Ray of Sunshine #1 for these Dark Times...

Bored at home? Here is something that you can get lost in for hours on end.

Open Culture is a website dedicated to "bringing together high-quality cultural & educational media for the worldwide lifelong learning community. Web 2.0 has given us great amounts of intelligent audio and video. It's all free. It's all enriching. But it's also scattered across the web, and not easy to find. Our whole mission is to centralize this content, curate it, and give you access to this high quality content whenever and wherever you want it."

Here you will find free classes, ebooks, audiobooks, movies, language lessons, resources for kids, lectures and more!

Sounds like fun to us! Enjoy!

Tooting our own horn

Now I'm sure that everyone has written down their New Years Resolution and is well on their way to slowly but surely dwindling on the enthusiasm.

But if learning a new language was part of that list - Annville Free Library has a fun way to keep on top of that!

We have recently gotten Pronunciator.  This will help you study from your phone and computer.  It also allows you to download and print items out.  And the complete bright side is - it's completely free for you!

Learn languages you never dreamed of knowing.
Simply follow the link and it'll ask you to enter your library card number and it would be who of you to enter your email address (for your sanity sake).

See or call a librarian if you have any questions and we'll be happy to walk you through it.


LET THE LEARNING BEGIN!

Like Factoids? Like Fun Graphics? You'll Love This!

OnlineEducation is an interesting, albeit with somewhat mysterious origins, site that takes topics like A Day in the Internet and creates this:


Created by Online Education

There are other nifty topics like Videogame Statistics, Facts About Your Farts, What's Changed This Decade, Facts About Bottled Water & more. (FYI: some topics may be more edgy than others.)

You will also find some useful lists here such as 100 Free Tools to Write, Publish, & Promote Your Own Book and 100 Best Blogs For Homeschooling Moms (which also includes blogs by homeschooling Dads and kids plus lots of homeschooling resources).

This is what the Online Education folks have to say on their About page:
"Everyone has a natural curiosity, and we are here to give you a daily dose of wit, humor and knowledge to satisfy that urge. We cover all the bases of life that didn’t get a lot of attention at school."

By George, I think they've succeeded! Check it out!

Librarian Chick Rocks!

Ok, Peeps, here is a good-to-know-about site that lists "links to the best of the Internet's FREE resources for those with big brains and small pocketbooks!".

Librarian Chick

There are 28 categories (like Books/ Audiobooks, College/Student Loans, Foreign Language, Lectures/Speeches/Podcasts) with tons of free educational resources to check out so don't delay!

The brain behind this site is Stacy Reed who, in her free time, reviews software and websites for Tucows. She also runs a sister site on free and open source software, web applications & resources: FOSSwiki; a blog: She Dreams in Digital & more! (Wow!)

Gotta love folks who like to share, right?

Mind Your Manners @ the McCord Museum of Canadian History!

The McCord Museum of Canadian History in Montreal was founded in 1921, and embodies the vision of  passionate collector, David Ross McCord, whose abiding wish was to shed light on the history and cultures of his country and thus bring its people together.

Here you will find online exhibits, history online, thematic tours, educational resources and more!

The website of the McCord Museum is definitely worth a visit if you do nothing else but try the Mind Your Manners role playing game for the Victorian Era. (FYI: there is also one for the Roaring Twenties). 

 This online game has many delightful Monty Python-esque attributes. Be sure to have your sound on. (Miss Bun especially appreciated the fate of the lady who wore the wrong dress to the evening dinner at home.) The whole game is very amusing! And be sure to check out the other interactive games to be found on this interesting site. 

P.S. A "thank you kindly" to my sources in New Hampshire for alerting me to this site!