As someone who has dedicated her career to making the world a better place through the education of our children, I was excited to learn that tablets and computers are nearly commonplace in elementary school classrooms across the nation. In fact, 88 percent of K-2nd-grade teachers use a tablet in the classroom and nearly 70 percent use educational apps and software, which means that our youngest students—who have never known a world without technology—can use the tablets they love for learning!
While it’s an exciting development for students, teachers are faced with a growing challenge—finding best-in-class content that supports learning and skills development and is also engaging. Throughout the school year, teachers spend hours upon hours searching the app stores for digital activities their students can use to master a math concept, advance a reading level, or reinforce a new science lesson. This is no small feat when you consider that there are thousands of apps to choose from and no set criteria defining the specific features of an educational app.
Teachers are largely left on their own to identify the content they need and then vet it with their internal IT person and school administrators. A recent study by Tyton Partners found that about 60 percent of teachers are responsible for making the digital purchasing decisions for their classroom and 27 percent purchase the content out of their own pockets. When you’re talking about a commitment of time and money, the stakes are high, so let’s take some of the guesswork out of the equation.
Following are five valuable tips for choosing best-in-class learning content that meets the need of teachers and aligns with the criteria many IT leaders and administrators look for when evaluating digital learning resources for schools:
1. Is the content mapped to curriculum standards?
Sure, teachers can assign fun games to students hoping they will inspire learning, but digital activities that are mapped to national, state and common core standards are designed to reinforce the curriculum students are learning in the classroom.
2. Does the digital program feature a variety of curricular activities across multiple subjects?
We all recognize that children learn at different paces and in diverse ways, so having a digital suite of curricular activities that provides multiple options for practicing a math concept or developing reading comprehension is key. It’s impossible for a teacher to know exactly what each individual student will need to be successful, so having options that reinforce curriculum concepts through repetition, pictures, puzzles, music, and other activities all in one place is a plus.
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