Hot Stuff: Guides, Games, and More

Credit: William Duke

How to Handle Difficult Parents: A Teacher's Survival Guide

By Suzanne Capek Tingley; $13; Cottonwood Press; 144 pages www.cottonwoodpress.com [1]

Parent-teacher relationships can be some of the most trying in the education business, but here's a handy guide with a sense of humor that'll keep the parent woes at bay.You'll meet Pinocchio's Mom (who insists that under no circumstances would her son tell a lie), the Competitor (who always enters the classroom ready for a fight), and No-Show's Dad (who allows and even encourages his child's truancy). Profiles of these and many more parent types, along with a short history of parent-school relationships, suggestions for handling parent-teacher conferences, and many other tips and tricks, can help classroom battles turn into supportive, collaborative partnerships -- or at least make you laugh.

Credit: William Duke

StockItToYa!

The Van Heyst Group/Very Hot Games; $25 www.stockittoya.com [2]; www.vanheyst.com/shop [3]

Whether or not you've got a stock trader's savvy, StockItToYa! is the place to use it (or learn it). The site combines the dice-rolling fun of traditional board games with lean, mean investment skills. Players choose from six fictional companies such as Crimson Chemical and Aegean Aerospace and practice navigating the ins and outs of stock trading through collecting penny stocks, acquiring and selling stock certificates, claiming shareholder's majority bonuses, landing windfall funds, and more. Naturally, whoever makes the most money in the end wins the game. This colorful crash course in financial literacy is ideal for kids -- and adults -- eager to play the stock market.

Credit: William Duke

MyStack

Stack magazine; free www.mystack.stackmag.com [4]

For all those devoted young athletes out there, here's a new place to shine: Stack magazine, a training and sports-skills resource for high school athletes, has launched a fun, personalized networking site. A kind of MySpace for sporty types, MyStack has more than fifteen thousand teenage users already creating profiles (including the athletic awards they have won and the colleges they hope to attend), uploading photos and videos, interacting with their peers, and making themselves visible to coaches, athletic directors, and college recruiters. Go, team!

Credit: William Duke

Google Educators

Online tools; free www.google.com/educators [5]

Google is no longer just a noun or a verb -- it's also a word denoting a sprawling collection of free tools for educators. From interactive maps to diagramming tools, teachers at all grade levels are finding innovative ways to incorporate some of the Web giant's most fascinating and useful products into class curricula and school networks. With clear, concise explanations of each tool and examples of and ideas for their use in education, the Google Educators site makes it simple to gather the gems of the information age and put them to the test in your classroom.