely. As a recent addition, the site now offers its first “TechThis! Project”, offering a tutorial about seamless backgrounds.

abcteach – pre-primary
This site covers kids, parents, student teachers, and teachers. Focused at the elementary level, activities are offered in reading, comprehension, maths, writing, handwriting, as well as thematic units. Also housed here are research/reports, administrative extras and tools for teachers, fun activities, games, portfolio needs for students and teachers, a babysitting/Daycare section, online printable flash-cards, and on-line forum communities, including home schooling, student, teachers/new teachers, grade level specific forums amongst others.

Amazing Travel Bureau (National Geographic Society)
Drawing on the rich imaginations of kids, four inspiring characters and a dog take children through adventures though history, space and time, enriching the child’s knowledge of the world and beyond.

Blue Web’N
Blue Web'n is an online library of over 1800 outstanding Internet sites categorized by subject, grade level, and format (lessons, activities, projects, resources, references, & tools). You can search by grade level (Refined Search), broad subject area (Content Areas), or specific sub-categories (Subject Area). Focus is on online activities targeted at learners.

BrainPop
BrainPOP creates original animated movies focused towards K-12 students to explain concepts in a voice and visual style that is accessible, educational and entertaining. The movies demystify difficult concepts of Maths, Science, Health, Technology and English. Through their online subscription, Teachers can use movies to enhance traditional classroom learning and Parents are given a safe and informative resource for their children.

Canada's SchoolNet
This bilingual site offered in both English and French houses over 7,000 Learning Resources, @SchoolNet Today - a daily information news service on the world of e-learning, and interactive features, such as polls of the month. With the original mandate of working in partnership with the provincial and territorial governments, the educational community and the private sector to connect Canadian schools and libraries to the Internet by March 31, 1999, SchoolNet's has continued working with its partners to extend connectivity into the classrooms. As of May 2000, there were close to half a million connected computers in Canadian schools. To date, the SchoolNet web site links to more than 5,000 teacher approved learning resources, making it easier for Canadian teachers and students to access an immense source of online resources. Canada's SchoolNet is an integral part of Connecting Canadians, the Government of Canada's strategy to keep Canada among the leaders in connecting its citizens to the Internet. Programmes running under SchoolNet include:

• SchoolNet GrassRoots Programme
  This programme fully integrates ICTs in the classroom. Students gain essential ICT skills by working with their teachers to initiate, design and implement innovative collaborative learning projects that are showcased on the net. Funding is offered to schools that complete a project following certain guidelines, that ensure the projects are curriculum relevant, focus on learning activities carried out using the Internet and result in the creation of a website. SchoolNet Network of Innovative Schools (NIS)
  This is a unique project that recognizes schools using ICTs in meaningful and imaginative ways to improve learning. The Network helps to ensure students, educators and community members are prepared for the challenges and opportunities of ICT for learning. Over 100 schools have joined the Network since 1999. Members of NIS are strengthening the capacity for innovation through the integration of ICTs across the curriculum, research on the impacts of ICTs on learning and sharing of innovative practices for the use of ICTs in the classroom. SchoolNet News Network (SNN), and its French counterpart, Rédaction de Rescol (RDR) is a cyber-school for writers, aspiring journalists, a multimedia publishing and broadcasting forum for their stories and a resource centre for teachers. SNN is open to all K-12 students in Canada in both official languages. SchoolNet Support Parents (SSP) is a programme designed to encourage and support parent volunteers to become active in classroom Internet activities. SSP offers Internet training for parents while providing trained volunteers for schools at the same time.

Cyber school bus - UN global teaching and learning project
With content offered in English, Spanish, French, Russian, Chinese and Arabic, this is a truly international site. The site gives students a voice in global issues, facilitating an on-line global education community, while creating educational projects to show students that they have a role in finding solutions to global problems. High-quality teaching resources are also provided to a wide range of educators in a cost-effective manner. Within the Cyberschoolbus site there are a number of activities and projects that teach students about global issues in an interactive, engaging and fun way. Projects on the bus include:

• On the International Day of Peace, over 500 schools from 38 countries commemorated the day with a minute of silence and sent in two lines of poetry per school. The Schools Demining Schools project brought schools together around the issue of landmines. The Model UN Discussion Area attracts thousands of students who gather to discuss international issues, request information and exchange ideas. For the Health module, classes from around the world connected with each other on a discussion board to discuss, then define health, before getting together on-line to question experts about their concerns. The interactive database, InfoNation, is accessed by thousands of users monthly who pull up accurate official and up-to-date information and statistics regarding the countries of the world. Cities of Today, Cities of Tomorrow includes a comprehensive 6-unit teaching module on urban issues. In the annual game Professor's Postcards, students track our eccentric professor as she travels around UNESCO's World Heritage Sites and sends back picture postcards with clues of her whereabouts.

EUROPEAN COLLABORATIVE LEARNING NETWORK (ECOLE)
ECOLE is a thematic network funded by the European Commission in the frame of Comenius, the programme for School Education. The main goal of Comenius Networks is to create links between projects carried out by school partnerships and those relating to the training of school education staff. Comenius Networks are based on subjects of common interest with the aim of promoting European co-operation and innovation in school education in various thematic areas. ECOLE is devoted to ICT in Education and more specifically to Computer Supported Collaborative Learning; the network is a sister-network of ESP. Main aims are: developing content for collaborative learning and for teacher education, and to provide an advisory service for using advanced tools and electronic learning environments in the collaboration for learning.

ECOLE’s overall objective is that of creating a learning community of teachers and pupils within compulsory education involved in project-based learning experiences supported by the educational use of ICT. ECOLE BEST (Best Experiences for Students and Teachers) Club is a meeting point for teachers with valuable international project experience and those who are on their way to start cooperation on international level.
Also see: www.ecolenet.nl.

Education Planet
Education Planet's K-12 resource portal provides teachers, students and parents with convenient access to over 100,000 quality, teacher approved educational resources. Since its launch in July 1999, the site has become one of the leading K-12 educational resource portals on the Web, with over 3.5 million teachers, students and parents expected to log on this year.  The Education Planet portal has received the coveted "Editor's Pick" award from AOLSearch, the "Editor's Choice" award from Netscape NetCenter, and the "Most Popular Sites" award from Yahoo.  In addition, there are now over 100,000 Education Planet Members who receive Education Planet's weekly newsletter and other membership benefits.

• Homework Planet
  This site makes it easy for students to find great homework and research resources, tutoring services, reference tools, learning games, content experts, college info and more.

• Parents’ Site
  Links to top parents’ websites dealing with issues of health and safety on the Internet, materials to help teach their kids, and so on. Teacher Site
  Includes a searchable database of over 20,000 lesson plans, discussion boards and more for a small yearly subscription. Teacher Web Tools, a powerful suite of web-based (ASP) applications that make it easy for teachers to use the Internet for practical teacher tasks such as creating teacher and school sites, newsletters, assignments, lesson plans and even storing files online. Free trial available.

European SchoolNet
With content offered in German, English, Dutch, Spanish and French, European SchoolNet is an international partnership of more than 26 European Ministries of Education developing learning for schools, teachers and pupils across Europe. Insights into the educational use of ICTs in Europe are provided for policy-makers and education professionals through networks. The initiative involves a leading European education portal for teaching, learning, collaboration, and innovation; valuable information on policy, strategy and school practice for policy-makers and ICT advisors; and a fostering of technical innovation through common standards to enable closer collaboration and improve efficiency and cost-effectiveness.

• Through eSchoolNet, the portal offers teachers outstanding resources, discussions, news, classroom activities, collaborative tools, practice examples and training opportunities.
  Pan-European communities and networks, such as: Virtual School provides online learning resources, tips and activities in curriculum subjects; myEUROPE organises regular activities for schools with an interest in European citizenship, mobility, cultural diversity, and trans-European collaboration School Managers Centre encourages sharing experience in school leadership;
  For policy makers and education professionals, European SchoolNet offers a gateway to a wealth of information. Frequently updated News and reports on national policies, studies, analysis, resources, summaries and examples of practice in schools INSIGHT gives policy-makers reliable updates, analysis, research and statistics; dot.SAFE monitors and develops and current thinking for keeping children safe on the Internet.
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Exploratorium – the museum of science, art, and human perception
Online since 1993, the Exploratorium was one of the first science museums to build a site on the Web. The site now contains over 12,000 Web pages exploring hundreds of different topics, with seventeen million visitors a year, (tellingly, nearly twenty times the number of visitors who make it to the museum in San Francisco!)

• Tools for teachers
  The site contains instructions for over 500 simple experiments, as well as links to good sites and publications. There is also an online educators’ community, and information of professional development opportunities.
• In Webcasting, live video is broadcasted directly from the museum floor onto the Internet, providing access to special events, scientists, and other museum resources for audiences on the Web.

German SchoolNet
Schulen ans Netz e.V. [Schools online] was founded on 18 April 1996 with the initial goal of connecting 10,000 schools throughout Germany to the Internet within three years. A resounding success, the initiative has now ensured students in virtually all 34,000 general education and technical and vocational education and training (TVET) schools in the country now have access to the net. Together with numerous universities and education policymakers, the organisation develops innovative education models for the use of new media in schools.

Self-responsible teaching and learning using modern IT resources is supported via seminars, workshops and events and a range of web portals that are either open to the general public or reserved for specific groups.

• ITworks -  supports schools and school boards to develop service-reduced, reliable technical concepts of IT system solutions for schools´ needs. LeaNet and LizzyNet - are online services and communities especially for girls and women. Lehrer Online - is a topical online service for teachers in secondary and primary education including the latest news concerning educational matters as well as materials for teaching in almost all subjects. WebLOTSEN - are a mobile training team travelling to schools all over Germany in order to introduce teachers in the use of new media.  International Affairs Section - the organisation is active in numerous international networks and organisations, it plans and implements joint projects at international level and provides German school authorities with advice and information. lo-net, the lehrer-online network, is a working and learning platform created especially for the use in lessons, in teacher training and for the virtual cooperation of teachers in general. lo-net is free of charge and useful in the planning and realization of international projects. From October 2003 on lo-net will also be available in English, French and Spanish.

Global Classmates
Global Classmates is a collaborative learning programme to promote global citizenship among youth across borders and cultures. Programme activities are implemented through an integration of a password-protected "collaboratory" for each of the partner schools into the Global Classmates website, allowing teachers and students to interact, share, and exchange ideas online. The pilot year of the project was designed to explore the use of digital pictures and video recordings, e-mail, chat rooms, discussion lists, electronic document libraries, voice and web cam collaboration, as well as more traditional video conferencing technologies, to facilitate classroom-to-classroom interactions.

Global School Net
Global SchoolNet combines smart teaching ideas with web publishing, video conferencing and other online tools that bridge geographic gaps, allowing young people around the world to learn together. Global SchoolNet is a growing international network of 70,000+ online educators, who engage in online project-based learning activities. Since its inception, Global SchoolNet has reached more than a million students from 25,000 schools across 100 countries.

• The Global Schoolhouse
  With rich resources, including: Projects Registry - Clearinghouse of more than 900 online collaborative projects, organized by topic, grade, and project date. Cyberfair - An international challenge where students produce a web site that tells a story about how people or programs in their own local communities use education to help make the world better, friendlier or safer. Classroom Conferencing - Classroom conferencing uses video conferencing software, such as CU-SeeMe, NetMeeting and other programs, to connect communities, cultures, and classrooms. Professional Development for Teachers - Web resources for teachers as they implement their own professional-development programmes.

Imagiverse
With the core belief that imagination is the key to learning, Imagiverse seeks to inspire through interviews, activities, and link to rich resources:

• Real-Time Chats - Students can ask questions from experts and get answers back in "real-time” Robotics - Various robotics projects, interviews with individuals involved with robotics and much more. Educators' Discussion List - For educators and individuals who would like to share ideas about lesson plans, Imagiverse/Internet in the classroom, or schooling in general.  Ask the experts - Q&A by e-mail for kids of all ages to ask questions to experts on various subjects. 

Open School
Open School BC involves teachers, instructional designers, web developers and education specialists who work together to produce ready-to-use, K-12 courses and resources that meet BC Ministry of Education curriculum guidelines. Because materials are tested by teachers and students, the resources and courses linked to here are genuinely useful and relevant.

• The Learning Lab is an online training programme for educators, who want to upgrade your information technology skills and who want to learn more about integrating technology effectively into their professional practice. The Learning Lab offers a range of training modules and resources to help teachers integrate technology into the classroom, as well as interactive discussions. Community Learning Network a site designed to help K-12 teachers integrate technology into the classroom. Here you’ll find over 5,800 annotated links to educational sites with free resources, all organized by theme pages and keyword search.
  

National Geographic
The world’s largest nonprofit scientific and educational organization offers excellent sites for:

• Kids
  Content includes games, features on the secrets of nature, activities and experiments, “Creature Features”, clubs, resources and an online forum. Parents
  Covers issues pertinent for parents – safe surfing, helping guide there kids through online resources, advice on homework help, family travel planning, and fun and games for those never too old to play! Students
  Fact-filled features to help support kids in their homework, reports, presentations, or for their own curiosity under the main themes of animals, history/culture, maps/geography, photos/art, places and science/nature. Teachers
  A veritable mine of resources to help teachers teach, including online adventures, maps and geography, lesson plans, a teacher community – involving a newsletter, professional development opportunities, grants information and news – as well as an online store covering the latest in educational materials.

Nordic Schoolnet
Contact: Magnus Saemundsson, magnus.saemundsson@skolutveckling.se
The Nordic Schoolnet is a regional network and web site run by the Swedish National Agency for School Improvement on behalf of the Nordic Council of Ministers. The aim is to stimulate educational improvement and innovation through cooperation and exchange between schools in the Nordic countries, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden. The target group is teachers and pupils in primary, secondary and upper secondary education. The web site is run in three language versions: Scandinavian (a combination of material in Danish, Norwegian and Swedish), Finnish and English.

SchoolNet Africa
The African Education Knowledge Warehouse is a pan-African education portal which services African SchoolNet practitioners, policymakers and school-based communities on ICTs in education across Africa. SNA works with SchoolNet project leaders in the 30 African countries.

• Flagship Projects - aiming to sustain school networking activities and to promote education through ICT in African Schools SchoolNet Centre
  The African SchoolNet Centre collects and houses information on national SchoolNets in Africa and globally and provides space for networking and collaboration among SchoolNet practitioners. How To Start a SchoolNet - This resource is aimed at people developing and building a network of learners, and will take you through the process of starting a SchoolNet in Africa. Tools - our resources page focuses on offering access to a range of information and tools to enhance the implementation efforts of learners, educators, and SchoolNet practitioners, and serves as a source of content which is relevant to African learners and educators. Policy Centre
  Resources for ICT in Education policy-makers, mostly focused at Africa

SchoolNet Community of Iranian Schools
SchoolNet makes it possible for schools and cultural institutions to connect to the Internet. Moreover, the central intranet at SchoolNet facilitates their access to the educational resources on the web. To date, SchoolNet has helped to provide computer equipment and facilities for over 100 schools in the country, while developing a database for the educational and research institutions. Forums, a Web-design competition, online courses and hot links are all provided here.

School.Net – Educational Online Sources
Links to an extensive range of resources on the net, organised by target audience - teachers, students, parents and partners; and by subject area. There are also sections linking to online networks; special kinds of learning, including adult education; and extra-curricular activities.

SchoolNet Global
Half a million children around the world tell about their lives, families and communities making this the world's biggest children's contributory website, promoting intercultural understanding and language learning. The SchoolNet Global project started in 1998 in the UK. Since then over half a million young people, aged 4 to 18 have been involved. At the heart of SchoolNet Global are the highly motivating Global Curriculum Projects, which encourage children to work at home and school, collaboratively, with the guidance of their teachers, help from their parents, and the 5 Steps to Cyberspace. They write creatively about their own lives, their homes, their interests, their wild ideas, hopes and dreams and how they will make the world a better place. They can choose between 12 projects, all designed to help children build respect for themselves, their families, their communities and enhance their understanding of people of other generations, backgrounds and cultures.

SchoolNet Portal - Malta
Here are links to top online resources organised by subject area and divided into the Primary and Secondary Level. Maltese sites are also provided, as well as a School mail service for students, and links to Maltese School websites.

SchoolNet Namibia
SchoolNet Namibia is a nonprofit provider of Internet services, hardware and training to the nation's schools. Since February, 2000, close to 250 schools have received free hardware, free training on the Linux operating system and subsidized telephone service. Projects:

• The Impact of AIDS in Katutura – This prize-winning site details information on how people can prevent infection; how to take care of people who are infected; treatment; home basic care, and how risky it is; how costly the drugs are; and what the community has to say about HIV/AIDS.
• SchoolNet's Wireless project - A first for African SchoolNets, SchoolNet Namibia's ambitious and cutting edge wireless network is under construction. 45 data broadcasting towers, dozens of bridges, radio links and Internet connections will be erected, established and linked on a steady schedule right through to 2005.
• Domestic Violence Awareness Campaign - The Domestic Violence Advocacy Campaign (DVAC) is an initiative aimed at raising public awareness of domestic violence, particularly amongst young people in rural areas. Part of the campaign consists of radio and video productions in a range of indigenous languages and a mural-painting project involving school children in selected rural locations.

http://www.schoolnet.sc.ug/homepage.php

SchoolNet SA (South Africa)
SchoolNet South Africa assists learners, educators and decision-makers to achieve their potential - using ICTs towards a better quality and range of education for all learners. For maximum impact, SchoolNet SA develops programmes and partnerships in teacher development and capacity building, content management and development for schools. They offer many services to schools including Schoolmail, Internet connectivity, and a technical support centre. The site houses resources, links, news and events, project details and more. Contact: Rod Grewan, rod@schoolnet.org.za.

SchoolNet Uganda
SchoolNet Uganda is a national network of professional educators and schools whose vision is to transform the Ugandan educational system from an Industrial model (learning by assimilation) to a knowledge-based model to prepare the youth of Uganda to effectively enter a Global Economy based on Knowledge, Information and Technology. SchoolNet Uganda’s objective is to work in partnership with all Uganda educational institutions, whether public or private, primary, secondary or tertiary, to set up their ICT facilities and to develop the technical and pedagogical capacities necessary to use ICTs to enhance teaching and learning.

SchoolNet UK
SchoolNet is a collection of services, such as online forums, links, resources and software, set up to allow schools to offer pupils hands on experience of Internet technology in a group learning environment. Schools have unlimited space to publish their own publicity and information on the World Wide Web, enabling schools to use the Internet to communicate with current and future parents and pupils who are now, or soon will be, online at home. Pupils are able to use information sources from around the world to gather research for projects. They will also be able to communicate with other schools locally, nationally, and internationally, both through email and their own web sites.

SchoolWorld Internet Education
Established in 1996, the SchoolWorld Internet Education site offers opportunities for direct interaction with schools from around the world and provides a platform for using the Internet for educational enhancement. Schools and educators are actively encouraged to suggest and/or design programmes that will enhance classroom activities, and share them on the net.

• Resource centre for teachers with links to sites dealing with curriculum, professional development, lesson plans, technology, news and reviews and so on. Tek Teachers – A question/answer service, staffed by SchoolWorld teachers. Learning Innovations Center - provides insight into a number of innovative methods to enhance learning through technologies. Internet Projects - Designed and produced by SchoolWorld members and their collaborative partners, all projects are free and are designed for use by international schools.

SCIENCE AND ARTS FOUNDATION (IRAN, UK, US, Sweden, France)
Contact: Alireza Masrour, masrour@schoolnet.ir
The Science and Arts Foundation, or SAF, a non-governmental organization, was found in March of 1999 by Professor Abbas Edalat of London’s Imperial College with the aim to eliminate the gap in ICT between developed and developing nations. With the help of the foundation’s executive director in Iran, Dr. Yahya Tabesh, Director of Sharif University’s Computing Center, SAF set out to bring unprecedented change in Iran’s educational system through the introduction and development of ICT training. The chief project undertaken by SAF, with the cooperation of Tehran’s Sharif University of Technology, is entitled SchoolNet. The aim of the SchoolNet program is to connect Iranian schools and cultural centers to each other and, more importantly, to the global system of the Internet. To date, through the SchoolNet program, SAF has provided computer centers, Internet connection and ICT training to over 50,000 students and educators in over 150 educational facilities.

The Swedish SchoolNet
Swedish SchoolNet is a portal for schools, by schools, about schools, offering an extensive choice of services and information. The contents are selected and checked for both quality and functionality. The SchoolNet's content is structured by information and services of a more permanent nature and by themes, which are known as Theme Sites. The Schoolnet offers many different services, functioning as an information centre, a library and a news agency. Within the schools, the Schoolnet is also a useful forum for Internet communication and activities, enabling teachers and students to set up a network of contacts and initiate discussions with other teachers and students all over the world. In addition, the Schoolnet provides a platform for the development of the new educational approaches opened up by the Internet and new multimedia
technologies.

The Multilingual Learner Project - ELECT Best Global Website 2003
The Multilingual Learner website is an example of how to carry out cross-cultural online communication. The content has been targeted to meet the needs of the target users and is fully customised for them. The images
and the content are relevant to each locale and the design have been crafted to satisfy the local appeal of each group. The website is built by practicing teachers and at the moment represents more than 20 languages.

The Odyssey – World Trek for Service and Education
The Odyssey is an Internet-based non-profit, with the mission to promote global awareness among youth and involve them in activities to create positive change in the world. Their current major project, the World Trek, began in January of 1999 and takes students on an otherwise impossible field trip - a two-year Trek around the world. More than 1300 classes in over 80 countries are traveling the world via The Odyssey website, their connection to a Team of five educators doing a real two-year World Trek. The Team is visiting ten major non-western countries to document their histories and cultures : Guatemala, Peru, Zimbabwe, Mali, Egypt, Israel, Turkey, Iran, India, and China. The photos, video, audio, and text they capture are posted on the website twice a week for students to follow along, free of charge. Students can also interact with the Team and prominent local figures such as Nobel Peace Prize Laureates via chats, e-mail, polls, and discussion boards.

ThinkQuest
ThinkQuest Africa is a Pan African Programme that aims to promote a new style of learning and Internet-based education in Africa. It promotes adoption of methodologies and approaches that enhance the educational process using ICT to empower African youth to become critical learners, thinkers, and eventually future African leaders who will contribute to the development of their respective countries. TQA encourages collaboration among African learners in development of African educational content. It also promotes African languages on the Internet. ThinkQuest Programmes provide a highly motivating opportunity for students and educators to work collaboratively in teams to learn as they create web based learning materials and teach others.

The Globe Program
GLOBE is a worldwide hands-on, primary and secondary school-based education and science programme, where students take scientifically valid measurements and report their data through the Internet. They create maps and graphs on the free interactive Web site and collaborate with scientists and other GLOBE students around the world. For Teachers, GLOBE provides assistance through Training at professional development workshops, teacher's guides, continuing support from a Help Desk, scientists, and partners and contact with other teachers, students, and scientists worldwide. For International and U.S. Partners, GLOBE also runs Train-the-Trainer workshops and offers guidance and support for mentoring teachers.

UN CYBERSCHOOLBUS
Contact: Bill Yotive, Yotive@un.org
The United Nations Cyberschoolbus (http://www.cyberschoolbus.un.org) is an online education component whose mission is to promote education about international issues and the United Nations. The primary goals of this project are to build a global online community where teachers and students can share, provide opportunities for students to participate in finding solutions to global problems, and to make the issues the UN deals with more accessible to children and youth. The UN Cyberschoolbus is part of the Department of Public Information’s Outreach Division.