Hong Kong Home Page
http://www.info.gov.hk/index_e.htm

Go directly to this new government -- which was so much in the news last year -- to learn its story, as told by the leaders of Hong Kong. In the Chief Executive section, meet Mr. Tung Chee Hwa in his biodata and press releases, and study his policy agenda and speeches. This large Website as sixteen main sections, offers automatic uploading of press releases, and boasts new pages on the Quality Education Fund and on Customs and Excise. The amount of information on the site is enormous; probing it interactively is to explore in detail the policies, resources, and viewpoint of Hong Kong today. The material here is not presented by journalists or historians. A school theme based on this site is very close what a student could only get by crossing the Pacific Ocean to interview the political leaders. Until the advent of country homepages on the Internet, virtually no school student could have so directly studied or reported on a government. (4/16/98)

Virtual Engineering/Science Laboratory
http://www.jhu.edu/~virtlab/virtlab.html

Here are fully interactive experiments that can pour important foundations for beginning science students. There are eight experiments already, and more to come -- promised by John Hopkins University, where this Website originates. In the logic circuits experiment, there are problems to solve using binary logic elements with dragable graphic logic gates. Another experiment involves designing a bridge truss by specifying loadings and support nodes. The builders of this virtual laboratory seek to introduce students to experimentation, problem solving, data gathering, and scientific interpretation early on. High school seniors and college freshman doing these experiments online will gain practice traditionally postponed to college junior and senior design labs. (4/16/98)

The Mexican American War
http://sunsite.unam.mx/revistas/1847/Summa.html

Study here: 1. the Mexican American War, 2. the development of a Website, and 3. the cyberwork from a University in Mexico. Ole!. The Website is being developed by an independent research group of undergraduates and graduate students, some of whom work in academic areas at the University Nacional Autonoma de Mexico. It is beautiful, peppered with handsome illustrations in the Mexican mural genre. This is a fine place for a student to do factual research on the war. Although issues which remain divisive are dealt with, the authors are careful to explain their viewpoint and their effort to be balanced.

This is also a fascinating place for students of political and social history to dig much deeper. In the Documents and Testimonial section, for example, is President James Knox Polk's statement to Congress requesting a declaration of war, the decree which reestablished the Mexican Federation in 1846, and much more. Walt Whitman's commentary about the war is included, in Spanish, with this comment from the Mexican Website builders: "The best thing about this journal article of the great American poet is not his rhetoric... but that it shows how the United States must have been seen, in the nineteenth century, the same way a lot of people -- the best of their time, almost without exception -- saw France at the end of the eighteenth century and Russia at the beginning of the twentieth." [3/1/98]

Giza Plateau Mapping Project
http://www-oi.uchicago.edu/OI/PROJ/GIZ/Giza.html

Dedicated to research on the geology and topography of the Giza plateau, the construction and function of the Sphinx, the Great Pyramids and environs, this project reveals matters of age-old fascination, as these ancient monuments are probed by the wonders of post-modern technology.

To get oriented, the satellite image of the Giza area and a wireframe topography and rendered structures in plan view. To learn about the creation and future work associated with the Giza Plateau Computer Model, you can view, for example, a clay model of a Sphinx Temple Statue. The foot high statue was taken to the Biomedical Visualization Laboratory at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where a laser scan created an ASCII data file of some 70,000 discrete three-dimensional data points which precisely model its surface geometry. Several images that have been made from the scan can be viewed on the Website, including a wireframe model and various rendered isometric views.

There is also a background article on the location and importance of the pyramid settlement, accompanied by a drawing reconstructing the plateau during the building of the Great Pyramid. Estimates of the number of workmen range from Herodutus' 100,000 to the 20-30,000 figure given by modern Egyptologists. This Website reveals to the multitudes wonders wrought four millennia ago. [3/1/98]

Leonardo: Drawings of da Vinci
http://banzai.msi.umn.edu/leonardo/

The Renaissance classified drawing as a form of inquiry, and here we see why. Thumbnails of twenty-eight Leonardo drawings are displayed on the homepage -- with subject matter ranging from landscape, to engineering, to expression, to anatomy. A click on a thumbnail enlarges a drawing to allow magnified study of the master's unerring strokes. Further inquiry into the life and works of Leonardo is offered, as well. Surely Leonardo would have been among the geniuses of the past who would have most appreciated the renaissance of knowledge emerging from the Internet. We hail him here, and learn from him still. [3/1/98]

Military History Timeline
http://www.cfcsc.dnd.ca/links/milhist/index.html

Historical studies are accessed here along a timeline across the monitor screen, with wars ranging from the Pelopennesian to the Persian Gulf. Pick your battles: Norman Conquest, Boer War, Russian Revolution, or any of many more armed conflicts before, since, and between on the timeline. This sweeping Website from the Canadian Forces College is a prime example of the Internet top-down trend where experts in a knowledge area offer a center piece, from which the details radiate. Surrounding the clickable timeline on the homepage is access to aviation, biography, museums, naval history, weapons -- along with large sections on time periods and wars by name. Entering a topic page provides, again, useful choices. For example, under the Israel-Arab War of 1948-49 there are three offerings: a US Army handbook section on Israel: problems of the new state 1948-67; the personal narratives of a young warrior Elihu King; and a 4-section description of the Machal volunteers whose memorial is inscribed: "All those of valor shall pass armed among your brethren, and shall help them." Joshua 1:14. [2/23/98]

The Existentialists
http://Userzweb.lightspeed.net/~tameri/exist.html#people

This Website is a collection of biographies and commentaries on existentialism and related schools of philosophy. Ten key existentialists have descriptive pages: Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Husserl, Heidegger, Kafka, Sartre, de Beauvoir, Merleau-Ponty, Camus, and Jaspers. .The biographies and commentaries are concise and readable, and are each accompanied by a chronology and resources. There are related pages on religion, history and divisions in thought in the world of existentialism. The author and keeper of this excellent site comments: "I am intrigued by the individuals associated with the movement known as 'phenomenology' and 'existentialism' -- they are fascinating people who to this day remain influential." [2/23/98]

Word of the Day
http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/mwwod.pl

This is a vocabulary-building tool for those with a serious interest in high-end English vocabulary, and is part of the Merriam-Webster Website, where the company's new WWWebster Dictionary and Thesaurus can be used to look up words interactively. Commencing on January 1, 1998, the Mirriam Webster site is providing a challenging new word each day, complete with pronunciation, definitions, an example sentence, and a bit about the word's origin and history. You may visit the archive for past words. Students of language, writing, and expression will benefit from this daily dose of the best of English. That coloring your essays with words like umbra, doppelganger, pusillanimous, caitiff, and clarion will impress any English instructor is irrefragable. [2/23/98]

A Digitzed Library of Southern Literature: Beginnings to 1920
http://sunsite.unc.edu/docsouth/southlit.html

Something new under the Southern sun, this compilation began in 1995 when the late Dr. Robert Bain wrote to some fifty scholars throughout the United States to get their nominations for the ten most important works of Southern literature published before 1920. From that he compiled the core list of 100 texts for this project. In this brand new repository, texts are digitized and often accompanied by original illustrations. This is no dusty site for specialists. We find all the verses of The Star-Spangled Banner, works of Edgar Allan Poe, and Booker T. Washington -- and are reintroduced to many once popular writers who have been forgotten by the general reader. >From elementary school through college, this is a place in which to wander to become in touch with America's Southern heritage. Wrote Samuel Henry Dickson:

I SIGH for the land of the cypress and pine Where the jessmine blooms, and the gay woodbine; Where the moss droops low from the green oak tree, - Oh, that sun-bright land is the land for me!

ORB Online Encyclopedia for Medieval Studies
http://orb.rhodes.edu/index.html

Hats off to the Medievalists for cleaving through the Gordian knots on the Web and giving us a primere site with knowedge that is up front and manageable. "Setting Out on Orb" is the entrance page, which provides an interactive outline of topics and articles, laid out in chronological order. The highlighted subjects lead directly to new essays on matters Medieval. Many of the subjects are not yet highlighted because they await a submission from a top historian from the relevant field. In a lively academic area like this one, where new discoveries and ideas are galloping off in all directions, the introductory essays bring a student immediately up-to-date. The Internet frustration of being dissipated by multiplying links is reversed: summary first, with sources moving out from the knowledge. For example, the Anglo-Saxon essay in the "Before 1000" section already includes a scholar's paradise on Saint Bede the Venerable. There is a Bede biography revised most recently four months ago, along with a choice selection of other Bede reference, including the famous passage describing the flight of the sparrow and the conversion of the Northumbrians.

Core Documents of U.S. Democracy
http://www.access.gpo.gov/su_docs/dpos/coredocs.html

Here a new standard resource has been created for American history, political science, law, and economics. The Government Printing Office describes this as a core group of current and historical Government publications. Of course the Declaration of Independence and Constitution are here, but so are Congressional bills and the Congressional Record, Public Laws, the United States Code, Supreme Court Decisions since 1937, the Code of Federal Regulations, the Federal Register, the Budget of the United States Government, many Presidential documents, the Statistical Abstract of the United States, and economic reports. Found here is the Congressional Directory, whose updated annual publication was Once eagerly awaited. The now searchable Directory is revised online, and accompanied by this comment that reflects transforming times: "No printed counterpart will exist for these online publication revisions, but when a new printed publication is required, the process will be greatly simplified due to the existence of the updated versions."

Arctic Circle
http://www.lib.uconn.edu/ArcticCircle/index.html/

Glimpse here future poweof digital technologies to teach science in width, depth, color, and layers. There are materials here for younger students, but they are imbedded in analysis of icy Arctic science sufficient for the most sophisticated scholar. Created at the University of Connecticut from the ground up for cyberspace, Arctic Circle seeks to expand knowledge of the Circumpolar North to a wider audience of students, educators, policy makers, environmental planners and others. It presents three interrelated themes: natural resources; history and cultures; and, social equity and environmental justice. Travel here widely: to the Kola Science Centre in Russia; see an Icelandic slide show, and a map of Kalaalllit Nunaat (Greenland, with the old Danish names); and, study Alaska Pipeline issues. But don't miss also going deep into this Website. For example, in Water Flows to the Sea, learn that all water drains to the oceans, and see what Africa looks like with overlays of drainage and political boundaries. That leads to noticing a data issue in computer generation of maps, where land mass fades into ocean depths and political boundaries are fuzzy. Many of the articles continue to be under construction, reminding us we are present at the creation of Internet knowledge resources.

Southeast Asia Fire and Air Pollution
http://www.state.gov/www/global/global_issues/fires.html

The United States Department of State has assembled here a stunning resource for the study of environments, weather, and immediate challenges to our species and the natural world. State Department Press Statements and Fact Sheets introduce the site, which offers hundreds of photographic images of fires and weather from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric and fire maps from the Forest Service. Currently, one of the pages is tracking Hurricane Pauline, with statistics and images. This site is a rich reference for science departments at colleges and high schools, as a continually updated visual and factual source to inform opinion and assist study of fundamentally important issues.

The 50 States of the United States
http://www.scvol.com/States/

Open each of the United States to find key facts. This is an basic reference for civics classes and homework, with maps, land area, population, cities, the names of Congressional representatives, and more. This Web site will give younger students an excellent way to search for state birds, flowers and nicknames. Good practice studying with the Internet would be an assignment searching this site for Presidential birthplaces or dates of statehood. This is a genuine grassroots study site, because it offers way for students in a specific locale to study their own state or city.

Outline of American Literature
http://www.usia.gov/usa/oal/oaltoc.htm

Like a literary timeline, this site travels from Early American and Colonial American writing up to American prose since 1945. Each of the eight period sections has a list of authors, with a biography and summary of works. Here is a companion source for the bounty of full texts found on the Internet, providing background to the texts, their literary setting, and contemporary works. It is an fine tool for teaching and studying American literature, either as a whole or by period.

Encyclopedia of Chemistry
http://www.scimedia.com/chem-ed/scidex.htm

Study chemistry with this encyclopedia at hand and over 200 relevant concepts are a click away. Listed alphabetically, from absorption of light to X-ray photoelection spectroscopy, are definitions often accompanied by formulas and illustrations. The articles are hyperlinked to allow quick movement through related ideas. Maintained by Science Hypermedia, this source is a wonderful example of a fine Internet reference provided by a private company to scientists and students.

Outline of American Literature
http://www.usia.gov/usa/oal/oaltoc.htm

The United States Information Agency provides here an overview of American literature across the sweep of our country's history from the early Literature of Exploration to the New Regionalism of recent decades. Each of eight chapters is a superb essay setting out the major ideas and methods of a literary epoch, and each chapter concludes with a collection describing the lives and works of the major authors of the time. The outline could serve well as the structure for a college course, an introduction for a high school class to American writers, and a summary and reference for students and teachers of American literature

Maps of Jerusalem
http://www1.huji.ac.il/jeru/maps_index.html

As the Internet is transformed from essentially a text medium to an ever more powerful graphic one, treasures of visual knowledge pour forth. This site is a perfect example. Examine, in this collection, an 1865 map drawn by British Soldier, Captain C. Wilson, whose work was the basis of all other maps made of Jerusalem until World War I, when the city was photographed from the air. From the Madaba Mosaic Map, one can display on the monitor screen a handsome color picture of the Jerusalem created in tile about 565 AD. There are printed maps beginning from the 14th century. The site is a fascinating study source for students of history, religion, cartography, geography, archeology, and art.

University of Virginia Hypertext Collection
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/hypertex.html

Great for book reports! Pick a book off this shelf and you get not only the full text and original illustrations, but sources, contemporary reviews, literary attributions, and much more. Tom Sawyer, for example, has an article called "Getting Tom to Market" describing Mark Twain's adventures of writing, rewriting and marketing the classic -- and you can also do a word search of this and other Twain books. There are already 36 hypertexts here in this growing collection of American literary treasures, including: The Oregon Trail, The Federalist Papers, Walden, Slave Narratives, and de Tocqueville's Democracy in America.

Environment Australia
http://www.biodiversity.environment.gov.au/

There is enough material on this site for an A+ high school science report, or to launch a master's thesis. This is just one of the flood of new super-informative sites about countries, sponsored by their governments. This one by the Biodiversity Group in Australia is a fine example. Delve into the regionalization of Australia, where attention is being focused on summarizing patterns, aggregating information, and allocating resources for and priorities in nature conservation. This site is not necessarily designed for children, but it is a superb discovery for budding young scientists. The Bird and Bat Banding section is a primer for this activity, in which young people can be introduced to conservation. There are many engaging small articles on animals, plants, and other subjects -- like the essay where we learn that Little Penguins usually live less than five years, but one was known to have lived eighteen.

International Space Station
http://station.nasa.gov/

Orbiting in cyberspace, the International Space Station site is counting down the launches, scheduled to begin in June, for the assembly of the station in space during the next five years. This constantly up-dated NASA site tracks the stages of an actual historic and scientific event, offering a student or classes a multifaceted project with onboard high quality resources. Follow the news, meet the crews, and send in comments. >From the science pages draw on detailed material for the major areas of research associated with the Space Station: life sciences, earth science, space science, microgravity, engineering and space product development. The Website is an exciting, enriching NASA mission which students may join.