Leagan gaeilge le fáil go luath
Useful Websites
The following websites may provide information regarding professional issues and/or information that may compliment classroom practice.
It is the responsibility of each individual teacher or school to determine whether the links provided are suitable for their school situation. The National Induction Programme for Teachers assumes no responsibility for the content of the sites listed below.
Government and Professional Bodies
www.education.ie – The Department of Education and Skills site contains information that is intended to assist in gaining an understanding of the work of the Department, as well as providing associated linkages to key agencies and bodies in the educational and scientific sectors. More information on the probationary process.
The Teaching Council website contains information on registration, on the codes of professional conduct for teachers, on teacher education and about all areas of the Teaching Council's work. Access the latest news stories, on-line publications and the Council's newsletter, Oide.
The Irish National Teachers Organisation site provides information relating to, working conditions, salaries, leave of absence, the structure and history of the organisation including details of member services and benefits, and educational issues in the Republic and Northern Ireland.
The Employee Assistance Service provides assistance to teachers who may be experiencing difficulties which are impacting on their performance in the classroom. The program being offered by VHI Corporate Solutions will incorporate confidential counselling on issues such as health, relationships, addictions, bereavement, stress, conflict, critical incident and trauma.
Professional Development Programmes
National Council for Curriculum and Assessment (NCCA)
Access the primary school curriculum online on the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment website. Get information on assessment, differentiation, teaching English as an additional language, ICT, inclusion and special educational needs. Check out the following links:
Assessment for Learning
Assessment Guidelines
Exceptionally Able Students – Draft Guidelines for Teachers
Sample activities and support material
Primary Development Service for Teachers (PDST)
Primary Development Service for Teachers website provides resources that support schools and teachers in implementing all subject areas of the curriculum. Get resources for Gaeilge, English, Maths, Science etc.
See Curriculum Glance Cards - one page overviews of the content objectives in each strand unit for each subject for all class levels.
Special Education Support Services (SESS)
Special Education Support Services website provides information about circulars, IEPs and general guidelines for teachers of students with general learning disabilities and continuing professional development in the area of special education. Check out the Classroom Resources section.
Education Centres
The education centres are a network of learning communities where teachers are empowered to achieve their full potential as professional educators and where other partners in the local school community are facilitated in meeting their training needs so that they can perform their roles effectively. The education centres support the in-service needs of local teachers, and provide a range of activities for the educational community. For details of your local centre, check out www.ateci.ie
Classroom Resources
General
Scoilnet is the education portal of the Department of Education and Science (DES) in Ireland. The website is managed on behalf of the DES by the National Centre for Technology in Education (NCTE). Resources are curriculum focused and have been selected and reviewed by curriculum specialists and teachers. Scoilnet actively promotes the integration of ICT in teaching and learning. Further information on supports and resources on integrating. See the most viewed resources.
Seomra Ranga has downloadable resources for the primary school classroom. The resources are arranged in accordance with the curriculum provisions of the Irish primary school. Check out the WABP section for resources regarding the writing process and get signs and posters. If you are interested in teaching tin whistle find resources for the teaching of music.
Sites for Teachers is a list of sites with resources for teachers- Lesson Plans, Worksheets, Activities, Clip Art and more.
Class Displays is a UK based site completely devoted to classroom displays. See displays for numeracy, literacy, history, geography, science, ICT, etc.
Teaching ideas is for teachers who teach children ages 5 to 11. It has been designed with UK curriculum in mind, all ideas can of course be used by teachers around the world. The ideas, activities and worksheets are organised according to subject areas. Check out the literacy area for ideas for a reading lesson.
Topmarks is one of the largest independent educational websites in the UK that aims to make it easy to find free educational resources on the world wide web for learning.
Primary Resources offers free lesson plans, activity ideas and resources for primary teachers and also classroom management aids.
LITERACY
The Woodlands Junior School website has large bank of interactive games and resources – great for lesson starters and revision.
Reading Rockets offers excellent Information and resources on how young kids learn to read, why so many struggle, and how caring adults can help. Check out the NQT section and the various articles on teaching reading.
MES English is mostly suitable for junior classes and offers free flashcards, worksheets, handouts and game cards to match, phonics materials, projects, games, and more all ready for printing.
BBC schools is a key educational tool that is free to all, which provides online learning, support and services to teachers and pupils from News to Music, Natural History to the Arts, Sport to Drama.
Starfall provides a free service to help teach children to read with phonics. The systematic phonics approach, in conjunction with phonemic awareness practice, is great for preschool, early years pupils, special education, homeschool, and English language development. On this site you will find online reading lessons. Very colourful and interactive for children. Check out the 'Alphabet' movie!
Busy teachers cafe is a resource site for busy teachers and educators. Here you will find resources, ideas, lessons, free printable and more.Check out the literacy strategies.
Adrian Bruce shares educational resources with the world- reading games, reading posters, maths games, phonics games, phonics posters, podcasting ideas etc. including a strategy for improving reading comprehension
Cbeebies is useful for junior classes. Check out the music and songs, stories and rhymes, fun and games section of this website.
Communication 4 All provides classroom resources to support children with SEN. The site has a large range of print and interactive materials supporting several curriculum areas including signing.
Literactive is the leading provider of reading material for early years pupils available online. The program is comprised of carefully levelled guided readers, comprehensive phonic activities and a wealth of supplemental reading material which gradually develop a child's reading skills in a sequential and enjoyable manner.
Writingforfun is an interactive writing help site that includes downloads to save for off-line use. Writing text types covered include reports, procedures, explanations, expositions (persuasion, point of view), discussions, narratives, recounts, descriptions, responses (inc. reviews), letters, invitations, news articles and emails. Poetry includes acrostic, ballad, cinquain, concrete or shape poetry, couplet, diamante, epitaph, free verse, haiku, limerick, ode, palindrome, quatrain, sonnet.
Cloze Maker helps you make cloze tests for your students. It's quick and easy to make your own cloze exercises using your own texts or texts from New English File.
E2BN is an excellent resource for making animated stories. Easy options to upload photos and add sound effects.
Kids Zone provides fun facts for kids, photos and printable activity worksheets. Suitable for pupils in junior cycle of school. Activities categorised according to American grading system.
Mrs Hurleys ESL is a fantastic site that covers a wide range of interactive games and resources. Excellent for pupils with EAL needs.
At ESL Printables English Language teachers exchange resources: worksheets, lesson plans, activities, etc. It has an ever increasing collection of resources for teachers.
NUMERACY
Maths is Fun is a site is aimed at basic math skills. However you will find some more complex stuff, and some easier bits. Hopefully there should be something for everybody.
ICT Games provides educational ICT activites linked to the English National Curriculum. These games are generally targeted at infant school teachers and parents of infant age children.
SEN Teachers has a huge bank of very useful Maths resources and printable materials for classroom use. Great for maths labels, flashcards and maths vocabulary.
Home School Math provides great ideas for homework projects. Good ideas for extending children at home. Useful for extending talented or gifted pupils.
BBC Skillswise site has a fun and interactive tool for teaching the times tables fun.
Crickle Web offers great resources for pupils in the senior primary cycle with a range of numeracy activities and games.
Sums Online is a very child friendly site with lots of fun maths activities. Targets pupils at all levels in the primary school and extends to cater for gifted and talented pupils.
Multiplication.com is very useful for teachers and provides a large bank of interactive multiplication games.
Interactive Maths is a great interactive site for home and school. Lots of interactive an fun games.
Cool Math 4 Kids has More math games, fun math lessons, puzzles and brain benders, flash cards for addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, geometry, etc
Primary Games is a super site created by a primary teacher for other primary teachers. Lots of online games for counting, addition , subtraction and money.
GAEILGE
www.cogg.ie - anseo tá áiseanna teagaisc agus foghlama i nGaeilge. Tá bunachar sonraí de na háiseanna atá ar fáil i nGaeilge agus don teagasc trí Ghaeilge sa Bhunscoil agus san Iarbhunscoil.
(Here you will find teaching and learning resources in Irish. There is a database of Irish language books and resources available for the teaching of and through Irish in Primary and Post-Primary schools.)
www.seomraranga.com - The aim of the Seomra Ranga website is to share practical ‘Gaeilge’ resources for the primary school classroom. The free to download resources provided on the site are made by teachers for teachers and so are very practical for classroom use. The resources are arranged in accordance with the curriculum provisions of the Irish primary school.
www.tobar.ie - Is suíomh é seo atá dírithe ar bhunmhúinteoirí chun cabhair a thabhairt dóibh ábhar teagaisc a aimsiú, a chruthú agus tairbhe a bhaint as áiseanna nuatheicneolaíochta sa seomra ranga agus i gcúrsaí oideachais i gcoitinne. Tá neart ábhar le fáil ar an suíomh seo atá feiliúnach don scoil
www.focal.ie - Is é seo an Bunachar Náisiúnta Téarmaíochta don Ghaeilge, arna fhorbairt ag Fiontar, DCU i gcomhar leis an gCoiste Téarmaíochta, Foras na Gaeilge. This is the National Terminology Database for Irish, developed by Fiontar, DCU in collaboration with An Coiste Téarmaíochta, Foras na Gaeilge. This is a great sight for translations and dictionary searches.
SCIENCE
Primary Science has activity sheets providing step by step instructions for fun science activities. Spend a rainy afternoon browsing some of the great Primary Science websites. Find out about Science Education projects and events taking place at a venue near you! This site is heavily linked to the Irish primary curriculum.
Sci-Spy is a science initiative aimed at primary school children in 5th and 6th class. It comprises 29 short TV programmes (each 6 minutes in length) and an interactive website with factsheets, interactive games, quizzes and experiment sheets on a huge range of science topics to show that science is all around us in our everyday lives!
Nature Grid is an easily accessible and child friendly site. It has great features for teaching the Natural Environments strand of the science curriculum.
CSI web adventure is a fun site for all your forensic enthusiasts in the class. This site is a fun and interactive site that brings science to life. Generally suited to the more senior classes of the primary classroom.
Science Bob has great ideas for your science week in school. A very useful questions and answers section and fun interactive experiments that you can use for demonstration purposes in your classroom.
Science Kids is the super site filled with lots information for pupils in science & technology. Pupils will enjoy the fun science experiments, cool facts, online games, free activities, ideas, lesson plans, photos, quizzes, videos & science fair projects.
BBC Science Clips has great science clips and fun interactive experiments that will compliment planning within the irish primary science curriculum. Check out a generous list of science websites for 4-11 year old students, including games and activities and resources for teachers and parents.
HISTORY
Ask about Ireland is a hive of information filled with great facts about Ireland. This site provides a huge archive of reading from Irelands publics libraries and museums. Great for research where pupils can discover explore and learn.
Scoilnet's Look at History section is a collaborative pilot project between the NCTE and RTÉ in which clips from media preserved by the RTÉ Archives may be of interest particularly to pupils in the senior cycle of the Irish primary curriculum. The RTÉ Archives preserve a unique and valuable record of Irish life as seen and heard through the media of television and radio.
Kidipede is a kids' encyclopaedia where you can find out about Ancient Greece or Ancient Egypt, or how
to make yogurt, or about why fires need air to burn. Kidipede will tell you who invented algebra, and what happens in the Iliad, and what Confucius said.
BBC History for Kids allows you to enter ancient worlds, meet famous people and discover fascinating facts by exploring a wide selection of historical games and activities.
Irish History Links is super Irish history website that will compliment any lesson relating to Ireland including comprehensive timelines, events, pictures and documents.
GEOGRAPHY
www.maps.google.com - Google Maps is a fantastic service that provides detailed and visually appealing street maps. Each map is easily panned and zoomed through mouse or keystrokes and the street names and road outlines are crisply displayed. Directions are clear and follow the roads in vivid lines
Google Earth lets you fly anywhere on Earth to view satellite imagery, maps, terrain, 3D buildings, from galaxies in outer space to the canyons of the ocean
Scoilnet maps page contains an excellent detailed map of the republic of Ireland. It contains great visual images of geographical features.
National Geographic Kids contains great quizzes and interactive lessons including videos that will really capture the pupils. Compliments the Natural Environments strand of the Irish Primary Curriculum.
Kids Geo is like an online geography textbook. Interactive activities, cross-curricular content , games and a super search facility.
MUSIC
SFS Kids is a really fun website that the pupils will enjoy. All strands of the Irish Primary Curriculum are covered on this site and is particularly useful for teaching the elements of music, a wide variety of instruments and notation.
Teaching Ideas music section is a great resources around teaching the listening and responding strand and also has some great resources for teaching the pupils about instruments, computation and notation.
BBC Schools Music section has great listening and responding activities. Great ideas for music lessons and also well linked to the Irish primary Music curriculum,
Sing Up is super for warm ups to music lessons. It also contains useful backing tracks for music compositions and a wide bank of songs.
DRAMA
Childdrama is a great website for helping teachers plan for and teach drama. It contains a wide bank of detailed lessons plans and rules for drama.
Drama Resource is is a super site for teaching the elements of drama through the story of the gruffalo. Useful methodologies used in lesson plans that can easily be transferred to teaching a variety of drama lesson.
Improv Encyclopaedia is one of the largest collection or resources for improvisation theatre on the web. Here you will find tons of stuff related to improvisation theatre including really useful ice-breakers, warm-ups and games.
Creative drama is a resource site for the teaching of drama. It contains lots of ideas for theatre and drama performances, warm-ups and games.
VISUAL ARTS
Iamanartist is a visual arts initiative aimed at primary school children. It comprises of 30 short TV programmes and an interactive website with factsheets, weblinks and interactive games on a wide range of visual arts topics.
Art Attack is a great website for teaching art lessons in step by step format. This site opvers all strands of the Visual Arts Curriculum.
Teacher Tap is filled with time saving resources. Lots of images and clip art features. Very useful search feature on this site.
Encyclopædia Britannica is a child friendly interactive encyclopaedia has a range of resources for teaching articstic concepts and the history of art including videos, images and audio. Lots of interesting articles available for reading also. Great for the art enthusiast in your class.
The Teacher's Guide has lots of art lesson ideas including full teacher lesson plans. This site has been created by teachers and has lots of create and different ideas to bring some exciting and diverse ideas to the classsroom.
Kinder Art is a great website with lots of art ideas. Useful for themed or seasonal lessons.
Get ideas for art lessons at Incredible ART.
Physical Education
The PDST Physical Education section contains a complete set of support materials for planning for PE lessons. Directly linked to the Irish Primary PE curriculum. Divided into strands so its easy to navigate through. Well presented and easy to follow.
Primary Resources is a great website filled with ideas for PE lessons including warm-up activies, dance & gymnastics, athletics, ball handling skills, outdoor and adventurous activities.
Teaching Ideas physical education section contains a large bank of resources for warm-up and cool down activities to incur[orate into your PE lessons.
PE Central has great ideas for teaching PE lessons to infants. These lesson ideas can offer a fun and dynamic element to PE lessons.
SPHE
Primary Resources has useful lesson ideas that compliment the Irish SPHE curriculum strands. Topics include All About Me, thinking of Others, Friendship & Relationships, Bullying & Discrimination, Making Choices & resolving conflict and may more…
Social Skills for Middle School Students is a comprehensive guide to teaching social skills to pupils in the primary school. This also a useful tool for teachers in providing an inclusive classroom environment for pupils with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties as well as other special needs.
SPECIAL EDUCATION
Irish Association of Teachers in Special Education is a forum for teachers who work in the area of special education. See links to other websites at www.iatse.ie
The
Reading Association of Ireland sute provides information on conferences, publications, teaching English as an additional language and reading ideas.
Mrs Hurleys ESL is a fantastic site that covers a wide range of interactive games and resources. Excellent for pupils with EAL needs.
SEN Teacher offers free teaching resources for special education
ICT
Take a look at the Mary Immaculate College website Teaching Practice section. Here you will find a list of search engines and online reference tools (dictionaries directories, encyclopaedias, conversion tools and more). There are images, sounds and video to add multimedia to your classroom activities and presentations. The is a list of resources sites and a list of online tools for making your own customised worksheets, wordsearches, puzzles, flashcards, etc. There are resources for your pupils too – online reference tools and a list of sites which are suitable for children's classroom use