Educational Technology at IU13

Here are some "Timely & Relevant" resources from Discovery Education for the month of December 2022. Be sure to log into your instance of Discovery Education before clicking on the links below.

Timely Content for December

• Already thinking ahead to December? Give teachers the DE December Newsletter for resources that support timely events like Winter Holiday Celebrations, World Soil Day, International Mountain Day, Wright Brothers Day, and much more! Also, if you're looking for resources for your students to do at home over the holiday breaks. Share these activities with your families to keep learning alive over break.
• Winter Holiday Celebrations include a Celebrations of Light Around the World Studio Board (Grades 3-8), Sentence Fix-It: December Holidays (Grades K-2) – capitalization rules for the beginning of sentences & proper nouns, and Grades K-12 DE Channels of resources for Christmas, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa. 

Ready-to-Use-Activities

• Have your teachers explored our ready-to-use activities? These time-saving activities can be used as-is or modified to meet the needs of their classroom! From Background Builders to Sentence Fix-Its to Choice Boards and more – teachers can find quick grab and go resources to use anytime in the Instructional Activities Channel.

• There you’ll find the recent Activity Calendars, such as these for December, for Grades K-2 and Grades 3-5. Use them as they are or make your own copy to edit and share.

Play to Learn with LEGO Virtual Field Trip

• Discover how creativity, learning, and imagination all intersect as students learn to solve challenges using the power of play. From the Home of the Brick in Billund, Denmark students will meet real-life LEGO® play experts, and discover how important play can be. Then, we will travel to meet U.S. Sea Turtle Conservationists, as they introduce us to some big challenges facing our planet and learn alongside student peers as they play, collaborate, and create! Learn more and register today!  Learn more and register today!

Feature of the Month: Collaborative Studio Boards

• Did you know you can create a Studio board template and then assign it to groups of students? They can then all work on the board together for a collaborative project!  Check out DE's Quick Start Guide to Share and Collaborate with Studio!

Call for Questions: Discovery Education Virtual Field Trip to the International Space Station

• Through our partnership with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), Discovery Education has been given the exciting opportunity to host a Virtual Field Trip to the International Space Station! We are inviting students around the world to submit questions for a chance to have them answered by astronauts aboard the space station. For more information and to submit questions, visit our website.
• Please note that, due to the complicated and ever-shifting responsibilities of the space station crew, there is always a possibility that the Virtual Field Trip will be delayed or cancelled as a result of circumstances outside of our control. If this event does move forward, it will occur during the first half of the 2023 school year, with more information to follow once a specific date is selected.

The Sora Big Library Read is occurring this year from November 2 - 16!!!

• A Snake Falls to Earth is now available to all IMS Sora Readers at no cost to your school library. Readers have unlimited access to the ebook and audiobook until November 16 – with no waitlists or holds. It’s a great way to bring your school community together through reading and discussion. The Content Access Level for this title is set at "Young Adult (YA)."

Get readers talking

• Check out the discussion guide designed to encourage conversation and help students and teachers get the most from A Snake Falls to Earth.
  
  

Get even more from A Snake Falls to Earth

• Be sure to visit Teaching Books for additional resources including activities, lessons, interviews and more.

Book Trailer

This video book trailer is provided by RJ Julia Booksellers. 

Here are some "Timely & Relevant" resources from Discovery Education for the month of November 2022. Be sure to log into your instance of Discovery Education before clicking on the links below.

This Month at DE

• Already thinking ahead to November? Give teachers the DE November Newsletter for resources that support timely events like Native American Heritage Month, Election Day, Veteran’s Day, Thanksgiving, and much more!

November 2022 Activity Calendar

• Explore ready-to-use activities for November that provide students with opportunities to explore their curiosity around a variety of topics. Looking for more? Explore the Instructional Activities Channel. There you’ll find the recent Activity Calendars for Grades K-2 and Grades 3-5. Use them as they are or make your own copy to edit and share.

Supporting Families

• Have you checked out the Family Resources landing page yet? Families can find a video as well as flyers to support learning at home with DE. Also, be sure to check out and share the new Sesame Learning flyer, highlighting the PK-2 content that DE has recently added in collaboration with Sesame Workshop.

Tundra Connections Virtual Field Trip

• Travel to Churchill, Manitoba with DE to learn about the polar bear’s environment and the people who share it. On this live Virtual Field Trip, we’ll discover what enables this unique species to survive in the arctic tundra, explore different ways you can work with polar bears, and identify how you can protect polar bears and our planet. Learn more and register today!

Feature of the Month: Share Quizzes

• Did you create a video or standard quiz and want to share it with others in your grade or subject area? You can share it via a link to anyone for them to use with their students. Check out DE's Quick Start Guide to Quizzes!

Sora has seen quite a few changes over the past few months and with all the emails that land in your inbox, it can be easy to miss an announcement or two. To help you get caught up on all things Sora, below is a list of seven new features and tools you may have missed. Check them out below:

• Google Classroom Add-On –  The new Sora Add-On allows you to browse your school’s catalog and attach specific titles to posts within Google Classroom.
• Only available for schools using Google Workspace for Education Plus or the Teaching and Learning Upgrade.
• See here for details.
• On-Demand Class Sets – Feedback from schools helped us develop a more flexible curriculum-centered lending model option.
• Content Bundles – Reserve titles and offer exclusive access to select users. Great for curriculum titles, classroom libraries, professional development for staff and more.
• Sora Extras – Add learning resources like DOGO News and Method Learning to Sora.
• Comics & Magazines – All access comics and magazines packages are now available for Sora! Contact your Account Manager for pricing.
• Sora Showcase – Give your digital collection a physical presence with our free interactive discovery kiosk software! Contact Zach Delin at OverDrive to get started.
• Student Dashboard – Admins can now see more detailed individual and aggregated reading data to help make data-driven decisions about literacy and reading initiatives.