Ruth’s Sociology Resources Blog

Sites for sociology teachers:

ATSS - The site for the Association for the Teaching of Social Scientists is a must visit for every Sociology teacher. Although it is not always the easiest to navigate and feels rather elderly there is a wealth of material here for those who have patience. There is a page with links to good Sociology sites and the ATSS also sell a range of resources as well producing a magazine for members and putting on conferences and other events.
Halovine Online Classroom - HaloVine the main producers of sociology videos have now gone online. The site is essentially an online shop for their products, with the opportunity to maybe watch a clip or two before you buy and also a new online ‘zine which for £25 for a year’s subscription looks like it could be useful and is also the kind of thing that’s affordable on a low budget. I’ve used some of their videos in the past and found them very helpful with students. The Paul Willis interview has always been a useful one for prompting discussion around class and education and also to illustrate a range of methodological issues - ethics, porblems/advantages of observation, gaining access, the research process as a whole.

Sociological Research Online - This is an online academic journal featuring a range of articles from across the field of Sociology, focussing on empirical research. You can do a search on the articles or click on the “archives” tab and browse past issues. Although the more recent issues claim to be for subscribers only there doesn’t actually appear to be any restriction on access. This is an easy way to get hold of academic articles and they are generally very well written, but the average A-level student will probably find them difficult to access.

The Women’s Library - As well as being what it says on the tin - a national collection of literature and sources about women’s lives and issues both contemporary and historical, the Women’s Library also has a wonderful exhibition space.  This hosts a series of exhibitions on issues, making use of the expertise of researchers in the relevant fields as well as the library’s resources.  In the Autumn and Spring terms each year they run FREE workshops for A-level Sociology students which take students round the exhibition and then set up a debate using the materials around them.  Definitely worth taking your students to if you can.

Sites for sociology students:

ATSS Good Sociology Sites - this page of the ATSS site has links to selection of Sociology websites, it’s a useful place to look if you can’t find what you want. Some of the sites linked to are very good (my 2 favourites are listed separately below) others are not so good, or are good if you are the target audience (ie a student at a particular school/college). There are also some links to some more generally useful sites.
Sociology Learning Support is one of my favourite student sites, it changes constantly and there always seems to be new material, although I do seem to get lost in it occasionally!

Sociology Central - This site is bung full of useful information, notes, links, hints and tips and it is constantly growing. It is well worth a look, although it takes a bit of a knack to navigate round it.

Useful Current Affairs sites:

BBC News - one of the best and most comprehensive news sites on the web, the BBC has news and current affairs commentary in a number of formats and is a good place to keep up to date with what is going on. You can search the site (although this function can be frustrating) as well as subscribing to RSS feeds for news on Education, Health and a variety of other topics or you can get regular updates by e-mail.

BBC Radio 4 - has a wealth of interesting and useful programmes for bringing Sociology to life. Regular slots include From Our Own Correspondent which is a programme which takes foreign correspondents’ tales of life abroad - stories which won’t make the news but which give an insight into other cultures, the most recent programme can now be downloaded as a podcast and transcripts are also provided on the site. Thinking Allowed is broadcast weekly and involves interviews with sociologists about their research - nice bitesize chunks which bring research into the classroom, past interviewees have included Ann Oakley and Angela McRobbie and there is a reasonable ‘back catalogue’ of sound files on the site. The Now Show and The News Quiz are both broadcast as part of Radio 4’s comedy slot each night at 6.30 and take a light hearted look at current affairs, although they are primarily comedy shows they do also provide commentary on the news and modern society.

Other Useful Sites

Freemind - this is mindmapping software which is free to download. I’ve found it very useful with my students, helping them to create summaries of modules and topics which can be altered and edited as you go along and you can add colours and images to the maps to make them come alive.

YouTube - there is a lot of junk on YouTube but there are also some gems - have a browse through their featured videos and there are some nice mini-documentaries, all only a few minutes long which will provoke discussion and thought.

Internet Archive - I have only just discovered this site and need to explore it more fully, but basically it is an online archive of all sorts of media, most of which seems to have been created since 1996. It will probably be most useful for its archive of documentaries and films on a wide range of subjects.