Good sites for Schools
The ultimate list of free educational resources for parents Teachers will be administering their own homework over the next few weeks but it’s great to have extra tools available on laptops and iPads to keep children entertained. Most are free and are interactive and fun for children as well.
Seomra Ranga
Seomra Ranga was created by a Dublin primary school teacher in 2007 and features a range of free activities and resources, such as flashcards, poetry books, and educational bingo games.
www.seomraranga.com
Khan Academy
Khan Academy is an international website that is highly recommended by many teachers and parents. Courses are broken up into multiple subjects and classes, helping you to create a personalised educational course for your child.
www.khanacademy.org
Education.com
Education.com’s Learning Library contains a plethora of fun worksheets for primary level children, such as word searches, colouring books and writing exercises.
www.education.com/resources
RTÉ Learn
RTÉ Learn contains tonnes of different activities for children as well as access to episodes of last year’s Home School Hub.
www.rte.ie/learn
Maths
Top Marks
Top Marks splits activities into age groups and levels ranging from the ‘Teddy Numbers’ game that helps toddlers learn to count to two-minute subtraction challenges for older children.
www.topmarks.co.uk
Tablestest.com
Help your children learn their times tables by testing them on tablestest.com
www.tablestest.com
Prodigy.com
Kids can play the Prodigy maths game for free on prodigy.com to help them learn equations in a fun and interactive way.
www.prodigygame.com
SESE (History, Geography and Science)
National Geographic Kids
You can find interactive games, videos, and fact sheets about everything from animals to the world's wonders and climate change on National Geographic’s dedicated kids' website.
www.kids.nationalgeographic.com
BBC Teach
BBC Teach provides educational videos for children on topics ranging from nature to drama but teachers particularly like the website for its historical content.
www.bbc.co.uk/teac
Virtual exhibitions
Take your child on a virtual field trip with the National Museum of Ireland and London Zoo's free online exhibits.
NASA STEM Engagement
NASA has created a website dedicated to teaching children about science, technology, and space with tons of content for every age.
www.nasa.gov/stem
Ask About Ireland
Learn everything you need to know about Irish history and geography from Ask About Irelands’ learning zone. Content is filtered by class and subjects.
www.askaboutireland.ie
Teachers love the Séideán Sí website for extra Irish vocabulary lessons for kids. You can choose your dialect and child’s class to find specific games and activities.
www.seideansi.ie
Gaelige le Chéile
Gaelige le Chéile was created with the aim of making learning Irish fun and its resources are a great way to make Irish a part of children’s daily lives during lockdown.
www.gaeilgelecheile.weebly.com
Music and Art
Songs in Irish
Songs in Irish has over 600 Irish language songs in its online database with an English translation and Youtube link for each. Guitar chords are also provided for some songs.
www.songsinirish.com
Kidzbop
Kidzbop’s Youtube page has hundreds of dance and singalong videos for children.
www.youtube.com
Cbeebies
Cbeebies provides a host of quick and easy craft activities for kids on its website.
www.global.cbeebies.com/make-and-colour
Kids Activities Blog
Kidsactivitesblog.com is a godsend for parents looking for child-friendly activities. Check out the 5-minute craft and drama activity sections of the website.
www.kidsactivitiesblog.com
Red Ted Art
Look no further than Red Ted Art for all of your art class needs for children.
www.redtedart.com
English
Collins Connect
Access Collins’ reading resources and activities, no sign-up required, on the website’s school portal.
www.connect.collins.co.uk
Knoword
Knoword has classroom vocabulary games and quizzes on its website to help enhance students’ knowledge.
www.playknoword.com
Handwriting Practice
You can find worksheets to help students learning to write on handwritingpractice.net
Oxford Owl
Oxford Owl has an extensive free e-book library as well as reading activities for all ages and phonics lessons available on its website.
www.home.oxfordowl.co.uk
Audible Stories
For those who struggle to sit down and read a book, Amazon’s Audible platform has a library of free audiobooks of all genres and levels for kids available on its website and app.
www.stories.audible.com
SPHE and Wellness
Fitness coaches, such as Joe Wicks, are providing free PE classes online. Picture: Alex Livesey Danehouse, Getty Images.The Great Isolation Activity Book
The Irish created Great Isolation Activity Book can be downloaded and printed out for free online. The book contains pages of fun and creative activities for children as well as useful lessons in SPHE and wellbeing.
Access the pdf here.
PE videos
There are loads of videos online offering free PE lessons for children to make sure they stay active during lockdown. The teachers we spoke to particularly liked fitness guru The Body Coach Joe Wick’s PE videos which are aimed young students.
RTÉ Jr also started to create 10 minute PE videos for kids to help them stay active
Cooking for kids
Why not get your kids involved in the kitchen and teach them some easy (supervised) cooking recipes when they can’t face sitting in front of a screen anymore?
BBC goodfood has a section of recipes for children online and Cbeebies has created a Youtube playlist of instructional videos for young chefs.t.
Seomra Ranga
Seomra Ranga was created by a Dublin primary school teacher in 2007 and features a range of free activities and resources, such as flashcards, poetry books, and educational bingo games.
www.seomraranga.com
Khan Academy
Khan Academy is an international website that is highly recommended by many teachers and parents. Courses are broken up into multiple subjects and classes, helping you to create a personalised educational course for your child.
www.khanacademy.org
Education.com
Education.com’s Learning Library contains a plethora of fun worksheets for primary level children, such as word searches, colouring books and writing exercises.
www.education.com/resources
RTÉ Learn
RTÉ Learn contains tonnes of different activities for children as well as access to episodes of last year’s Home School Hub.
www.rte.ie/learn
Maths
Top Marks
Top Marks splits activities into age groups and levels ranging from the ‘Teddy Numbers’ game that helps toddlers learn to count to two-minute subtraction challenges for older children.
www.topmarks.co.uk
Tablestest.com
Help your children learn their times tables by testing them on tablestest.com
www.tablestest.com
Prodigy.com
Kids can play the Prodigy maths game for free on prodigy.com to help them learn equations in a fun and interactive way.
www.prodigygame.com
SESE (History, Geography and Science)
National Geographic Kids
You can find interactive games, videos, and fact sheets about everything from animals to the world's wonders and climate change on National Geographic’s dedicated kids' website.
www.kids.nationalgeographic.com
BBC Teach
BBC Teach provides educational videos for children on topics ranging from nature to drama but teachers particularly like the website for its historical content.
www.bbc.co.uk/teac
Virtual exhibitions
Take your child on a virtual field trip with the National Museum of Ireland and London Zoo's free online exhibits.
NASA STEM Engagement
NASA has created a website dedicated to teaching children about science, technology, and space with tons of content for every age.
www.nasa.gov/stem
Ask About Ireland
Learn everything you need to know about Irish history and geography from Ask About Irelands’ learning zone. Content is filtered by class and subjects.
www.askaboutireland.ie
Teachers love the Séideán Sí website for extra Irish vocabulary lessons for kids. You can choose your dialect and child’s class to find specific games and activities.
www.seideansi.ie
Gaelige le Chéile
Gaelige le Chéile was created with the aim of making learning Irish fun and its resources are a great way to make Irish a part of children’s daily lives during lockdown.
www.gaeilgelecheile.weebly.com
Music and Art
Songs in Irish
Songs in Irish has over 600 Irish language songs in its online database with an English translation and Youtube link for each. Guitar chords are also provided for some songs.
www.songsinirish.com
Kidzbop
Kidzbop’s Youtube page has hundreds of dance and singalong videos for children.
www.youtube.com
Cbeebies
Cbeebies provides a host of quick and easy craft activities for kids on its website.
www.global.cbeebies.com/make-and-colour
Kids Activities Blog
Kidsactivitesblog.com is a godsend for parents looking for child-friendly activities. Check out the 5-minute craft and drama activity sections of the website.
www.kidsactivitiesblog.com
Red Ted Art
Look no further than Red Ted Art for all of your art class needs for children.
www.redtedart.com
English
Collins Connect
Access Collins’ reading resources and activities, no sign-up required, on the website’s school portal.
www.connect.collins.co.uk
Knoword
Knoword has classroom vocabulary games and quizzes on its website to help enhance students’ knowledge.
www.playknoword.com
Handwriting Practice
You can find worksheets to help students learning to write on handwritingpractice.net
Oxford Owl
Oxford Owl has an extensive free e-book library as well as reading activities for all ages and phonics lessons available on its website.
www.home.oxfordowl.co.uk
Audible Stories
For those who struggle to sit down and read a book, Amazon’s Audible platform has a library of free audiobooks of all genres and levels for kids available on its website and app.
www.stories.audible.com
SPHE and Wellness
Fitness coaches, such as Joe Wicks, are providing free PE classes online. Picture: Alex Livesey Danehouse, Getty Images.The Great Isolation Activity Book
The Irish created Great Isolation Activity Book can be downloaded and printed out for free online. The book contains pages of fun and creative activities for children as well as useful lessons in SPHE and wellbeing.
Access the pdf here.
PE videos
There are loads of videos online offering free PE lessons for children to make sure they stay active during lockdown. The teachers we spoke to particularly liked fitness guru The Body Coach Joe Wick’s PE videos which are aimed young students.
RTÉ Jr also started to create 10 minute PE videos for kids to help them stay active
Cooking for kids
Why not get your kids involved in the kitchen and teach them some easy (supervised) cooking recipes when they can’t face sitting in front of a screen anymore?
BBC goodfood has a section of recipes for children online and Cbeebies has created a Youtube playlist of instructional videos for young chefs.t.
Library Links
A Message from Karen at the Library
Although Monaghan County Libraries have had to close their doors, rest assured we will continue to provide a service to children and their families through our Online Services. With this in mind, we are offering complimentary access to ‘TTRS - Touch-Type Read and Spell’. It has been described as “an excellent program in which you can work on spelling at the same time as learning to touch-type. It is particularly useful for those with dyslexia, DCD/dyspraxia, ASD, ADHD, or working memory and processing weaknesses. This is because it uses repetition and real words right from the start. There are no "finger-muddling" key combinations and it has an easy-to-use settings panel.”
You can learn more about the TTRS method at www.readandspell.com
In the past we were only offering this to children who had been referred to us however we have recently increased our number of user licenses significantly and are now in a position to offer it out more widely. There is absolutely no cost for any child using the program. We have paid for the Subscription on behalf of our users. If you have particular students who you feel would benefit from using this program whilst the school closures persist we can set up User accounts and send the information through the school or alternatively please feel free to circulate the attached flyer amongst the parents and they can contact me individually. I am happy for you to publish the flier on your schools website/social media if you see fit.
We have also put together a dedicated webpage for Home school supports which will be added to regularly. This can be viewed at www.monaghan.ie/library/homeschool
Finally, we continue to offer our suite of Online services which are available to anybody with a Library card. If you don’t have a Library card you can register online at https://lgma.iii.com/selfreg then contact your local library to activate the account for Online services.
Our current online resources include:
ALL OF THE ABOVE CAN BE ACCESS THROUGH www.monaghan.ie/library/onlineservices
If you have any questions relating to our online offerings please do get in touch.
Although Monaghan County Libraries have had to close their doors, rest assured we will continue to provide a service to children and their families through our Online Services. With this in mind, we are offering complimentary access to ‘TTRS - Touch-Type Read and Spell’. It has been described as “an excellent program in which you can work on spelling at the same time as learning to touch-type. It is particularly useful for those with dyslexia, DCD/dyspraxia, ASD, ADHD, or working memory and processing weaknesses. This is because it uses repetition and real words right from the start. There are no "finger-muddling" key combinations and it has an easy-to-use settings panel.”
You can learn more about the TTRS method at www.readandspell.com
In the past we were only offering this to children who had been referred to us however we have recently increased our number of user licenses significantly and are now in a position to offer it out more widely. There is absolutely no cost for any child using the program. We have paid for the Subscription on behalf of our users. If you have particular students who you feel would benefit from using this program whilst the school closures persist we can set up User accounts and send the information through the school or alternatively please feel free to circulate the attached flyer amongst the parents and they can contact me individually. I am happy for you to publish the flier on your schools website/social media if you see fit.
We have also put together a dedicated webpage for Home school supports which will be added to regularly. This can be viewed at www.monaghan.ie/library/homeschool
Finally, we continue to offer our suite of Online services which are available to anybody with a Library card. If you don’t have a Library card you can register online at https://lgma.iii.com/selfreg then contact your local library to activate the account for Online services.
Our current online resources include:
- ebooks & eAudiobooks available to download for free via our ‘Borrowbox’ app
- Newspapers & Children’s magazines available through PressReader app
- Magazines available through RB Digital app including computer & gaming magazines, cookery, health, current affairs, craft, entertainment etc so plenty of reading material for all interests!
- Over 500 online courses available through Universal Class
- Language Learning programmes available through Transparent languages (including Child Friendly courses)
ALL OF THE ABOVE CAN BE ACCESS THROUGH www.monaghan.ie/library/onlineservices
If you have any questions relating to our online offerings please do get in touch.