Student-Questioning Resource

I love me a good resource!  Not one that is hidden behind a lot of theory and data...just stuff you can use!  My friend @JohnMVenner retweeted this gem today.  Right now, my building is focusing heavily on questioning.  Not just teachers asking the right questions, but getting students to ask effective questions.  Here is a beautiful resource with graphic organizers and short descriptions for how to help students generate their own questions.  These particular examples are designed to use with newspapers, but these tools can certainly be fixed to fit all of your questioning activities.
Essential Question Resources

Google Differentiates!

If you go back and read my very first blog, you will find a super-ambitious goal that I set for myself...one post a day on this here blog.  So, 2 months and only 7 posts later. here we are.  Thank goodness @khornberger got me back on track.  How about a new goal?  2 per week?  That may be more realistic for now.  

So on to the post...

The trouble with setting students loose to do research on Google is that while it can be exciting, it can also be risky.  While I am all for free exploration, there are some difficulties that arise when a student is left to his or her own devices.  Of course there's the dreaded adult sites, ads, junk sites, and of course, long boring text without pictures...but what about sites that students just can't understand?  Or, what about sites that don't challenge those advanced readers? 

Google has managed to be awesome again.  Within their advanced search options, you can search by reading level!  I know this is nothing new, but it is worth mentioning. 

I have used this to differentiate reading material for students of different reading levels.  What's more impressive is when students use this search feature themselves and challenge themselves to intermediate or even advanced readings.   When you are entering your search fields, you can use the drop down menu to either choose a specific reading level, or you can choose for the search to specify the reading levels of the filtered resources.  This is something worth checking out when planning lessons, research projects, or directing the students to find resources for themselves.  

Gotta love Google!