Educational websites can be a great resource to supplement a child's academic progress. Most of the sites in this article provide numerous free material and worksheets ranging from language development, reading, math skills, Montessori material, art, free high-tech educational video games, and state standards support for preschoolers through eighth grade.
Starfall was developed by Stephen Schutz who was a struggling reader at the age of nine. Now Schutz has a PhD in physics and is a successful publisher and artist. Starfall offers a variety of phonetic and reading activities to develop phonemic awareness and literacy. Starfall offers a download center for printable worksheets to support online activities. Starfall is guaranteed to keep children entertained and engaged.
First School, KidZone, Coloring and DLTK-Teach offers a variety of printable worksheets for early childhood education. Supporting topics include: monthly themes, phonics, letters, numbers, colors, shapes, mini-books, thematic units, geography, science, lesson plans, and art and crafts. These free sites offer great resources for early childhood educators, home-schooled families, childcare providers, after school programs, or parents wishing to provide academic support.
Educators and parents will find Artists Helping Children to be the online go-to place for arts and crafts projects. Activities include: painting, origami, drawing, recyclable crafts, themed-art, recipe book making, coloring pages and murals. Artists Helping Children not only provides arts and crafts projects and ideas, it offers ideas and suggestions for educators and parents who would like to get children involved in community service, charities and volunteering to help other less fortunate children.
Montessori Print Shop and Montessori for Everyone are reasonably priced sites that offers material support for the Montessori classroom. Material purchased is available for immediate download on a PDF file. These sites are recommended for Montessori educators or Montessori homeschooled families. All Montessori subject areas are available for purchase for academic support. This is a great resource for price conscious Montessori educators working at building their personal repertoire of material. Some limited material is offered for free on these websites.
Enchanted Learning offers material that can be easily adapted for the Montessori classroom and for parents at home. Printable activities include: geography, math, language, literacy, music, foreign language and artists. Some printable material is offered for free; however, a yearly subscription is required to have full access to the site and to print without ads. The $20 price is worth the wealth of resources Enchanted Learning provides.
Educators and parents looking to support children in meeting state standards may find IXL and Headsprout to be ideal resources in providing that support. IXL and Headsprout are fee subscriber websites, but are worth the price for the results they produce. IXL offers math support for preschool through the eighth grade. State listings are provided on the home page. The monthly cost is approximately $10 per month or $80 annually. Headsprout offers reading and comprehension support with its engaging activities and adorable characters that children will grow affectionately fond of. Headsprout offers the first three lessons for free as a trial. Average cost for the online program that provides additional material is approximately $200.
Last but not least, and a must see site is Timez Attack created by Big Brainz. Timez Attack is a high-tech video game that teaches multiplication and division math facts. In December 2011, Big Brainz will be releasing the high-tech video game version for addition and subtraction facts. This incredible website is offered to educators and parents for free and is being implemented in schools in over 200 countries.
