I am currently reading chapters from Curtis Bonk's book, "The World Is Open". In this book, Bonk discusses the open learning environment that has been created by technology and the ability to easily access and share information on the Web. I just finished reading the chapter in which Bonk discusses online portals and repositories where people achieve information on the Web. In this chapter Bonk mentions many online portals that contain vast amounts of information, but the portals mentioned in this chapter only scratch the surface of the portals and repositories available to learners on the Web. Many of these portals provided information that would be most useful in higher education, however Bonk discusses one portal that provides resources for students and teachers in grades K-12.
This portal was created by Scott McNealy and it is now known as Curriki. According to Bonk, "Curriki intends to provide universal access to free K-12 curricula and associated instructional materials and assessments". Anyone can post resources on Curriki, however the resources are reviewed by the Curriki team and are rated as "exemplary", "good", or "basic". After reading about Curriki in Bonk's book I was eager to check it out for myself. After briefly exploring Curriki I believe that it will be a valuable resource for me as an elementary teacher. The website is very easy to navigate and Curriki offers multiples filters through which the user can search for resources. For example, resources can be filtered by grade level, subject area, and/or standard. Ratings and comments are also provided for the resources that have been reviewed by the Curriki team and a rubric is provided for each rating. After exploring the site briefly I was able to locate a great supplementary resource for teaching students the phases of the moon. This website is just one example of the thousands of resources that can be found on Curriki. I am excited to explore Curriki more and use it as a resource in my future classroom.
Have you used Curriki before? If so, what do you think?
I just finished playing around on this site for a little bit--there is a ton of stuff on there! I agree with you, Laura, that this is a great resource for teachers. The search filters are so easy to use which make the site simply navigable. I also really like that it shows what type of instructional type of activity each resource is. I've seen a few great animations for math and science that I think students would enjoy. Great find, Laura.
ReplyDeleteI love that you linked us to Curriki! It has a great amount of resources on there, as you described. I did have problems with the loading time as I tried to search for resources based on NCSCOS...Did you have the same problem with loading time? They have yet to update their resources to align with Common Core....it will be wonderful when they do update/align the material with Common Core!!
ReplyDeleteU-Class is similar in some ways to Currici but more collaborative in intent.
ReplyDeleteLaura,
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed learning about Curriki. I had never heard of it. I instantly went and registered and previewed the site. Knowing that educators from all over the world have contributed to this site is amazing. This website is truly a great place to find and to share resources and lessons. I can't wait to contribute lessons and resources to this site one day. The rating system was also helpful.
Larissa