The Scout Report -- Volume 26, Number 20

The Scout Report -- Volume 26, Number 20
May 29, 2020
Volume 26, Number 20

Best of 2019-2020

The Internet Scout staff takes pride in providing links to some of the best online resources in our weekly Scout Report. Although all of the resources we cover are valuable, inevitably some stand out from the pack. Each May, we collaborate to compile an annual "Best of" issue in order to share some of our favorite resources from the past academic year. Creating this list is never easy as the interest of our staff varies as much as our readers. We selected these ten sites based on a variety of criteria, including design, content, and creativity. As always, we also considered the websites that were most popular with our readers.

We hope you enjoy this list and take a few minutes to revisit some of our favorite sites from 2019-2020. We look forward to providing new batches of fantastic resources throughout the upcoming year.

Staff Picks

Theme: Reader Favorites

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Staff Picks

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Refugee Flow
Social studies

Many of our favorite resources this year combined data visualization, statistics, and storytelling to create projects that are equal parts attractive and informative. Refugee Flow, a site using interactive technology as a vessel for increased understanding and action surrounding migration and refugees, fits this bill. The site's ability to humanize statistics, along with its stunning visuals, brought it to the top of our list.

Refugee Flow is an interactive data visualization project that "examines one of the direct fundamental causes of the global refugee crisis, the collapse of order and stability in today's international landscape." On the main screen, featuring a striking 3D globe, visitors can explore the locations and fatality counts of armed conflicts worldwide for the years 2010-2018, with the ability to filter by region and quarter. This screen also provides a graph of total asylum applications from the region and year being viewed. Under the project's Route tab, visitors will find mapped representations of migrants' causes of death and injury along regional migration routes, accompanied by text and graphs summarizing each region's refugee situation, country-specific information on illegal border crossings, and links to data sources. This ongoing project integrates data from multiple sources, including the UNHCR Population Statistics Database and Armed Conflict Location & Event Data, to visualize "the impact conflict, persecution, and violence has on the lives of persons in their home countries and communities." Launched in July 2018, Refugee Flow was co-created by Will Su, a data visualization designer and coder, and Abin Abraham, a Web Development Coordinator at the United Nations Global Compact.

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Disability Visibility Project
Social studies

Award-winning activist Alice Wong created the Disability Visibility Project (DVP) to uplift narratives from "the perspective of disabled people." DVP's diverse voices and media forms (including oral histories, blog posts, and podcast episodes) stood out as accessible, engaging, and exemplary sources of stories and information. Since we featured this resource in June, DVP has continued to add to its wealth of offerings, including timely podcasts episodes (covering "Coronavirus and Caregiving" and "Coronavirus and Disaster Planning") and grant opportunities for disabled writers.

Founded in 2014 by disability rights activist Alice Wong, a medical sociologist by training, the Disability Visibility Project is "a community partnership with StoryCorps and an online community dedicated to creating, sharing, and amplifying disability media and culture." Visitors to this project will find excerpts from dozens of oral history interviews discussing different aspects of the lives and everyday experiences of people with disabilities. These interviews are organized alphabetically by the interviewees' last name and each includes a text transcript. Most of the interviews were recorded between 2014 and 2016, though a few have been added since then. This project also includes numerous blog posts and essays exploring issues such as stereotypes and representation in entertainment media, as well as written interviews with authors, artists, and activists who are active in the disability community. Additionally, the Disability Visibility Project has a podcast hosted by Alice Wong with more than 75 episodes available as of this write-up.

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Plateau People's Web Portal
Social studies

Among the resources of our November Native American Heritage Month issue, Plateau People's Web Portal garnered extra praise. Cataloging hundreds of cultural materials across tribes and archival sources, the portal provides an in-depth look at Native American heritage. Notably, all items in the collection were "chosen and curated by tribal representatives." Additionally, the site's Curriculum section offers a wealth of resources for educators and caregivers.

Readers interested in Native American cultures, particularly tribes in the Pacific Northwest, should pay the Plateau People's Web Portal a visit. This project is a collaboration between eight different tribes, including the Schitsu'umsh (Coeur d'Alene), the Umatilla, and the Yakama. Here, readers will find "a gateway to Plateau peoples' cultural materials held in multiple repositories," such as the Northwest Museum of Art and Culture and the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of the American Indian. What makes this project unique is that the digital materials visitors will find here are curated, annotated, and managed by tribal representatives in accordance with each tribes' specific cultural protocols. This rich, multifaceted collection contains hundreds of images as well as historical documents and audio and video recordings. Visitors can Browse these materials by tribe, category, or collection, and they can also filter the results by multiple fields. The Plateau People's Web Portal is built on the Mukurtu platform (see the 4-26-2019 Scout Report) and is supported by the National Endowment for the Humanities and the American Council for Learned Societies, among others.

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Musicmap
Arts

Musicmap captured our staff's hearts for a variety of reasons. The data visualization project's creative use of color and design make a great first impression. The in-depth explanation of the research process and methodology used to assemble the resource add credibility to impressive content. Despite the large amount of content, the Musicmap is easily navigable using the toolbar on the left-hand panel of the site. Plus, the compilation of musical metadata makes the project both informative and fun.

Launched in 2016, Musicmap is a fascinating interactive visualization of music history that "attempts to provide the ultimate genealogy of popular music genres," including the relationships and influences between genres. Visitors to Musicmap will find a colorful infographic designed to resemble a city skyline, with each "building" color-coded and labeled as a different musical "super-genre." Clicking a building brings up a synopsis of its genre with a list of subgenres at the bottom; for example, the Country block leads to subgenres ranging from Classic Country/Hillbilly to Nashville/Countrypolitan to Americana/Alternative Country. Users can then click a subgenre to read a short description and find a playlist of examples linked to embedded YouTube videos. Returning to the main map, visitors can also zoom in (using the buttons in the lower right corner) to see an intricate genealogy of the connections between subgenres, denoted by solid and dotted white lines. In addition, Musicmap includes a helpful menu on the left side, containing detailed information about its background and intentions, explanatory guides, and a glossary of musical terms. Musicmap is the brainchild and passion project of music enthusiast Kwinten Crauwels, who by day is an architect in Belgium, with the assistance of his brother Dries Crauwels, a web developer.

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PBS Learning Media: Mathematics
Mathematics

The Scout staff had a difficult time choosing from the many wonderful educational resources featured this year. Ultimately, PBS Learning Media's Mathematics hub triumphed for its considerable collection of interactive tools and lesson plans for math educators and students. With thousands of materials included, you are sure to find whatever you are looking for to "bring math concepts to life." Filter tools that allow users to tailor materials to their needs keep the extensive collection from feeling overwhelming.

Math educators at many levels (as well as parents and students) may appreciate this extensive collection of teaching and learning resources provided by PBS LearningMedia. Here, readers will find thousands of videos, lesson plans, interactive features, and more, covering a wide range of mathematics topics. Shortcuts to several broad math subjects (for example, high school algebra and geometry) are prominently highlighted on the collection's main page, and visitors can easily filter the collection by grade level and resource type, with resources ranging from pre-K through high school and beyond. For example, filtering for fourth grade returns (as of this write-up) more than 400 videos, nearly 130 interactives, over 50 lesson plans, and much more. The search results display a short description of each resource as well as the grade levels it best suits, making it easy to scan for content that fits particular needs. Most resources also include a list of the educational standards with which they align. In addition to the Mathematics collection's filters, the search bar at the top enables visitors to explore the entire PBS LearningMedia site by keyword for resources on a specific topic as well.

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Theme: Reader Favorites

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Beautiful News Daily
Social studies

A reader favorite that was also popular with the Scout staff, Beautiful News Daily lives up to its name in more ways than one. Its aesthetically pleasing visuals make the site stand out among other data and news projects, and its focus on a daily dose of positivity offers a welcome break from gloomy news cycles. Readers may also enjoy following the project on Instagram or Twitter (@beautifulnews.daily and @beautiful__news, respectively).

Many of us strive to stay well-informed of local and international events, but sometimes the news can be stressful or discouraging. To help counterbalance this, the data visualization website Information is Beautiful recently embarked on a new project, Beautiful News Daily. As its name implies, this project offers its visitors "a collection of good news, positive trends, uplifting statistics and facts, all beautifully visualized." New graphics are posted each day over the course of the project's one-year lifespan, which aims "to move our attention beyond dramatic news headlines to the slow developments and quiet trends that go unseen, uncelebrated." Readers can browse all of the Beautiful News items on the project's main page, and they can also filter them by category. Each item's page includes a brief summary, and below readers will find links to view the data in spreadsheet form and to see the source that inspired the chart, as well as a link to a relevant organization for those who would like to get involved. All of the images created for Beautiful New Daily are covered by a Creative Commons license and can be used and shared freely. Information is Beautiful was founded by David McCandless, a London-based writer, designer, and artist.

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Open Textbook Library
Educational Technology

Each year the Scout Report features a variety of materials designed for educators and students. Amid an impressive array, Open Textbook Library was a clear favorite. The resource is committed to curating no- and low-cost textbooks for a variety of academic subjects. With a plethora of titles for both STEM and Humanities classes, the collection makes education more accessible to educators and students across academic concentrations.

The University of Minnesota's Open Textbook Library provides educators, students, and lifelong learners an excellent resource for finding high-quality digital textbooks. Here, visitors will find a large collection of openly-licensed textbooks that can be downloaded for free as PDF or e-book files. The books come from multiple authors and publishing organizations, and cover a wide range of academic areas, including the humanities, natural and social sciences, and mathematics, as well as medicine and law. For visitors curious about the effectiveness of a particular volume, many of the books in the Open Textbook Library also include detailed reviews written by faculty and instructors. In addition to reviews, the landing page for each textbook typically shows its table of contents, a brief description of the book and of its intended audience, and information about its authors, so that readers can better decide whether they should download it. The Open Textbook Library is maintained and supported by the Open Textbook Network and the Center for Open Education, which are also based at the University of Minnesota.

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Medieval England and France, 700-1200
Arts

Digital exhibitions from libraries and museums are frequently featured in the Scout Report. The British Library's Medieval England and France, 700-1200 manuscript gallery is one such exhibition that really resonated with readers. Fascinating and often whimsical imagery make this collection intriguing. The variety of learning materials offered (such as animated videos and a detailed glossary) make it a comprehensive resource to learn about medieval history.

Thanks to a collaborative project conducted by the British Library and the Bibliotheque nationale de France (BnF) from 2016-2018, a trove of 800 medieval illuminated manuscripts have been digitized and made available for public viewing. For this project, the British Library and the BnF each selected 400 of their respective collections' most historically and culturally significant manuscripts for digitization. Here, the British Library has created a resource (available in both English and French) to "highlight a selection of the project's manuscripts within their historical and cultural context." Readers can explore this curated selection of approximately 100 manuscripts by themes such as art and illumination; history and learning; or science and nature. Visitors will also find 30 enlightening articles written to help viewers understand the context and meaning of these beautiful manuscripts, several videos about how the manuscripts were made, and a helpful glossary of terms relating to medieval art and culture. For those interested in viewing all 800 manuscripts, the British Library also included a link to the project's main website with the full collection. This joint digitization project was funded by the Polonsky Foundation, a UK-based charity that "primarily supports cultural heritage and research."

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Weather Spark
Science

The Scout Report strives to highlight a variety of strategic yet simple-to-use tools. As an engaging platform for tracking weather patterns, Weather Spark was a reader favorite that fit the bill. The site is perfect for practical planners and meteorology enthusiasts alike. And, with useful data and gadgets tracking weather patterns all around the world, the resource is especially great for trip-planning.

Travelers of both the armchair and in-person varieties, as well as weather enthusiasts, may appreciate Weather Spark, a wonderful website that offers detailed summaries of "the typical weather anywhere on Earth." From the home page, readers are invited to enter a location in the search bar or to choose among major cities such as Hong Kong and Chicago, and they can also search via an interactive map (linked below the city list) or view a randomly selected place. Each location in Weather Spark's database has a vast amount of information concisely presented through colorful graphics and text descriptions, including average temperatures, humidity, solar energy, and much more, with reports available for a yearly, monthly, or daily timeframe. Visitors can also compare the average weather for multiple locations simultaneously. Made with a global user base in mind, Weather Spark allows visitors to display temperatures in Fahrenheit or Celsius and can be viewed in eight languages in addition to English. The reports provided here are primarily "based on a statistical analysis of historical hourly weather reports and model reconstructions from January 1, 1980 to December 31, 2016," and links to their other data sources are included. Weather Spark is the creation of Cedar Lake Ventures, a small company based in the Minneapolis area.

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Standard Ebooks
Language Arts

Literature-focused resources are often highly regarded by Scout subscribers. From Shakespeare to Thoreau, Standard Ebooks' "e-shelves" are full of literary treasures that brought delight to our readers. Their mission resonated too, as the site is committed to maintaining modern, consistent, and attractive versions of classic text, all within the public domain.

While free public domain books can be readily downloaded from resources like Project Gutenberg and the Internet Archive, those wishing to read these finds on an e-reader or mobile device may be somewhat frustrated by their formatting or mistakes in transcription. This sentiment is the inspiration behind Standard Ebooks, "a volunteer driven, not-for-profit effort to produce a collection of high quality, carefully formatted, accessible, open source, and free public domain ebooks that meet or exceed the quality of commercially produced ebooks." Some of the ways Standard Ebooks strives to improve their source material include proofreading and correcting typos and ephemera, editing the typography and design for consistency, and updating the formatting to meet current e-book best practices such as tables of contents and popup footnotes. As of this write-up, more than 300 titles are available, including L.M. Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables, Booker T. Washington's Up from Slavery, and P.G. Wodehouse's Jeeves Stories. Visitors can browse Standard Ebooks' full library in order of newest additions, author name, reading ease, or length (using the "Sort by" filter at the bottom of the page to adjust browsing selections), and each e-book is available in four different file formats. Those interested in participating in this project should visit the Get Involved section to learn how.

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