There is so much available on line. During the Christmas break at the Eclectic Homeschool Online, we thought we’d give you some starting points for your own explorations. Some of these sites are kid ready while others provide resources that you can use to supplement your own lessons or units.

BioWorksU
BioWorksU is a virtual environment where you can learn about exciting careers in biotechnology and health care. The goal of BioWorksU is to get young people—from 4th grade to young adults—interested in these growing industries. Along the way, BioWorksU also teaches important lessons in science, math, and more.

NIH Curriculum Supplements
The NIH Curriculum Supplement Series are interactive teaching units that combine cutting-edge science research discoveries from the National Institutes of Health, one of the world's foremost medical research centers, with state-of-the-art instructional materials. Each supplement is a teacher’s guide to two weeks’ of lessons on science and human health. Multimedia activities can be done online or you can download them.

Ancient Mesopotamia: This History, Our History
Ancient Mesopotamia: This History, Our History was developed in collaboration with a team of Chicago Public School teachers. They selected key artifacts from the Oriental Institute Museum’s Mesopotamian collection to create a Learning Collection for this project. These artifacts shed light on many aspects of the everyday lives of the people who lived long ago in the area now called Iraq.

With this resource, teachers and students are able to examine artifacts up close and use the teacher-developed questions to drive individual research or classroom discussions. Students can also go on a virtual archaeological dig in Iraq and examine an online collection of significant artifacts from the Oriental Institute Museum with the interactive Dig into History. Finally, for teachers who wish to learn more about Mesopotamia and earn graduate credit, the Oriental Institute Museum offers an in-depth eight-week Online Course.

Historic Maps in K-12 Classrooms
Inside are high quality images of historic map documents that illustrate the geographical dimensions of American history. Each map is accompanied by lesson plans written for four grade levels and designed to support a variety of social studies, history, and geography curricula.

Portals to the World
Portals to the World contain selective links providing authoritative, in-depth information about the nations and other areas of the world. They are arranged by country or area with the links for each sorted into a wide range of broad categories. Area Specialists and other Library staff using Library of Congress selection criteria selected the links. When completed, the project will include all the nations of the world.

Calendars Through the Ages
History and FAQ's of calendars, from ancient Rome to outer space, including Julian, Gregorian, Jewish, Islamic, Chinese, and Mayan.

Federal Court Concepts
The federal courts are the third branch of the government of the United States of America, and may be the least understood of the three branches. Most Americans are familiar with the White House and the Congress, but are less familiar with the Supreme Court and the many lower federal courts nationwide. While courts occasionally make news with landmark rulings or through decisions in interesting cases, they tend to be less visible than other government entities.

Ology
OLogy, the Museum's Web site for kids ages seven through twelve, is based on the premise that "everyone wants to know something," and is designed as a place for kids to explore, ask questions, get answers, meet OLogists, play games, and see what other kids are interested in.

With age-appropriate content in archaeology, astronomy, biodiversity, genetics, marine biology, paleontology, and physical science, OLogy makes science learning rich and engaging. Educators can find suggestions and tips on how to use the OLogy Web site in the Educator's Guides.

Teacher’s Domain
Teachers' Domain resource collections constitute an extensive digital library of multimedia resources for K-12 teachers and students. You can find resources through subject, topic, and subtopic menus, filtered by grade level of interest, or search by keyword, grade, media type, or subject. You can use resources to creatively supplement your existing curriculum or follow more prescribed Teachers' Domain lesson plans. All resources and lesson plans are correlated to national and state standards.

Get Smarter
Free and interactive site to compare math & science achievement against students worldwide. ILN provides a voluntary, no-risk self-assessment with international benchmarks, and learning opportunities with hints and links to help you get smarter.

Practical Uses of Math and Science
PUMAS (poo' · mas) -- is a collection of one-page examples of how math and science topics taught in K-12 classes can be used in interesting settings, including everyday life. The examples are written primarily by scientists and engineers, and are available to teachers, students, and other interested parties via the PUMAS Web Site. Our goal is to capture, for the benefit of pre-college education, the flavor of the vast experience that working scientists have with interesting and practical uses of math and science.