PBS Teachers Connect, K-12

PBS Teachers Connect is a free Web portal that provides teachers, school teacher librarians, technology coordinators, early childhood educators and other education professionals with opportunities to share ideas, collaborate and support the effective use of instructional technology and multimedia to enhance student learning. Users create profiles, select avatars and tell other members how they are using digital media, and the questions they may have about it, in the K-12 setting.

Educators can search more than 3,000 standards-based classroom activities, lesson plans, interactive resources and other materials on the PBS Teachers Web site, then easily bookmark, annotate, share and manage their tagged content within the PBS Teachers Connect community. The community features a personalized homepage for each user, enhanced user profiles, a searchable database of resources and community members, bookmarking tools and discussion threads. By customizing their homepage, users will receive local PBS station and event schedules, in addition to local educational resources. Additional online components, such as private messaging, community feeds, friend feeds, online events, and a digital media gallery, will be available this fall. According to a PBS statement, "The power of Web 2.0 technologies, such as blogs, wikis and forums, enables educators to grow their network exponentially, connecting with teachers across the United States and around the world. Social networking in education opens doors to an unprecedented array of learning opportunities in an environment where educators often feel freer to express themselves, share their ideas and be catalysts for change." To access this Web portal, go to http://www.pbs.org/teachers/connect/