Totally 3rd Grade Blog

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I am absolutely giddy.  I recently discovered a cool new project developed by Google that essentially allows anybody to instantly translate text from one language to another.  It’s called Google Translate and it has the potential to revolutionize  teaching resources.

As an experiment, I copied the lyrics from the most popular song on this site, 50 States, and pasted them into Google Translate.  Then I hit “translate” and the entire lyric popped up in Spanish (the language I chose) so quickly that I didn’t realize at first that it was already finished.  No kidding, I hadn’t even taken my finger off the mouse before my Spanish translation was complete.

I immediately added the Spanish translation to the 50 states activities menu and am now asking for opinions about how well this thing works.  The Spanish version of the lyrics can be viewed by clicking here.

As cool as that is, there is one  feature that will be life-changing for a substantial number of students and teachers.  Instead of simply pasting text into the translator, you can also paste the URL of any website.  When you use the translator this way,  the entire website will automatically  be translated into your language of choice.  This is a real time-saver and it encourages additional reading exploration.

Imagine these 3 scenarios:

1. You discover that a particular website in India offers something relevant that your class would enjoy reading.  Simply enter their URL, select the language in which you’d prefer to read and start reading your translated version instantly.

2. You want to better help ESL students in your classroom so you, when necessary,  provide instructions  in their native language.

3. You could also use the tool to communicate in writing with non-English speaking  parents.  The potential is staggering.

If you’re personally web-savvy, Google also provides widget code so that you can make your own websites fully translatable.  I added the widget to this site right under the big pointing finger graphic.  Go give it a try.

What do you think; is this the coolest thing since sliced chleba or what?  (Chleba means bread in Czechoslovakian.  Go try it!)

Busy Teacher’s Cafe offers a free collection of themes, strategies and printables for reading, writing, language arts and math.

I was most impressed with the reading and writing resources.  For some reason these subjects don’t normally translate to worksheets very well, but Busy Teacher’s Cafe has done a fine job of creating and collecting really useful goods.

Since the site serves K-6, it’s also a good place to go if you have kids who are younger,  on IEPs or who have fallen behind for any reason.

It’s not quite as polished as Super Teacher Worksheets, but there is so much good stuff on the site that it’s definitely worth checking out.

Super Teacher Worksheets is one of the most complete, high quality collections of well thought-out worksheets that I’ve come across in a long time.  If that wasn’t enough, they’re also free!

Math, reading, writing, grammar, phonics, spelling, science and social studies worksheets are well organized, which means you won’t be wasting time trying to find what you want.  Each also comes with its own answer key.

Since there are numerous variations for each subject,  it should be easy to find the perfect way to present material to your students.

Here is a sample worksheet for counting coins. Clearly, these worksheets aren’t just thrown together. There is a lot of meat on these bones.

You simply must go check this out.  Now!