Podcast Series: Innovations in Education

Explore the full series of eSchool News podcasts hosted by Kevin Hogan—created to keep you on the cutting edge of innovations in education.

BetterLesson Sponsors $1 Million Matching Grant Program for Professional Development

To provide expanded access to K-12 schools and districts with virtual professional learning services to improve teaching and learning in remote and hybrid environments and to promote social justice, BetterLesson is sponsoring a matching grant program. Public and private K-12 schools, districts and education service agencies are invited to submit their proposals between today and Friday, September 4, 2020.

“Teachers and school leaders are facing intense challenges right now. And if we want success for all students, educators need to be meaningfully, continuously supported; now more than ever,” said Erin Osborn co-founder and COO of BetterLesson. “We’ve seen over the past few months how much BetterLesson’s virtual Professional Learning can help districts and schools improve the use of powerful distance learning strategies, as well as help educators take real steps toward advancing social justice. The grant program felt like a concrete way to increase access to this support and reach as many educators as possible.”

The program provides public and private K-12 schools, districts and education service agencies in the United States with virtual professional learning services to improve teaching and learning in remote environments and integrate practices that advance social justice as part of regular classroom instruction.…Read More

New Data from Rave Mobile Safety Shows Schools’ Top Safety Concerns About Returning to the Classroom

Rave Mobile Safety (Rave), the critical communication and collaboration platform customers count on when it matters most, today announced a new survey report that reveals the top safety concerns that school administrators, teachers and staff have about returning to the classroom, as well as the steps they are taking to create a safe environment. Chief among those concerns are the mental and physical health of both teachers and students and enforcing social distancing practices. The report also addresses what learning will look like once everyone does return to classrooms and managing a hybrid learning environment.

Key findings of the report include:

  • Social distancing and mental/physical health of school staff are the top health and safety concerns for the new year as the coronavirus evolves. Social distancing is a top concern for those returning to school (77%), followed closely by teacher/staff physical health (70%) and mental health (69%), as well as student mental health (69%) and physical health (67%). To address these concerns, schools will be putting up signage promoting social distancing (74%) and issuing daily temperature checks (69%) and wellness checks (57%).
  • State and local governments will be the major influencers about when schools reopen and teachers and students return to the classroom — and many are starting early. While parent preference (43%) and a belief in the importance of in-person learning (50%) are factors in the decision whether to return to the classroom or not, most school leaders report that state (81%) and local (57%) governments are major influencers in that decision. Additionally, 44% report that their school districts are going back before September, compared to 6% considering a December or later return to in-person learning.
  • Hybrid learning is the most likely class model for students and teachers this year, meaning that schools also need to overcome distance learning challenges.As circumstances force schools to consider alternate learning models, a hybrid approach of in-person and remote learning is the most popular solution (75%). For that model to be successful, schools need to consider the challenges that emerged from classes held remotely this spring, chief among them being students lacking internet access and low student and parent engagement.

“This year, ‘school safety’ has taken on an entirely new level of meaning, from meeting CDC standards to caring for the mental health of those in the building,” said Todd Miller, Chief Operating Officer, Rave Mobile Safety. “Clear communication about safety standards and compliance with everyone involved in that effort, from teachers and administrators to parents and students, has never been more critical. We are proud to support schools in these efforts through tools that enable daily wellness checks and frequent communication with all stakeholders, which help promote health and safety and create a sense of consistency during a disruptive, stressful time.”…Read More

Flinn Scientific Launches New Solutions to Support Hands-on Science in Any Learning Environment

Flinn Scientific, a flagship provider of science lab materials and safety and STEM solutions for the K-16 education market, is launching two new solutions – 360Science™ and Science2Go – to support hands-on learning this coming school year. Now, regardless if learning is taking place in a virtual, hybrid, or in-person environment, educators will have the resources needed to teach students about important scientific concepts and phenomena in a safe, effective, and engaging way.

“Even though in-person learning was halted this spring, Flinn has been busy developing new hands-on learning programs for this coming school year,” said Mike Lavelle, CEO of Flinn Scientific. “We saw the need for programs tailored to both in-person and remote learning and created 360Science and Science2Go, respectively, to meet this need. These complementary offerings will help teachers deliver engaging science education no matter where teaching and learning is taking place.”

Designed for in-classroom learning, 360Science is a customizable program that provides high school teachers with 200 easily-modified, hands-on biology, chemistry, and environmental science labs along with complementary digital content. The program, which is aligned to the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) and other state science standards, features a unique instructional approach in which students begin each class with an inquiry-based lab.…Read More

Professional Development Pandemic Style—How one District Is Prepping Staff For Success

Jon Castelhano, Executive Director of Technology at Gilbert Public Schools in suburban Phoenix, Arizona, is making lemonade. Instead of stopgap measures to make it through the COVID-19 crisis, his district is crafting strategic changes with an eye toward the long term. These are ideas long talked about but never implemented in the 40 schools that serve 34,000 students. For it to work, faculty need to reinvent themselves too. In this conversation with eSchool News, Jon describes how they intend to do just that.

ESN: What does your fall look like at the moment?

JC: We are developing a number of options for families. The first is a complete online option, which is really just our current virtual academy. The one I’m excited about is our flex option—think blended/hybrid type model for our elementary schools and a little different flex look at the high school. It’s similar to what some kids do now where they might take a few classes on campus but then take a couple online.…Read More

How to make remote learning easily accessible

When school starts again in the fall, it’s likely that a significant number of students will still be learning remotely. To make classrooms less crowded and prevent the spread of the coronavirus, many states and districts are considering a hybrid approach in which some students attend school and some learn from home, such as by having students alternate between in-person and remote learning.

One of the key lessons learned in the shift to remote learning this spring was the need to make online instruction easily accessible to everyone. K-12 school systems have taken many actions to ensure that students have the technology they need to learn from home, such as distributing mobile devices and wireless hotspots to students who need them and even negotiating deals with internet service providers to extend free or discounted broadband service to low-income families.

Related content: 5 ways to build a community of learners online…Read More

50 tips to develop and run your online courses

From getting started to managing the day-to-day business, try these 50 tips for setting up a successful online course for any grade level

online-learningAs many K-12 U.S. public schools and districts are struggling to compete with 100 percent online cyber charter schools for essential student funding, many universities are struggling to understand the impact of MOOCs on future enrollment. Both of these scenarios point to the one thing that is abundantly clear, online education is having another growth spurt in the second decade of the 21st century and the race to create in-house online content is on.

In-house online content is defined here as online course development created by practicing K-12 educators to avoid having to access sometimes cost-prohibitive, commercially-developed online courses.

However, in addition to the already full plates of educators, in-house online content and course development remains a challenge. With a healthy dose of optimism and motivation to better serve their current, digitally-inclined students’ expectations, along with many excellent, free online tools for online and blended course development, K-16 educators are now able to master the task of online course content for blended learning models and/or 100 percent online course development using the following easily-implemented strategies. While the physical location of the classroom may be left behind, the online classroom adventure has just begun.…Read More

The best tips for getting your school ready for Common Core assessments

An elearning pro shares how to prioritize to make the transition to online assessments smoother

common core assessmentsAs with anything in life, certain tradeoffs must happen in order for schools to spread already-thin resources across all critical projects. Schools already face this challenge on a daily basis, and now they must become Common Core assessment-ready at a time when resources are especially tight.

“In the end, there have to be some projects and/or expenses that receive lower priority within the district,” says Thomas Ryan, Ph.D., CEO at eLearn Institute, Inc., a nonprofit that helps districts prepare online learning strategies. “At this point, any prioritization that takes place really has to be based on district-wide, long-term decisions.”

Transitioning to a data-driven system
In looking at the digital education shift as a whole, Ryan says some schools are “holding onto the old way of doing things” even as they realize that the shift to online assessments is going to have to happen. “Trying to support a paper-based instructional model and a digital-based model is just too expensive,” says Ryan. “Unless there’s a stream of new funding coming in, schools really need to start putting [digital] transition plans in place.”…Read More

This hybrid innovation is about to change your school forever

Online learning experts say hybrids are changing classrooms across the country; here’s how to spot them and implement them successfully

hybrid-innovation-schools Hybrid innovations are technologies that bridge tradition to the future, fundamentally changing how an entire industry performs, and according to education experts, K-12 is experiencing one hybrid technology that will reshape classrooms for the future. The hybrid’s name? Blended learning.

“There are two kids of innovation: sustaining and disruptive,” said Heather Staker, senior research fellow of education at the Clayton Christensen Institute, during a recent Consortium for School Networking (CoSN) webinar. “Sustaining innovation makes the traditional model, like a classroom, better almost immediately, but the impact is small. Disruptive innovation has a low impact at first, but slowly begins to change the status quo over time.”

cosn2…Read More