2019 Course Catalog

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DISCOVERY EDUCATION PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

We work closely with our partners to provide results-driven professional learning that combines the power of content, pedagogy and technology to create innovative and engaging learning experiences that drive systemic transformation. With each partnership, our goal is to strengthen teacher effectiveness, empower school leaders and increase student engagement through meaningful learning opportunities.

PHILOSOPHY

Inspiring Educators To Reimagine Learning

The Discovery Education professional development model is designed to inspire educators and administrators to take those next steps to transform their classrooms and schools into engaging, student-centered learning environments. Discovery Education offers research-based, results-driven professional learning. Our innovative approach systematically impacts multiple layers of the school system and provides educators with immersive experiences to bridge theory to practice. Because our approach is teacher-centered, we offer face-to-face professional learning, online support, classroom application and job-embedded coaching.

We engage with our partners to:

  • Design professional learning plans collaboratively that support continuous improvement in teacher and administrator skills
  • Address professional learning needs for both classroom teachers and district leaders
  • Provide highly-trained and certified educators for all professional learning experiences
  • Support sustainability through the Discovery Education Community
ABOUT

Discovery Education Professional Development is recognized as one of the top ten professional development providers in the US. Our approach is unique, including research-based content aligned to our philosophy that honors the educators with whom we work.

We craft innovative and engaging experiences, immersing educators in purposeful learning which balances content, pedagogy and technology. Digital is the differentiator in our world, allowing equitable access to learning, increasing student engagement and offering opportunities for collaboration and feedback. We regularly position technology as a means to completely redesign a lesson–to create something otherwise impossible without it.

PARTNER SUCCESS STORIES

Discovery Education develops sustainable solutions that transform classrooms, empower teachers and captivate students. Whether our partners are just beginning their digital journey or are well along their way, our programs are designed to drive impactful growth through a combination of the highest quality digital resources, capacity building instructional and administrative professional development and support from the largest learning network of its kind. Here are just a few of our compelling partnership success stories. View all of them below or explore by category.

CONTENT DESIGN

Innovative and Accessible

The professional development content provided by Discovery Education engages all educators through its research-based and actionable approach, connecting best practices to innovative new methods of reaching all students. Discovery Education’s professional development content is anchored in core tenets that will:

  • Transform learning through the combined power of content, pedagogy and technology used to create innovative and engaging classroom experiences
  • Model effective and purposeful integration of digital content and resources as a differentiator in meeting the diverse learning needs of students
  • Immerse educators in learning experiences grounded in research leading to actionable and intentional transfer to classroom practice
  • Facilitate opportunities for professional collaboration and reflective practice
APPROACH

With each professional development partnership, we start with the end in mind, working closely with our partners to provide a well-rounded, consultative and adaptive approach to each professional learning plan.
Consult & Plan

We utilize a consultative approach in our work with partners, as we listen to understand their challenges and identify pathways to support their goal in reaching intended outcomes.

Launch & Deliver

Communication is a hallmark of our approach. In collaboration with our partners, we build an implementation plan designed to include key stakeholders as we ensure goals and expectations will be clearly understood.

Monitor & Adapt

Continual reflection is critical as we monitor implementation. We interrogate reality – reviewing multiple data points including participant survey data, usage data, observations, student learning artifacts and much more. Our approach based on that information to ensure the intended outcomes are met.

Evaluate Success

At key partnership milestones, we evaluate progress against program goals to understand the impact of our work. We use these opportunities to further develop our professional learning plans and course correct, if necessary, to ensure we properly differentiate for the learning process and evolving partner objectives.

Ongoing Support

Discovery Education Professional Development partners are provided with ongoing support from initial implementation through maintenance and adaptation of each solution. This support is illuminated through connections found in the largest educator community of its kind.

PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT TOPICS

Discovery Education Professional Development support a culture of discovery with a focus on the power of digital strategies and resources to facilitate an engaging, flexible learning experience.

EDUCATIONAL THEMES
  • Literacy (Complete)
  • Science (Complete)
  • Math (Complete)
  • Social Studies (Complete)
  • Leadership – (Complete)
  • STEM – uploaded to basecamp
  • PBL – uploaded to basecamp
  • Going Digital – uploaded to basecamp
  • Graduate (Wilkes) – copy in development
  • Custom (Complete)
DISCOVERY EDUCATION SERVICES
  • Science Techbook (Complete)
  • NGSS Techbook (Complete)
  • Math Techbook (Complete)
  • Social Studies Techbook (Complete)
  • Streaming (Complete)
PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT

Discovery Education provides professional development opportunities in a variety of formats to best meet our partners learning styles and schedules.

IN PERSON

Discovery Education Professional Development in-person learning opportunities empower participants with rich and relevant interactive learning experiences. In person support allows the Discovery Education Professional Development team to leverage the power of interaction, collaboration and observation. The team also incorporates the partner’s instructional environment to provide a relevant and engaging learning experience.

Multi-day Academy | Six-hour Course | Half-day Session

Each multi-day academy, six-hour course and half-day session is carefully designed to meet the identified needs of the group and can utilize direct instruction, guided exploration and model lessons to build a solid foundation of research based instructional strategies for each participant.

Conference Learning Event

A Discovery Education conference-style event consists of an informative and inspiring day of professional development. Designed for larger audiences, these events can provide an opportunity for educators to gain a broad view of innovative teaching and learning. Participants can choose from a variety of professional learning topics or focus on a specific content area.

One Discovery Education Professional Development Specialist can support the learning needs of up to 25 educators at any given time with face-to-face training.

Job-Embedded Learning

Coaching and Instructional support services each contribute to improving teaching and learning.  Both approaches provide push-in classroom support where Discovery Education Coaches are elbow to elbow with educators to produce results in specific areas of focus.  The services differ with regard to the level of intensity and support provided.

Instructional and Leadership Coaching

Instructional and Leadership Coaching is more intensive and requires  more frequent contact over time between coach and educator to set goals and evaluate impact. Additionally, the complex nature of coaching requires that it takes place between the same coach and educator over multiple sessions to build a strong relationship.  Since the focus of coaching  is on student learning outcomes, coaches are well rooted in pedagogy and guide  educators in reflective conversations and the collection of multiple data  points to get to the heart of student achievement.

Instructional Support

Instructional Support is just-in-time, job-embedded support for educators designed to illustrate the value of incorporating new strategies. Instructional Support is a natural follow up to full-day, in-person learning sessions designed to bridge the gap between theory and practice, reduce implementation barriers, increase fidelity and reinforce efforts. Participants work directly with a Discovery Education Professional Development Specialist to apply knowledge and skills learned during whole group learning sessions.

ONLINE

Discovery Education Professional Development online learning opportunities provide participants with meaningful learning experiences in a variety of formats and time frames, accommodating the most complex schedule.

Webinars or Web Conferencing

Using high quality video and integrated voice conferencing, webinars offer both auditory and visual interactive experiences for all participants. Accessible from multiple locations, webinars can be organized for a single attendee, small groups of educators, or large audiences. Discovery Education webinars enable participants to learn specific processes, collaborate, consult or receive continuous support to enhance professional learning.

Interactive Training

Whether you are new to Discovery Education or have been utilizing our resources for years, we invite you to explore our interactive training courses that bring you together with community members from all around, as they share tips, tricks and practical integration strategies for using digital resources and maximizing your experience in Discovery Education. Each course addresses one component of Discovery Education through a series of five steps, which include video overviews and step-by-step guides. Upon completion of the steps, you can take a quiz to receive a certificate for an hour of professional development credit.

COMMUNITY

Connecting educators with their most valuable resource… each other.

A blended community of practice for education professionals who are passionate about transforming the learning experience with digital media, the Discovery Education Community connects members across town and around the world through social media, virtual conferences and in-person events.

Fostering valuable networking, idea-sharing and inspiration, the Discovery Education Community was founded in 2005 and has grown into one of the largest, most active professional education learning communities in the world. Learn how the Discovery Education Community empowers teachers and administrators.

EVENTS

Academies
Build Your Instructional Strength

Discovery Education is proud to partner with educators to offer professional learning Academies, at no cost, to provide best practices in using digital content to implement standards, digital resources for immediate classroom integration, practical implementation strategies and leadership applications in the areas of Literacy, STEM, Math and NGSS. Learn more (link to academies page)

Thought Leadership Conferences

Discovery Education brings educational leaders together to share successful strategies, discuss challenges and build meaningful alliances.

Powerful Practices

The Powerful Practices series is a new collection of exclusive experiences and content designed specifically for superintendents and curriculum leaders searching for new ideas and inspiration to grow instructional leadership capacity. Powerful Practices targets the issues all educational leaders face today and provides rich insights into moving schools forward.

Superintendent & CAO Thought Leadership Symposiums

Throughout the year, Discovery Education brings together district administrators for two days of collaborative learning and networking. Attendees engage in rich dialogue with their peers around critical topics they’ve identified.

Principal Summit

Each year, Discovery Education brings together school administrators for days of intensive professional development and networking. Attendees learn how to use technology to energize their own leadership, empower their teachers and develop lasting relationships with other school leaders.

DEN Summer Institute

This is a unique weeklong residential-style event, focused on educational excellence, leadership and networking. Attendees leave connected to other passionate professionals, inspired by experts and equipped with new ideas to transform teaching and learning.

FOR ADMINISTRATORS

Inside :30
Professional Learning For Busy District Level Administrators

Inside :30 is a new thought-provoking webinar series that will explore important educational topics and provide administrators with innovative ideas to make improvements in teaching and learning… all in just 30 minutes. (link to Inside :30)

Community

A blended community of practice for education professionals who are passionate about transforming the learning experience with digital media, the Discovery Education Community connects education leaders so they can collaborate and learn from one another.

One Idea With: Series

Discovery Education Senior Vice President Scott Kinney interviews industry leaders about one idea they are employing to significantly impact their work in education. From teacher preparedness and digital citizenship to early learning, inclusion and so much more, explore One Idea With: (link to blog)

Take Five

These five-minute professional learning videos are designed to provide building and education leaders with quick, but powerful leadership strategies around storytelling, social media, brand development and more.

Principal Update

Packed with timely information about upcoming events, new content, best practice from other administrators, instructional ideas to share with your staff and inspiration for staff development, the Principal Update is your window into all the great opportunities for educators, teachers and students from Discovery Education.
Learn more. (blog tag)

GRADUATE

Masters of Science Degree in Instructional Media

Discovery Education has partnered with Wilkes University to offer an online Masters of Science Degree in Instructional Media that is designed for today’s educator, to provide them with the tools to thrive in the 21st century classroom. Developed and taught by thought leaders in the field of educational technology, this degree combines the convenience of the online format with the expertise of Discovery Education and Wilkes University. Learn more

12-Credit EDGE Program

The Discovery Education EDGE Letter of Endorsement Program

An alternative to the full Masters of Science degree, this 12-credit program takes less than one year to complete. Gain an edge on leading the digital transition with this program that provides a quick pathway to expertise in emerging resources, allowing educators to stay on the cutting edge of digital technology and instruction.

STEM

Wilkes offers the only endorsement program coupling academic excellence from a recognized university with Discovery Education’s proven expertise in STEM and digital resource integration. Course designers and faculty members have designed a curriculum that is both relevant and practical, allowing for immediate career application.

WHO WE ARE

Content and Strategy

The Discovery Education Professional Development Content and Strategy Team is made up of highly qualified educators who work closely with our partners around the world to design results-driven professional learning solutions. Their approach combines the power of content, pedagogy and technology to create innovative and engaging learning experiences that drive systemic transformation. Meet the Content and Strategy Team.

Learning Consultants

Discovery Education Professional Development Consultants work with partners all over the world to deliver innovative and engaging content. Our consultants are expert practitioners with a passion for teaching and learning who have the ability to dynamically facilitate robust professional growth experiences that inspire educators and administrators to reimagine learning.

Speakers Bureau

Tap into your potential with Discovery Education’s Speakers Bureau. Work with our team of keynote speakers and workshop leaders to identify, encourage and promote the most effective use of technology in the classroom.ost effective use of technology in the classroom.

CALL TO ACTION/CONTACT US

Form
Chat

PARTNER STORIES

Partner story page
Number of people/schools impacted
Partner Voice

“The professional development has reinvented me as a teacher and as a colleague. I am the leader that is assisting other teachers in achieving their professional goals by growing and improving as teachers. They are using best practices to also reach their students and achieved maximum learning gains. Many teachers have told me that I have inspired them and I have helped them become DEN stars so that their students can benefit from all the resources available through Discovery Education. My participation as a DLN has forever changed my life.” – Miami-Dade Educator

“Participating in the PD has opened my eyes to the amount of technological avenues were available to use with my students. It not only made it fun for me to teach, but also made it engaging and innovative for my students. I am very grateful to have participated in such an amazing and eye-opening professional development.” –  Educator
“Thank you for making us better teachers!”  -Houston Educator

PRICING

One day of on-site professional development is generally $2500 for a 6-hour session with one of our expert instructors, accommodating 25 educators.

Customized professional learning sessions can be designed specifically to meet partner needs and generally start at $3500 per session.

Job embedded capacity building plans are designed to meet partner needs and generally start at $3500 per session.

Follow-up webinars are offered as part of Discovery Education’s Professional Development to provide continuing support. Webinars are sold in packages of three (3) one-hour sessions for $600.

Discovery Education provides ongoing support through the Discovery Education Community, a global professional learning community that supports educator growth and collaboration. Membership is available to all Discovery Education partners for no additional cost.

Please contact your Discovery Education partnership representative for more details.

EVENTS CALENDAR

Include Academies, Thought Leadership Events, Community Events

Educational Themes

This course collection has been designed to address the complex instructional and leadership challenges faced by today’s classroom teachers and leaders. Educators will grow their instructional strength with immersive experiences that examine how to use digital strategies and resources to increase student engagement, motivation, and relevance.

Courses:

Going Digital

EMPOWERING STUDENT-CENTERED LEARNING

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development inspires the purposeful use of technology through research-based pedagogy and digital-tool integration. As classrooms and learners migrate to a greater infusion of ubiquitous technology, educators will engage in the thoughtful exploration of strategies, resources, and methods that will target today’s digital learners and instill modern learning skills necessary for future college and careers.

Approach

We offer an engaging, yet practical, professional learning series aimed at equipping teachers to successfully “go digital” and transform their classroom practice to:

  • Facilitate a student-centered learning environment
  • Promote purposeful integration of tools in the areas of collaboration,
    formative assessment, content creation, communication, and access
    to rich content
  • Address classroom management, technology troubleshooting, and
    digital citizenship
  • Reflect on technology integration across a continuum of complexity

Going Digital Courses

The Blended Classroom – Session 1

Audience: K-12 Educators

Expand learning possibilities with blended learning! Immersive experiences and hands on explorations will allow participants to experience and consider how to facilitate student learning while purposefully integrating technology in their classrooms. Participants will tour the Technology Integration Matrix, investigate classroom management in a technology-rich environment and explore a variety of digital resources. In addition, participants will explore what it means to be a connected educator. Throughout the session teachers will collaborate with peers, create lesson plans, receive feedback, and reflect on session goals.

Guiding Questions:

What is blended learning and what does it look like when it is effectively implemented? Which materials and classroom management methods are most effective in a blended classroom? What digital tools support student learning in the blended classroom?

Learning Targets:

I CAN use the Technology Integration Matrix to explain how to effectively transform instruction.

I CAN model how to integrate technology purposefully in the classroom.

I CAN explain and share classroom management strategies that ensure the success of all students.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Diverse Learning in the Blended Classroom – Session 2

Audience: K-12 Educators

Participants will explore and share best practices while considering how a blended classroom provides opportunities for educators to facilitate learning and differentiate instruction. Participants will experience a collaborative, differentiated assignment that models how to integrate technology effectively and purposefully to increase student responsibility and meet all student needs. Teachers will explore assessment tools before planning a lesson that utilizes facilitation and differentiation techniques. Finally, teachers will consider how online professional learning communities can broaden their growth as educators.

Guiding Questions:

What methods and strategies encourage students to take more responsibility for their own learning?

What instructional practices meet the needs of diverse learners?

How can educators connect and share practices with others to encourage professional growth and development?

Learning Targets:

I CAN create a student-centered blended classroom learning environment.

I CAN model how to integrate assessment tools purposefully into the classroom.

I CAN design and facilitate learning experiences for students.

Prerequisite?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Flipped Learning with Tiered Assignments – Session 3

Audience: K-12 Educators

By immersing teachers in a positive, collaborative learning environment, they will consider how to use digital resources to meet the diverse needs of students, focusing on the use of flipped learning and tiered assignments. Teachers will troubleshoot possible scenarios, focusing on how to prevent and solve common classroom management issues in the blended classroom. Working together, sharing best practices, and exploring digital resources with their colleagues throughout the day will allow teachers to see themselves and each other as valuable resources. Hands-on explorations on such topics as flipped learning, tiered assignments, and creation tools will support teachers in planning lessons to meet the diverse needs of all students.

Guiding Questions:

How can we use assessment information to adjust our instructional practice?

How can we leverage digital resources to personalize instruction?

Learning Targets:

I CAN apply and share instructional methods that meet the diverse needs of students.

I CAN model and share Fair Use guidelines with students and colleagues.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Collaboration in the Blended Classroom – Session 4

Audience: K-12 Educators

Digital tools can be leveraged to increase and empower student collaboration. Participants will evaluate a variety of tools, which promote student collaboration and differentiation. Investigations on the management and assessment of group projects will empower teachers to plan lessons using research-based strategies and instructional methods to increase student collaboration. Participants will synthesize their understanding using a collaborative digital resource, investigate ways to leverage digital tools to assess group projects and apply their learning in their lesson plans. Participants will authentically collaborate with peers to obtain feedback and share their work with others.

Guiding Questions:

What methods and tools encourage student collaboration in a positive environment?

What strategies help teachers effectively manage and assess collaborative assignments?

Learning Targets:

I CAN apply and share instructional methods that encourage students to collaborate while maintaining a safe and supportive school and community environment.

I CAN manage and assess collaborative assignments in a way that empowers students to succeed.

Prerequisites: Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Student Created Content and Presentations – Session 5

Audience: K-12 Educators

Educators will authentically explore content creation and have the opportunity to design an original presentation. Participants will also experience a variety of feedback methods designed to keep the audience engaged during the presentation process. Digital storytelling and student portfolios will encourage students to become more responsible for their own learning. Applying their learning, participants will create a lesson with student created content with multiple feedback and assessment opportunities. Celebration and reflection on their professional growth will empower teachers to sustain the momentum at their schools.

Guiding Questions:

What instructional methods encourage students to learn from each other and take responsibility for their own learning?

What practices empower students to be content creators and assess themselves and each other?

Learning Targets:

I CAN apply and model instructional methods that encourage students to learn from each other and themselves.

I CAN integrate instructional practices that empower students to be content creators and assess themselves and each other.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Session 3: The Power of Differentiation

Audience: K-12 Educators

During Streaming Plus™ Sessions 1 and 2—Setting the Stage to Engage and The Stage Is Set:  Why Cognitive Engagement—we worked to apply engagement strategies to our lessons to insure that our students were not just present, but intellectually engaged in their learning experience.  Streaming Plus™ Session 3, The Power of Differentiation, builds on our previous learning by capitalizing on the use of stations-based learning as a catalyst for unleashing the power of differentiation in student-centered learning environments.  During this session teachers will discuss ways and means of differentiation, explore how Streaming Plus™ supports student learning, and participate in a stations-based immersion experience.  Teachers will also have an opportunity to apply their learning through planning and implementation of stations-based lessons in their own classrooms.

Guiding Questions:

How can I create an engaging student-centered learning environment?

How can I meet the needs of varied learners in my classroom?

How can I effectively use stations-based learning to meet the needs of all learners?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe an engaging, student-centered learning environment.

I CAN design differentiated learning experiences that are responsive to student learning needs.

I CAN plan and implement effective stations-based learning in my classroom.

 

Duration: 6 hours

Session 2: The Stage is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement

Audience: K-12 Educators

In Session One, we set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as through utilizing various search features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ supports teachers in their engagement of their students.  Day Two—The Stage is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement—enquires into the fact that we know we want our students to have fun learning and to be present during the learning process, but what does it mean to truly engage our students cognitively?  This course is designed to get at the heart of what cognitive engagement is and how we can insure that our students are connected to the content on a deeper level.  This session employs content specific immersions, a deep dive into Content Collections and Browse by Standard within Streaming Plus™, as well as opportunities for teachers to infuse their own lessons with cognitively engaging strategies and multi-modal texts.

Guiding Questions:

What is cognitive engagement and what does it look like?

How do we know our students are cognitively engaged?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what a cognitively engaged student looks and sounds like.

I CAN apply cognitive engagement strategies to my lessons to insure that my students are not just present, but intellectually engaged in their learning experience.

 

Duration: 6 hours

Session 1: Set the Stage to Engage

Audience: K-12 Educators

In this session, we will set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as the exploration of key features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ supports teachers in the engagement of their students.  Participants will explore each of the different assets and then determine how to use them effectively to engage all students in rigorous and relevant instruction, leaving this session with actionable plans to use Streaming Plus assets in their classroom immediately.

Guiding Questions:

What does student engagement look like in my classroom?

How can I use assets from Discovery Education Streaming Plus to create engaging lessons for my students?

How can I select the most effective instructional strategies to integrate with digital content to ensure the engagement of all students?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what student engagement looks and sounds like.

I CAN select, organize and manipulate the digital assets found within Discovery Education Streaming Plus to create engaging lessons for students.

I CAN apply and integrate modeled instructional strategies into my lessons to increase student learning and engagement.

Duration: 6 hours

Digital Storytelling with Discovery Education Streaming Plus

Audience: K-12 Educators

This day enables participants to examine the role of storytelling and story creation to increase content understanding and develop literacy skills.  In addition, participants will develop an understanding of the role of digital planning and publishing tools in the storytelling process.

Guiding Questions:

How can Digital Storytelling enhance content understanding and develop literacy skills?

What makes an effective story?

What is the role of technology in storytelling?

Learning Targets:

I CAN explore the background, research, and application of storytelling across the curriculum.

I CAN apply the storytelling to a content driven lesson.

I CAN utilize graphic organizers in the storytelling process.

I CAN create instructional plans for the integration of digital storytelling.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 6 hours

The Connected Educator

Audience: K-12 Educators

Today, educators must be more than information experts. They must be life-long learners collaborating, seeking new knowledge, and acquiring new skills.  Blogs and social networking tools empower educators to make these connections and grow a personal learning network (PLN) on a variety of topics. Research shows that a rich PLN compliments education improvement initiatives. This session will help participants make these valuable connections with other educators and increase opportunities to grow professionally.

Guiding Question:

How does being a connected educator make us a better?

Learning Targets:

I CAN navigate and use a variety of social networking tools to make connections with other educators.

I CAN analyze social networking tools to determine how to best find information and make connections with other educators.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Digital Citizenship

Audience: K-12 Educators

Participants will explore the elements of digital citizenship and how they impact children and stakeholders involved in the education of children. Participants will also be introduced to resources and ideas for incorporating the elements of digital citizenship in classrooms across grade levels and content areas.

Guiding Questions:

What are the elements of digital citizenship?

How are the elements of digital citizenship relevant in classrooms and at home?

What are some tools and resources for teaching digital citizenship?

Learning Targets:

I CAN discuss the nine elements of digital citizenship and their applications to our stakeholders.

I CAN use knowledge and resources from today’s activities to begin to integrate the practice of digital citizenship into everyday learning.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Digital Storytelling for College and Career Readiness

Audience: K-12 Educators

Placing technology in the hands of students to create digital stories is a powerful practice that has the potential to greatly impact their learning. Throughout this course, participants will learn how digital storytelling engages students emotionally, behaviorally, and cognitively. Much of the time will be spent exploring and discussing how educators can use digital storytelling in tandem with their current curriculum to create fresh and exciting ways for students to demonstrate mastery of college and career ready standards. In addition, assessment practices for these types of learning products will be addressed through interactive and thought-provoking experiences with colleagues.

Guiding Questions: 

Why is student engagement a necessary component in effective instruction and assessment?

What implications can digital storytelling have on students’ learning and engagement?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN explain the various types and levels of student engagement.

I CAN describe how digital storytelling can help students demonstrate mastery of standards.

I CAN create and assess rich tasks worthy of the class time spent.

Prerequisites? Yes, Digital Storytelling with Discovery Streaming Plus

Duration: 6 hours

Make the Connection: Web 2.0 and Effective Instructional Practice

Audience: K-12 Educators

Reach beyond the classroom walls and bring the world to your students with Web 2.0 tools that increase engagement with concepts and content. Web 2.0 tools are constantly evolving, and this session will help educators keep current with best practices and the creative use of integrating Web 2.0 tools into the classroom. Discovery Education Specialists will show participants how to use up to five current Web 2.0 tools to address specific student and instructional needs. Participants will learn how to effectively navigate the Web 2.0 application, integrate Discovery Education assets, and apply best teaching practices. In addition to an introduction to a variety of Web 2.0 tools and instructional strategies that work well with them, participants will have the opportunity to create content that can be utilized for instruction and demonstration purposes.

Guiding Questions:

How can I effectively use Web 2.0 tools to enhance instruction and meet students’ needs?

How can I modify the use of a Web 2.0 tool to address students’ needs?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe how Web 2.0 tools can be integrated into effective instructional practice.

I CAN apply Web 2.0 tools to support student learning needs.

I CAN use Web 2.0 tools to create instructional content to use with students.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Back to Main Menu

Leading Change

LEADING THROUGH LEARNING

Audience: District and Building Administrators, Curriculum Leads, and Instructional Coaches

Discovery Education Professional Development empowers leaders, regardless of role, to nurture effective instruction, manage the change process, and embrace the digital transition.

Approach

We offer a robust professional development series designed with the needs of building and central office leadership in mind. Sessions are inquiry driven, connecting traditional methodology with modern learning practices to:

  • Build a deep understanding and execute a vision of innovative teaching and learning
  • Motivate leaders to leverage the power of digital learning in their work
  • Examine the impact of technology and digital resources on instructional practice and student learning
  • Provide immersive opportunities for leaders to experience, recognize, and celebrate innovative teaching and learning

Leading Change Courses

Instructional Coaching Academy – Session 2

Audience: District and Building Administrators, Curriculum Leads and Instructional Coaches

Session 2 of this 3-session Academy furthers the coach’s understanding of skills and dispositions needed to be an effective instructional leader. The session begins with hands-on lesson design during which coaches will use the TPACK model to investigate student learning experiences. Coaches will also have the opportunity to explore the importance of active listening and reflective questioning through coaching conversation vignettes which will enable them to make immediate and relevant connections to practice. The learning will culminate with scenarios that require coaches to develop an effective coaching conversation which employs and integrates all of the skills learned throughout the day.

Guiding Questions:

What does an effective coaching conversation sound like?

How can I use active and listening and reflective questioning to help teachers solve their own problems of practice?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN augment existing learning tasks to include meaningful use of technology and pedagogy.

I CAN employ active listening in order to move coaching conversations forward.

I CAN use reflective questioning techniques that help teachers solve their own problems.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Instructional Coaching Academy – Session 1

Audience: District and Building Administrators, Curriculum Leads and Instructional Coaches

Session 1 of this 3-session Academy introduces coaches to the research behind instructional coaching. Whether participants operate under the title of literacy coach, math coach, academic coach, or instructional coach, all effective coaching is grounded in research-based principles. This academy is grounded in research and guides the coach’s exploration through essential coaching roles and responsibilities. Protocols and instructional strategies will be used and modeled as coaches learn and reflect throughout the day. The session will concluds with learning around the single most important aspect of any coaching relationship: building trusting relationships; this concept will be explored both individually and in small groups, pushing coaches to develop and articulate their personal coaching brand. 

Guiding Questions:

What are the roles and responsibilities of an instructional coach?

How can I effectively build trust with teachers I support?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN define and explain instructional coaching.

I CAN create and articulate a clear purpose for my coaching/support.

I CAN use strategies for building effective relationships with those I serve.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Instructional Coaching Academy – Session 3

Audience: District and Building Administrators, Curriculum Leads and Instructional Coaches

While sessions 1 and 2 of this 3-session Academy focus on a coach’s work with individual teachers, the third session explores how best to meet the needs of teachers in small group settings. Through exploration of adult learning theory and professional learning designs, coaches will adeptly create an action plan for their upcoming work with the teachers they support. The academy will culminate with a mini-EdCamp structure, allowing coaches to drive their own learning through relevant dialogue with each other.

Guiding Questions:

What aspects of adult learning theory are important to my role as a coach?

How do learning designs influence instructional outcomes?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN identify learning designs that meet the needs of teachers I serve.

I CAN lead or participate in a discussion about topics relevant to my practice.

I CAN create an action plan for my future coaching work.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Building a Culture of Inquiry with Science Techbook

Audience: Instructional Leaders

Discovery Education Science Techbook is an exciting digital resource which provides multiple pathways for all students to cultivate scientific thinking both in and beyond the classroom. However, leading the transition from print to digital is not without its challenges. It is imperative that school leaders have a thorough understanding of the digital resource, how it will support the tenets of good instruction and how to manage the change process with their teachers. During this session, leaders will have the opportunity to delve into inquiry as a basis for science instruction, explore key features of Techbook and engage in a collaborative exercise designed to help leaders anticipate and address teacher questions and concerns. 

Guiding Questions: 

How do the multimodal resources and features within Science Techbook provide opportunities for inquiry-based learning? 

How can I support teachers in their use of Science Techbook for inquiry-based teaching?  

Learning Targets:  

I CAN describe how Science Techbook supports best practices in teaching science. 

I CAN support educators as they transition to a digital resource. 

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

Set the Stage to Engage for School Leaders

Audience: Instructional leaders

In this session, school leaders will set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as the exploration of key features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ will support teachers in the engagement of their students.  School leaders will explore each of the different assets and then determine how they should be used effectively to engage all students in rigorous and relevant instruction, leaving this session with actionable plans to support teachers in their use of Streaming Plus assets in an engaging way.

Guiding Questions:

What does student engagement look like in classrooms throughout my school?

How can I use assets from Discovery Education Streaming Plus to support teachers as they create engaging lessons for students?

What actions will I implement to ensure that teachers are effectively integrating instructional strategies into their lessons?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what student engagement looks and sounds like in classrooms throughout my school.

I CAN support teachers in using the digital assets found within Discovery Education Streaming Plus effectively to create engaging lessons for students.

I CAN lead the integration of effective instructional strategies into classroom lessons to increase student learning and engagement.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

Cultivating and Supporting a Culture of Inquiry with Social Studies Techbook™

Audience: Instructional leaders

Through active engagement in inquiry, administrators will explore how Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™ can help cultivate critical thinking that impacts teacher and student work inside as well as beyond the classroom.  Administrators will have the opportunity to develop a vision of what inquiry can look like in their school and gain an understanding of the key features of Techbook™.  They will be immersed in collaborative activities that provoke conversation and serve to support them in exploring how Social Studies Techbook™ can be a powerful resource to support their teachers in using inquiry-based teaching and students in inquiry-based learning.

Guiding Questions:

How does inquiry-based learning foster critical thinking skills that students need to be successful?

How do the multimodal resources and features within Social Studies Techbook™ provide opportunities for inquiry-based teaching and learning?

How can I support teachers in their use of Social Studies Techbook™ for inquiry-based teaching?

Learning Targets:

I CAN state why cultivating a culture of inquiry and critical thinking is essential to student success.

I CAN identify how Social Studies Techbook™ can support teachers and students with inquiry-based teaching and learning.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

The Stage Is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement for School Leaders

Audience: Instructional leaders

In Session One, we set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as through utilizing various search features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ supports teachers in their engagement of their students.  Day Two—The Stage is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement—enquires into the fact that we know we want our students to have fun learning and to be present during the learning process, but what does it mean to truly engage our students cognitively?  This session is designed to get at the heart of what cognitive engagement is and how we can ensure that our students are connected to the content on a deeper level.  School leaders will explore the specifics of cognitive engagement and leave this session with a plan to lead the implementation of cognitive engagement strategies in all classrooms.

Guiding Questions:

What is cognitive engagement and what does it look like?

How do we know if our students are cognitively engaged?

What strategies do I need to implement to ensure the cognitive engagement of all students?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what a cognitively engaged student looks and sounds like.

I CAN apply cognitive engagement strategies to insure that my students are not just present, but intellectually engaged in their learning experiences.

I CAN determine a “next steps” strategy to implement that promotes cognitive engagement of all students.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

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Literacy

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education provides a series of professional development pathways that incorporate digital media and web 2.0 tools, revolutionizing literacy instruction and providing interactive, engaging learning opportunities for students.

Approach

We provide educators with immersive experiences to examine how to use digital strategies and resources grounded within the science of literacy to increase student engagement, motivation, and relevance. Educators will build meaningful practices to:

  • Leverage the power of multimodal text
  • Create authentic reading, writing, speaking, and listening tasks
  • Integrate web 2.0 tools and digital media

Literacy Courses

iRead, Write, and Think - Comprehension

Audience: K-5 Educators

This six-hour session is designed to broaden and deepen teachers’ understanding of the question “What does comprehension look like in the 21st Century?” Topics explored will include: research-based approaches in the use of digital media to aid students’ comprehension; exploration of methods that support students by pairing various digital media with specific comprehension strategies and skills; in-depth investigations using effective strategies such as close reading and text-dependent questions; utilizing powerful Web 2.0 tools to differentiate instruction for students; and, the use of digital portfolios to measure students’ learning and growth. 

These topics will be explored through a variety of experiential processes that will use whole-group, small-group, and partner collaborations. Ample time will be provided for participants to have meaningful dialogues with colleagues as well as to reflect on implications for their own practice. 

Guiding Questions:

What does comprehension look like in the 21st century?

How can I effectively increase student comprehension while simultaneously improving student engagement, motivation and relevance to the task?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN use various forms of digital media to support reading comprehension. 

I CAN pair strategies such as close reading and text-dependent questions with digital media.

I CAN describe how digital media allows students to practice higher-order thinking skills. 

I CAN use Web 2.0 tools to increase student engagement and efficacy.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

iRead, Write, and Think - Fluency

Audience: K-5 Educators

This session will address effective fluency instruction in K-5 classrooms. Participants will discuss three commonly used fluency strategies and discover ways to enhance them through the use of media and technology. A portion of hands-on time will be provided for participants to explore newly introduced tools, strategies, and incorporate ideas into lessons. Course emphasis will be placed on using media with targeted Web 2.0 tools and applications to increase student engagement and achievement in the area of fluency.

Guiding Questions:

What are effective instructional strategies that can be used to teach fluency?

What lessons can be created to incorporate fluency practice and instruction? 

How can teachers use technology tools to give meaningful feedback to students and help students give meaningful feedback to each other? 

Learning Targets: 

I CAN implement and refine fluency instruction as a bridge to comprehension.

I CAN describe how media and technology can make effective reading instruction more engaging.

I CAN increase the quality and quantity of different types of feedback.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Effective Writing Instruction - Session 1

Audience: K-5 Educators

Participants will be immersed in powerful strategies to teach writing. These strategies are meant to engage student writers through the process of generating ideas and are intended to increase students’ ability to write with meaning and purpose. Strategies will be useful for both teaching writing as well as conferring and supporting students through the revision process.

Guiding Questions:

How do best practices for teaching writing connect with my current practices? 

How will infusing the traits of writing into instruction support my students? 

What strategies can I use to inspire my students to write?

How does a community of writers enhance a writing workshop?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN describe Writing Workshop and identify the most important elements or structures.  

I CAN describe how to infuse the traits of writing into narrative, informative and opinion/argumentative writing. 

I CAN identify practical strategies for generating writing topics for each mode of writing. 

I CAN identify steps for establishing a community of writers and describe the importance of community within the Writing Workshop.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Effective Writing Strategies - Session 2

Audience: K-5 Educators

Session two continues the exploration of six trait writing. Participants will review traits learned in the previous session and explore three additional traits in depth. The principle of “reading like a writer” will be infused throughout a session that ties close reading to improving student writing. Participants will have multiple opportunities to put “reading like a writer” into practice as they experience the strategies of Sentence Fluency, Word Choice, and Conventions firsthand. 

Guiding Questions:

How does understanding the traits help me to be a better teacher of writing? 

How can I push my students to develop these traits in their own writing?

How does “reading like a writer” help students to be better writers?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN define each trait and find evidence of each trait in the standards. 

I CAN understand the concept of reading like a writer. 

I CAN gain strategies and create a plan for teaching and improving Sentence Fluency, Word Choice, and Conventions. 

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Effective Writing Strategies - Session 3

Audience: K-5 Educators

Feedback is one of the most powerful instructional tools a teacher has in his/her arsenal. Providing consistent feedback across and among teachers can be a challenge. In this session, participants will understand how to provide meaningful feedback to student writers as well as learn how the role of feedback is part of the conferring process. The session also includes the opportunity to analyze student writing using a rubric and to calibrate their responses with their colleagues. Discussions around both the student writing in relation to expectations as well as possible next steps for student writers will be conducted. The importance of translating student writing into actionable next steps will be emphasized through clear, precise and timely feedback.

Guiding Questions:

What is feedback and how feedback impact student writers?

How can conferring be used to provide feedback and support revision? 

In what ways does the analysis of student writing, collaboratively, improve my skills as a teacher of writing? 

How might I use data collected from analyzing student work to be a responsive teacher of writing?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN describe what feedback is and is not. 

I CAN employ conferring as a source of feedback to support student writers in the revision process. 

I CAN describe the role of collaborative analysis of writing in the instructional process. 

I CAN use data collected from the deep analysis of student work to drive lesson planning.

Prerequisites? Yes 

Duration: 6 hours

Consume, Critique, Produce: A Framework for Rigorous Instruction

Audience: K-12 Educators

Participants will engage in various activities that will deepen their understanding of rigorous writing instruction which aligns with college and career ready standards and expectations, specific to argumentation. Participants will grasp the concepts within Consume, Critique and Produce (CCP), a writing framework, which incorporates the use of mentor text as a method for explicitly teaching writing. CCP is inquiry-driven and engages students in the purposeful analysis of text. The CCP process will result in students as producers of their own quality texts. 

Guiding Questions:

How do I make my writing workshop reflect the shifts in more rigorous writing standards?

How can teaching within a CCP framework to enhance my students’ skills as writers?

Learning Targets:

I CAN understand the expectations for teaching writing based upon more rigorous writing standards.

I CAN describe the shifts from persuasive to argumentation writing. 

I CAN define the Consume, Critique, Produce (CCP) framework. 

I CAN consider how CCP might apply to my own teaching.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like an Historian - Session 1

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Begin to integrate literacy strategies into your social studies lessons. In this session, participants will learn how to apply high-yield reading strategies in an engaging and meaningful way to help students learn social studies content while acquiring disciplinary literacy skills. Participants will experience how the close reading and analysis of digital media, complex text, and primary source documents fosters critical thinking skills such as sourcing, contextualization, and corroboration. These skills, coupled with reading strategies, will strengthen critical analysis capabilities that make students college and career ready readers and writers.

Guiding Questions:

What are effective literacy strategies that will build student confidence, understanding and independence with complex, historical text?

How can a historical investigation of multiple sources engage students and help them construct historical arguments based on evidence?

Learning Targets:

I CAN identify disciplinary literacy skills in social studies and strategies designed to teach them.

I CAN model historical inquiry with a variety of materials including text, maps, secondary source documents, and digital media. 

I CAN cite textual evidence to support an historical analysis of social studies texts and secondary source documents. 

I CAN gather evidence from multiple sources to produce well-written, historical explanations.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like an Historian - Session 2

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Expand critical thinking with an engaging follow-up to Read, Write, and Think Like an Historian, Session 1! Participants will focus specifically on the value of historical thinking and how to make it explicit to students. Participants will engage in an historical exploration and analyze primary source documents. A Discovery Education Specialist will share strategies that highlight specific ways that historians approach and interact with text. In this session, participants will apply historical process skills to create a digital story and a written response describing specific understandings learned during the investigation. 

Guiding Questions:

How can Social Studies Techbook be used to reinforce historical thinking skills and inquiry-based reading?

Learning Targets:

I CAN demonstrate how to incorporate historical thinking skills and inquiry-based reading through the analysis of primary source documents. 

I CAN use digital storytelling to encourage chronological thinking and to convey interpretations of historical events.

I CAN create engaging student assessments with embedded media.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scholar - Session 1

Audience: 6-12 Educators

This two–part session will support grade 6-12 ELA teachers in designing compelling lessons that incorporate digital media and target college and career readiness standards and expectations. During this session, participants will experience model lessons that creatively support research-based literacy instruction by integrating multi-modal text and various Web 2.0 tools. In addition, participants will create media-rich activities and lessons that reflect the rigor required by current reading, writing, and speaking standards.

Guiding Questions:

How can I integrate digital media into my standards-aligned instruction?

How can I improve literacy skills and foster critical thinking through the use of Web 2.0 tools? 

Learning Targets:

I CAN implement strategies that foster critical thinking and literacy skills within the classroom.

I CAN purposefully select digital media that enhances standards-aligned ELA instruction.

I CAN create media rich lessons that offer students a variety of experiences with complex text.

I CAN use web 2.0 tools to facilitate discussion and foster collaboration.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scholar - Session 2

Audience: 6-12 Educators

During the second part of this two–part session, grade 6-12 ELA teachers will continue lesson immersions using research-based literacy strategies that integrate digital media and web 2.0 tools. Through the exploration of centers, writing prompts, close reading and the effective use of informational texts, participants will use Discovery Education’s board builder to design lessons and resources for immediate classroom implementation.

Guiding Questions:

How can I integrate digital media into my standards-aligned instruction?

How can I improve literacy skills and foster critical thinking through the use of Web 2.0 tools? 

Learning Targets:

I CAN implement strategies that foster critical thinking and literacy skills within the classroom.

I CAN purposefully select digital media that enhances standards-aligned ELA instruction.

I CAN create media rich lessons that offer students a variety of experiences with complex text.

I CAN use web 2.0 tools to facilitate discussion and foster collaboration.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scientist - Session 1

Audience: 3-12 Educators

Begin to integrate literacy strategies into your science lessons. In this session, a Discovery Education Specialist will help participants learn how to foster this reciprocal relationship using rich text, digital media, interactive writing, and high-yield reading strategies. Through an inquiry experience, reading and writing strategies will be examined to guide the development of content knowledge and practice scientific thinking while enhancing students’ literacy skills. Participants will explore strategies for building the critical analysis skills applicable to written text, science labs, media, and more. 

Guiding Questions:

How do I facilitate inquiry-based reading instruction into my science instruction?

How can I effectively integrate reading strategies in my lessons through the use of multimodal texts?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN facilitate inquiry-based reading in science. 

I CAN select multi-modal text that encourages scientific investigation skills. 

I CAN integrate high yield reading strategies within science instruction. 

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scientist - Session 2

Audience: 3-12 Educators

This session is an engaging follow-up to Read, Write and Think Like a Scientist, Session 1, and will focus specifically on the value of scientific thinking and how to make it explicit to students. Participants will engage in a scientific investigation. Strategies that highlight specific ways in which scientists approach and interact with text will be examined and applied through hands-on exercises. A Discovery Education Specialist will guide participants through the application of the scientific process to create a digital story and draft a written response describing specific understandings learned during the investigation. 

Guiding Questions:

How can I maximize the technology resources available?

How can I effectively plan lessons that integrate digital media, literacy skills, and engagement to promote scientific knowledge?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN explain how to make claims about multimodal text and the importance of using evidence to support them. 

I CAN help students convey arguments that cite valid and sufficient evidence. 

I CAN facilitate argumentative writing that presents a claim, sufficient evidence, and reasoning.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

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Math

PROBLEMS WORTH SOLVING. MATH WORTH TEACHING.

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development shows educators how to engage all students in deep mathematical thinking, modeling, and application using digital media and web 2.0 tools as they develop conceptual understanding and mathematical fluency with real-world problems. Participants capitalize on best practices by learning how to facilitate active, inquiry-based classrooms where students take control of their learning.

Approach

We provide teachers with immersive experiences to develop effective math strategies, build meaningful digital practices, and grow instructional skills by:

  • Exploring three aspects of rigor: conceptual understanding, procedural
    fluency, and real-world applications and their effective classroom
    implementation
  • Using digital tools to assess mathematical understanding, fluency, and
    problem-solving
  • Integrating web 2.0 tools and digital media
  • Encouraging exploration and investigation to develop students’
    conceptualization, ability to model with mathematics, and application of
    mathematics concepts and skills to real-world problems worth solving
  • Leveraging digital media to craft relevant real-world problems for students

Math Courses

Make the Connection: Web 2.0 and Effective Instructional Practices

Audience: K-12 Educators

Reach beyond the classroom walls and bring the world to your students with Web 2.0 tools that increase engagement with concepts and content. Web 2.0 tools are constantly evolving, and this course will help keep educators current with best practices and the creative use of integrating Web 2.0 tools into the classroom. Discovery Education Specialists will show participants how to use up to five current Web 2.0 tools to address specific student and instructional needs. Participants will learn how to effectively navigate the Web 2.0 application, integrate Discovery Education assets, and apply best teaching practices. In addition to an introduction to a variety of Web 2.0 tools and instructional strategies that work well with them, participants will have the opportunity to create content that can be utilized for instruction and demonstration purposes.

Learning Targets:

I CAN purposefully incorporate Web 2.0 tools into effective instructional practices.

I CAN use Web 2.0 tools to create meaningful learning experiences for my students.

I CAN explain how Web 2.0 tools can address varying needs of my learners.

Duration: 6 hours

Mathematical Practice Series - Session 1: The Overarching Habits of Mind

Audience: K-12 Educators

This series is designed to deepen participant understanding and application of the Common Core Standards for Mathematical Practice. These practices embody the mathematical thinking and habits of mind needed for solving real world problems. In each session, participants will design appropriate math tasks that foster student development of these practices. Furthermore, they will capitalize on best instructional practices modeled by the facilitator to create pathways for students to achieve a deeper understanding of mathematics. This session will also focus on Math Practices one and six, which are considered the overarching habits of mind. Application of these practices will result in student work that is accurate and mathematically sound, and will provide a foundation for weaving the other six mathematical practices into instruction.

Guiding Questions:

What’s the intent of each Math Practice and their importance to math instruction and student learning?

What teacher actions most effectively develop students’ mathematical “habits of mind?”

What evidence indicates student acquisition of the math practices? 

Learning Targets:

I CAN explain the key role of the Math Practices.

I CAN describe the intent of Math Practices 1 and 6 and explain their importance to math instruction and student learning.

I CAN apply strategies for developing and assessing student proficiency in MP 1 and 6.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Mathematical Practice Series - Session 2: Focus on Mathematical Reasoning, Explaining and Modeling

Audience: K-12 Educators

This series is designed to deepen participant understanding and application of the Common Core Standards for Mathematical Practice. These practices embody the mathematical thinking and habits of mind needed for solving real world problems. In each session, participants will design appropriate math tasks that foster student development of these practices. Furthermore, they will capitalize on best instructional practices modeled by the facilitator to create pathways for students to achieve a deeper understanding of mathematics. This session will focus on Math Practices two and three, which address mathematical reasoning and explanation, and Math Practice four, which addresses modeling. Together, these practices will promote skills that enable students to represent their learning and communicate their thinking through justification of their mathematical ideas.

Guiding Questions:

What’s the intent of each Math Practice and their importance to math instruction and student learning?

What teacher actions most effectively develop students’ mathematical “habits of mind?”

What evidence indicates student acquisition of the math practices? 

Learning Targets:

I CAN identify the intent of MP 2, 3 and 4 and explain their importance to math instruction and student learning.

I CAN apply strategies for developing and assessing student proficiency in MP 2, 3 and 4.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Mathematical Practice Series - Session 3: Deepening Mathematical Thinking with Using Tools, Seeing Structure and Generalizing

Audience: K-12 Educators

This series is designed to deepen participant understanding and application of the Common Core Standards for Mathematical Practice. These practices embody the mathematical thinking and habits of mind needed for solving real world problems. In each session, participants will design appropriate math tasks that foster student development of these practices. Furthermore, they will capitalize on best instructional practices modeled by the facilitator to create pathways for students to achieve a deeper understanding of mathematics. This session will focus on Math Practices five, seven, and eight, which require students to choose appropriate tools and bridge connections between math concepts, so they can make knowledgeable generalizations and connections between procedural fluency and conceptual understanding.

Guiding Questions:

What’s the intent of each Math Practice and its importance to math instruction and student learning?

What teacher actions most effectively develop students’ mathematical “habits of mind?”

What evidence indicates student acquisition of the math practices? 

Learning Targets:

I CAN identify the intent of MP 5, 7and 8 and explain their importance to math instruction and student learning.

I CAN apply strategies for developing and assessing student proficiency in MP 5, 7 and 8.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

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Project-Based Learning

DEVELOPING AUTHENTIC CONNECTIONS TO THE REAL WORLD

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development offers a Project-Based Learning pathway (PBL) designed to bring learning to life. Through the investigation of the ABC’s of PBL, participants explore best practices of inquiry-driven instruction, finding connections between real-world experiences and the classroom and driving toward solving problems for genuine audiences. Participants develop rigorous learning opportunities to engage, excite, and intrigue students through content directly linked to their real world. The projects students engage in become the vehicles for student-centered learning driven by choice, curiosity, and authentic problem-solving.

Approach

We empower learners through differentiation and choice with learning experiences that:

  • Provide relevance and purpose for students to apply learning
  • Foster a student-centered learning culture through inquiry and choice
  • Focus on metacognition and emphasize process equal to product
  • Integrate blended learning and state standards directly into the
    instructional experience
  • Embed content within the project learning cycle

Project-Based Learning Courses

Foundations of Project-based Learning

Audience: K-12 Educators

During the session, participants will deconstruct and rebuild the ideas, processes, and logistics of creating, launching, and maintaining an authentic experience in their classroom. Participants will dig into the process of project-based learning, explore the idea of endless inquiry, deconstruct and rebuild project questions, and explore the community aspect of this instruction. In groups, participants will be given time to start to develop a “starter” experience which they will build upon over subsequent sessions.  

Guiding Questions:

What is project-based learning?

How do I get started with creating a project-based learning experience for my students?

What makes project-based learning effective?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what project-based learning is and is not.

I CAN delineate conditions and requirements for an effective project-based learning experience.

I CAN begin to design a foundational project-based learning experience with my colleagues for our students.

Duration: 6 hours

Layering Experiences on the Foundations of Project-based Learning

Audience: K-12 Educators

The second session for educators implementing project-based learning in their classrooms shifts gears to dig into some of the details needed to make the experience worthwhile for students. Participants will explore the tenants of 21st Century Learning, engage in dialogue around content, and engage in metacognitive activities. Finally, participants will start the feedback loop with each other in order to develop the most effective project-based learning experiences possible.

Guiding Questions:

What are the 21st Century skills and why do they matter?

How do I balance the importance of teaching students the skills needed for the future while still emphasizing content?

Why are my colleagues such a powerful tool when designing project-based learning experiences?

Learning Targets:

I CAN design a project-based learning experience which balances career and college ready skills with content expectations. 

I CAN collaborate with my colleagues to design engaging and purposeful learning experiences. 

I CAN give constructive feedback to my colleagues in order to develop deeper learning experiences. 

Duration: 6 hours

Building a Project Map for Project-based Learning

Audience: K-12 Educators

Session three empowers educators with practical strategies for continuing to implement project-based learning. A key element is developing a more detailed project map to effectively layout goals and timing for a project-based learning experience. Educators will also explore how digital tools and resources can support inquiry and empower students to create, collaborate, communicate, and think critically. During this session, participants will reflect on the process thus far, build in ways to make the experience more rigorous. Time will be provided for participants to apply new learning. 

Guiding Questions:

How can digital resources and tools support project-based learning experiences?

How do I use a project map to effectively layout my goals and timing for a project-based learning experience?

Why is vetting a project-based learning experience an important part of the process?

Learning Targets:

I CAN use a project map to effectively plan a longer term project-based learning experience.

I CAN incorporate digital tools and resources to promote college and career skills.

I CAN effectively evaluate project-based learning experiences.

Duration: 6 hours

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Science

LEADING WITH INQUIRY

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development offers educators learning experiences designed to integrate the tenets of inquiry with rich digital media and web 2.0 tools. Participants use resources flexibly to create engaging learning opportunities, which strengthen critical thinking, core ideas, science and engineering practices, and communication skills.

Approach

We empower learners with multiple pathways to success in science content:

  • Is grounded in inquiry, which fosters scientific thinking as well conceptual
    understanding
  • Provides multiple means for teachers and students to experience science
  • Inspires curiosity and links science to the real world through hands-on tasks as well as digital explorations
  • Integrates argumentation writing through a scientific explanation, as
    students routinely collect evidence, make a claim, and support their
    claims with the evidence and logical reasoning

Science Courses

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scientist - Session 1

Audience: 3-12 Educators

Begin to integrate literacy strategies into your science lessons. In this session, a Discovery Education Specialist will help participants learn how to foster this reciprocal relationship using rich text, digital media, interactive writing, and high-yield reading strategies. Through an inquiry experience, reading and writing strategies will be examined to guide the development of content knowledge and practice scientific thinking while enhancing students’ literacy skills. Participants will explore strategies for building the critical analysis skills applicable to written text, science labs, media, and more. 

Guiding Questions:

How do I facilitate inquiry-based reading instruction into my science instruction?

How can I effectively integrate reading strategies in my lessons through the use of multimodal texts?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN facilitate inquiry-based reading in science. 

I CAN select multi-modal text that encourages scientific investigation skills. 

I CAN integrate high yield reading strategies within science instruction. 

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scientist - Session 2

Audience: 3-12 Educators

This session is an engaging follow-up to Read, Write and Think Like a Scientist, Session 1, and will focus specifically on the value of scientific thinking and how to make it explicit to students. Participants will engage in a scientific investigation. Strategies that highlight specific ways in which scientists approach and interact with text will be examined and applied through hands-on exercises. A Discovery Education Specialist will guide participants through the application of the scientific process to create a digital story and draft a written response describing specific understandings learned during the investigation. 

Guiding Questions:

How can I maximize the technology resources available?

How can I effectively plan lessons that integrate digital media, literacy skills, and engagement to promote scientific knowledge?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN explain how to make claims about multimodal text and the importance of using evidence to support them. 

I CAN help students convey arguments that cite valid and sufficient evidence. 

I CAN facilitate argumentative writing that presents a claim, sufficient evidence, and reasoning.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Digital Storytelling in Science

Audience: K-12 Educators

Explore innovative ways for students to demonstrate understanding of scientific concepts. Digital Storytelling engages your students in higher levels of critical thinking as they create movies to show their level of understanding around concepts in science. In this course, a Discovery Education Specialist helps participants learn to combine text, images, audio, and video to tell stories that make scientific concepts stick. Participants create simple to complex digital stories as they explore the art of digital storytelling and the ways it can be used in an inquiry-driven lesson.

Learning Targets:

I CAN explore the background, research and application of storytelling across the curriculum.

I CAN apply the storytelling to a content driven lesson.

I CAN utilize graphic organizers in the storytelling process.

I CAN create instructional plans for the integration of digital storytelling.

Duration: 6 hours

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Social Studies

READ, WRITE, THINK LIKE A HISTORIAN

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development enhances social studies instruction through the integration of digital media and web 2.0 tools. Educators learn how to engage students in historical thinking as they create learning environments with increased cognitive challenge, inquiry, and the critical thinking skills that are central to the discipline of social studies.

Approach

We offer an enriching and meaningful professional learning series that provides educators with immersive experiences to strengthen pedagogy, broaden the effective use of digital resources, and engage students of all abilities in social studies content:

  • Promoting historical thinking and process skills
  • Providing exposure to varied and complex texts
  • Integrating web 2.0 tools and digital media
  • Infusing literacy strategies to provide greater access and engagement with primary and secondary sources

Social Studies Courses

Read, Write, and Think Like a Historian, Day 1

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Begin to integrate literacy strategies into your social studies lessons. In this course, participants learn how to apply high-yield reading strategies in an engaging and meaningful way to help students learn social studies content while acquiring new literacy skills. Participants experience how the close reading and analysis of digital media, complex text, and primary source documents fosters critical thinking skills such as sourcing, contextualization, and corroboration. These skills, coupled with the reading strategies, strengthen critical analysis capabilities that make students more adept readers.

Learning Targets:

I CAN approach reading and writing in social studies from historical perspective.

I CAN model historical inquiry with a variety of materials including text, maps, secondary source documents, and digital media.

I CAN embed content area literacy routines within each lesson.

I CAN cite textual evidence to support historical analysis of social studies text and secondary source documents.

I CAN gather evidence from multiple sources to produce well-written, historical explanations.

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Historian, Day 2

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Expand critical thinking with an engaging follow-up to Read, Write, and Think Like a Historian Day One, and focus specifically on the value of historical thinking and how to make it explicit to students. Participants engage in a historical exploration and analyze primary source documents. A Discovery Education Specialist shares strategies that highlight specific ways in which historians approach and interact with text. In this sessions, participants apply historical process skills to create a digital story and a written response describing specific understandings learned during the investigation.

Learning Targets:

I CAN reinforce historical thinking skills and inquiry based reading through the analysis of primary source documents.

I CAN use digital storytelling to encourage chronological thinking and convey interpretations of historical events.

I CAN create engaging student evaluation with embedded media.

Duration: 6 hours

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STEM

DISCOVER. COLLABORATE. INNOVATE.

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

Discovery Education Professional Development offers a collection of pathways to empower educators and administrators to build a culture of STEM teaching and learning within their schools and surrounding communities. Powerful critical thinking and exploration practices vital to career readiness will be drawn across disciplines and connected by a common or transdisciplinary theme.

Programs:

STEM Foundations

Discovery Education’s STEM Foundations offers educators a variety of professional learning experiences that provide foundational support around STEM teaching and learning within a district, cohort, or school.

STEM Leader Corps

Discovery Education’s STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning that develops and nurtures teachers and administrators as they build a culture around STEM teaching and learning through a shared leadership model, robust STEM professional development, ongoing job-embedded coaching, and administrative leadership support.

STEMformation

Discovery Education’s STEMformation is a three-year system for professional learning and leadership within a school designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning, which includes robust STEM professional development, ongoing job-embedded coaching, and administrative leadership. This comprehensive partnership will engage key stakeholders to create a shared STEM vision; develop educators and administrators; cultivate inquiry-based, transdisciplinary instruction; and prepare our future workforce.

STEM Foundations Courses

STEM Foundations: Getting Started with STEM

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

Transform teaching and learning with a focus on STEM student-centered classrooms using Discovery Education Streaming Plus, an innovative instructional resource designed to support transdisciplinary learning experiences. Participants will be immersed in Discovery Education’s extensive library of rich and engaging media that spans all curriculum areas and provides resources that are tied to inquiry-based learning. This session is designed to engage teachers in the why and what of STEM and how real-world learning experiences engage students in rigorous learning experiences. Participants will have the opportunity to experience exemplary STEM learning activities and plan experiences for their own students.

Guiding Questions:

What is STEM?

What makes an exemplary STEM experience in the classroom for my students? 

How can I use digital resources in order to bring real-world experiences to my students?

How can I effectively use instructional strategies with multimodal text? 

Learning Targets: 

I CAN I can analyze the nature of exemplary STEM lessons.

I CAN navigate Streaming Plus to locate a variety of STEM resources that engage students in rigorous learning experiences.

I CAN apply effective instructional strategies with multimodal text resources.

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

STEM Foundations: Centers-Based Teaching and Learning with STEM

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

Using a center-based approach, participants will engage in a STEM-infused model lesson first hand by rotating through a variety of experiences designed to build student content knowledge. Directions, management, resources and planning techniques for centers will be shared as participants unpack this model and work collaboratively to create their own centers using materials and planning templates. This session will use a variety of instructional approaches such as whole group instruction, small group instruction and paired activities. In addition, facilitators will model effective instructional practices and will encourage participant inquiry.

Guiding Questions:

How can STEM-infused centers-based instruction lead toward student-directed learning?

How can I effectively integrate media and research-based instructional strategies to support teaching and learning in the classroom?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe a centers-based lesson from the student and teacher perspective.

I CAN develop a dynamic centers-based lesson that incorporates a variety of resources and instructional strategies.

I CAN effectively use digital media with high-yield instructional strategies in a one, few or multi-computer environment.

Prerequisites? Yes

Duration: 6 hours

STEM Foundations: Maximizing Student Engagement through STEM

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

This session will illuminate an immersive experience designed to provide STEM leaders with authentic, innovative teaching and learning that incorporates rigorous, digital assignments with STEM-infused practices. STEM teachers will explore educational research on rigor and scaffolding, then translate those best practices to STEM instruction using digital tools. STEM teachers will also create a STEM-infused digital assignment that includes two or more digital assets, capitalizing on the universal design features embedded in Discovery Education Streaming, thus creating pathways for all students to meet essential questions and learning targets through STEM practices.

Guiding Questions:

How can we effectively differentiate instruction using Discovery Education tools?

How can we leverage engaging and collaborative STEM practices to increase student achievement?

How can rigor and scaffolding help create student-centered classrooms infused with STEM?

Learning Targets:

I CAN construct a student performance task which requires multiple media types.

I CAN create assignments based on student interest, readiness and learning profiles.

Prerequisites? Yes

Duration: 6 hours

STEM Foundations: Developing Foundations for STEM Experiences in the Classroom

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

Participants will dive into the development of rigorous STEM lessons and immersion activities for immediate use in their own classrooms. Participants will collaborate with their peers to develop STEM tasks that are differentiated for content skills, literacy skills and numeracy. The essential elements of STEM instruction including content standards, real-world examples, careers, transdisciplinary practices, and the 4 C’s will be infused throughout all aspects of building high quality STEM lessons.

Guiding Questions:

What makes an instructional experience STEM? 

How can we integrate authentic real-world experiences into lessons that match our student’s schema?

How can a lesson be analyzed for STEM elements? 

Learning Targets:  

I CAN identify examples of STEM practices in lessons and evaluate how they relate to STEM indicators.

I CAN explain the meaning of “real-world” application in relation to my students.

I CAN analyze and transform a lesson into a STEM experience.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

STEM Leader Corps Courses

STEM Leader Corps - Year 1

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

The focus of year one is to build highly effective, robust, student-centered environments through the development of teacher leadership skills tied to a school wide learning lab culture. STEM Leader Corps participants will utilize skills and information gained to create authentic STEM‐infused performance tasks that are rich and engaging, student-oriented and supportive of differentiation while also authentically assessing student progress. The implementation of this progression will include 5 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 3 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

How can I fulfill my role as a STEM Teacher Leader?

How can I effectively integrate media and research-based instructional strategies to support teaching and learning in the classroom?

How do I begin to infuse STEM into my instruction?

Learning Targets:  

I CAN create and support an atmosphere for collaboration through a school-wide learning lab approach.

I CAN utilize 21st century teaching strategies through multimodal resources.

I CAN assist with moving instructional practice away from teacher-directed towards student-led.

I CAN implement best practice STEM strategies to engage students through the use of interdisciplinary learning.

I CAN develop teacher leadership strategies.

Prerequisites?  No

STEM Leader Corps - Year 2

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

The focus of year two of STEM Leader Corps is to develop high quality STEM experiences in “MY” classroom through multiple forms of inquiry including project-based learning. STEM Leader Corp participants will plan larger scale change efforts to engage their colleagues in this shift in pedagogy. Participants will develop and implement actionable strategies to begin to transform their classroom and support their colleagues in building STEM instructional practices. The implementation of this progression will include 7 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

What does our STEM vision look like when effectively implemented? 

What would it look like to transform my classroom into the model STEM classroom of our vision? 

How can I engage and support my colleagues in building STEM instructional practices?  

Learning Targets:  

I CAN deliver challenging standards-based STEM learning activities.

I CAN utilize highly effective instructional strategies tying content to STEM careers and the real world.

I CAN use assessments in helping to measure creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication.

I CAN develop a learning lab environment and culture. 

Prerequisites?  Yes

STEM Leader Corps - Year 3

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

The focus of year three of STEM Leader Corps is to develop robust critical thinking instructional strategies while collaborating with grade level teams for the creation of robust transdisciplinary units. Transdisciplinary teaching and learning requires deliberate planning in regard to making organic connections to the real world and curricular standards. Participants will gain a deeper understanding of STEM transdisciplinary themes and strategies to lead their buildings toward the development of STEM transdisciplinary units. The implementation of this progression will include 7 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

Coming soon.

Learning Targets:  

I CAN increase opportunities for learning lab access and internal STEM coaching.

I CAN create and implementing standards-based STEM experiences through a transdisciplinary approach.

I CAN promote future career and college skills while exposing students to the possibilities of STEM. 

I CAN increase student discourse and the development of student-led inquiries. 

Prerequisites?  Yes

STEM Leader Corps - Year 4

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

STEM Leader Corps is built on the concept of gradual release to build sustainable practices in all classrooms. How do we keep building a culture of STEM through the introduction of new initiatives, mandates, and shifts within a school? The focus of year four of STEM Leader Corps is to implement sustainable practices that bring depth to instruction, emphasized through the integration of parallel initiatives, instructional strategies and continuous community connections. The implementation of this progression will include 7 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

Coming soon.

Learning Targets:

I CAN deliver challenging standards-based STEM learning activities.

I CAN utilize highly effective instructional strategies tying content to STEM careers and the real world.

I CAN use assessments that effectively and authentically measure creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication.

I CAN implement a learning lab environment to support the continued growth and sustainability of a STEM culture.

Prerequisites?  Yes

STEMformation Courses

STEMformation Year 1 - High Quality STEM Lessons

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEMformation is a three year system for professional learning and leadership designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning. This comprehensive partnership will engage key stakeholders to create a shared STEM vision, develop educators and administrators, cultivate inquiry-based, transdisciplinary instruction and prepare our future workforce.

The focus of year one is to develop high quality STEM experiences. Its primary goal is to foster a community of stakeholders sharing a common language, knowledge, understanding and vision for STEM education and to ignite community engagement around this cultural change. The implementation of this progression will include 8 sessions of professional learning along with 15 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM Innovators. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 8 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

Why is STEM important for our classrooms, our school, and our district?

What does STEM teaching and learning look like?

What is my role in supporting STEM in my school and district?

What is our STEM story?

Learning Targets:

I CAN provide challenging STEM learning activities.

I CAN understand and use effective strategies for STEM topics.

I CAN use frequent formative and summative assessments aligned to measuring creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication.

Prerequisites?  No

STEMformation Year 2 - Transdisciplinary STEM Units

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEMformation is a three year system for professional learning and leadership designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning. This comprehensive partnership will engage key stakeholders to create a shared STEM vision, develop educators and administrators, cultivate inquiry-based, transdisciplinary instruction and prepare our future workforce.

Year two of STEMformation focuses on developing critical thinking in students, implementing project-based learning, and developing grade level collaboration for the creation of transdisciplinary units. This focus will support the year’s goal to empower the school community with innovative teaching and learning experiences as well as strategies designed to engage all stakeholders in moving their school toward their STEM vision. The implementation of this progression will include 6 sessions of professional learning along with 15 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM Innovators. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 8 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

How does project-based learning support STEM? 

What do STEMbl experiences look like for my students?

How do I implement and lead transdisciplinary teaching and learning in my school? 

Learning Targets:

I CAN develop structures and opportunities that support data-driven, cross-curricular collaboration and professional learning.

I CAN apply facilitation of learning in my classroom vs. direct, explicit instruction.

I CAN integrate science, technology, engineering and mathematics through a transdisciplinary approach.

I CAN promote College and Career Readiness outcomes. 

I CAN implement a student-centered, inquiry-based curriculum, authentically integrating application of real world concepts.

Prerequisites?  Yes

STEMformation Year 3 - Vertical Alignment of Transdisciplinary STEM Units

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEMformation is a three year system for professional learning and leadership designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning. This comprehensive partnership will engage key stakeholders to create a shared STEM vision, develop educators and administrators, cultivate inquiry-based, transdisciplinary instruction and prepare our future workforce.

During year three of STEMformation, the implementation of problem-based learning and the development of STEM in a vertical capacity across grade levels will be the primary focus. The goal will be the continuation of the transformation of the school community through a gradual release of responsibility to school leaders and STEM Innovators in leading the change effort. The implementation of this progression will include 5 sessions of professional learning along with 18 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM Innovators. District and building administrators will receive 8 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

Coming Soon.

Learning Targets:

I CAN utilize structures and opportunities that support data-driven, cross-curricular collaboration and professional learning.

I CAN create and implement multiple and diverse opportunities for students to develop STEM conceptual knowledge and higher-order cognitive skills through various types of inquiry.

I CAN utilize productive, focused collaboration through a variety of formats and in various time frames, including intentional collaboration with educators of the STEM disciplines, other disciplines and strategic alliances with stakeholders from the STEM community. 

Prerequisites?  Yes

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Teacher Leadership

GROWING LEADERS. GROWING CAPACITY.

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Leader Corps provides a system for professional learning and leadership employed to fuel an innovative change movement, which is intentionally designed to:

  • Drive system transformation
  • Build a culture of continuous improvement
  • Support a shared leadership model
  • Maximize teachers’ impact on student learning

Programs:

Digital Leader Corps

Digital Leader Corps is a multiyear system for professional learning and leadership employed to fuel an innovative change movement. This program has been intentionally designed to empower and grow teacher leaders as they drive system transformation, build a culture of continuous improvement, and maximize impact on student learning.

STEM Leader Corps

Discovery Education’s STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning that develops and nurtures teachers and administrators as they build a culture around STEM teaching and learning through a shared leadership model, robust STEM professional development, ongoing job-embedded coaching, and administrative leadership support.

Digital Leader Corps Courses

YEAR ONE: Emerging as Leaders: The Student-Centered Classroom

Audience: K-12 Educators

As members of Digital Leader Corps, teachers will experience dynamic learning opportunities designed to empower them with leadership skills and effective teaching strategies that integrate digital content and tools. Teachers will have the support of a Discovery Education Coach through job-embedded classroom support, provided to design and facilitate student-centered lessons and activities that leverage accessible technology and meet the varying needs of students. The implementation of this progression will include 5 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 3 sessions of professional learning.

Guiding Questions:

What does it mean to be a teacher leader? 

How can I use my digital resources and tools to enhance my instruction in meaningful ways and demonstrate leadership among my peers to grow and sustain a culture of continuous improvement?

What does it mean to be a “future ready” leader?

How can district and building leaders create a culture of instructional transformation?

Learning Targets:

I CAN create student-centered learning activities that are aligned to standards and use digital media to promote critical thinking and active learning.

I CAN use reflective practice and collaboration with colleagues to improve and transform instruction.

I CAN design and host Learning Labs to practice and model effective technology integration using research-based teaching strategies.

I CAN work with my school administration to build and promote a culture of continuous improvement.

Prerequisites?  No

YEAR TWO: Growing as Leaders: Going Digital with Blended Learning

Audience: K-12 Educators

This engaging, yet practical, professional learning series is aimed at equipping teachers to successfully “go digital” through research-based pedagogy and digital tool integration. Participants will experience content that promotes a meaningful infusion of strategies, resources, and methods that will target today’s digital learners and instill modern learning skills necessary for future college and careers. The session content will address collaboration, formative assessment, content creation, communication, and access to rich content in addition to classroom management, technology troubleshooting, and digital citizenship. The implementation of this progression will include 5 sessions of professional learning and 10 sessions of job-embedded instructional support for teacher leaders. District and building leaders will receive 3 sessions of professional learning.

Guiding Questions:

What methods and strategies encourage students to take responsibility for their own learning?

What instructional practices meet the needs of diverse learners? 

How can educators connect and share with others to encourage professional growth and development?

How can we leverage digital resources to personalize instruction? 

Learning Targets:

I CAN purposefully integrate technology and digital media to drive rigorous and relevant learning experiences.

I CAN utilize differentiated instruction, digital assessment, and technology enhanced collaboration to ensure student success.

I CAN design student-centered opportunities for developing college and career skills and the ethical use of technology.

I CAN maximize available technology to meet the needs of diverse students.

Prerequisites?  Yes

YEAR THREE: Expanding as Leaders: Literacy in a Digital Environment

Audience: K-12 Educators

Through the examination of best practices in reading instruction, the use of technology to differentiate and support student learning, and the utilization of a variety of print and non-print resources, this professional learning series will help teachers develop a wide-ranging and flexible set of strategic tools that support student literacy. Teacher leaders will explore ways that digital resources can be used to monitor learning, facilitate productive collaboration, and make learning apparent and accountable. The implementation of this progression will include 5 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 3 sessions of professional learning.

Guiding Questions:

What are effective instructional strategies that can be used to teach literacy using digital content and tools?

What lessons can be created to incorporate literacy using digital content and tools? 

How can teachers use technology tools to support disciplinary literacy?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN regularly apply strategies related to the five pillars of reading instruction and disciplinary literacy to my classroom practice.

I CAN integrate digital tools to promote and support meaningful and active learning with multimodal texts.

I CAN share and collaborate with colleagues to improve literacy practices across grade levels and content areas.

Prerequisites?  Yes

YEAR FOUR: Thriving as Leaders: Moving to Redefinition Through Student Content Creation

Audience: K-12 Educators

This professional learning series is designed inspire teachers to redefine their use of digital tools by empowering students to consume, create, and share their work beyond the walls of their classroom. Teacher leaders will dive deeply into the facets of content creation and publishing from task design to reimagining what student work can look like. The content will engage participants in the exploration of digital tools and strategies for being informed, effective, and ethical participants in a world that is increasingly technology driven as well as ways to promote a positive digital identity.The implementation of this progression will include 5 sessions of professional learning and 10 sessions of job-embedded instructional support for teacher leaders. District and building leaders will receive 2 sessions of professional learning.

Guiding Questions:

What does it mean to have students as content creators? 

How can I design meaningful tasks that require students to integrate digital skills with complex content to share with a real world audience?

What is my personal brand as a teacher leader and how can I influence my district and community?

Learning Targets:

I CAN foster student content creation through the use of digital tools.

I CAN design opportunities for student created content that promote safe and ethical research, design, and publishing of work.

I CAN share my practice beyond my school and district through technology and social media.

Prerequisites?  Yes

STEM Leader Corps Courses

STEM Leader Corps - Year 1

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

The focus of year one is to build highly effective, robust, student-centered environments through the development of teacher leadership skills tied to a school wide learning lab culture. STEM Leader Corps participants will utilize skills and information gained to create authentic STEM‐infused performance tasks that are rich and engaging, student-oriented and supportive of differentiation while also authentically assessing student progress. The implementation of this progression will include 5 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 3 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

How can I fulfill my role as a STEM Teacher Leader?

How can I effectively integrate media and research-based instructional strategies to support teaching and learning in the classroom?

How do I begin to infuse STEM into my instruction?

Learning Targets:  

I CAN create and support an atmosphere for collaboration through a school-wide learning lab approach.

I CAN utilize 21st century teaching strategies through multimodal resources.

I CAN assist with moving instructional practice away from teacher-directed towards student-led.

I CAN implement best practice STEM strategies to engage students through the use of interdisciplinary learning.

I CAN develop teacher leadership strategies.

Prerequisites?  No

STEM Leader Corps - Year 2

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

The focus of year two of STEM Leader Corps is to develop high quality STEM experiences in “MY” classroom through multiple forms of inquiry including project-based learning. STEM Leader Corp participants will plan larger scale change efforts to engage their colleagues in this shift in pedagogy. Participants will develop and implement actionable strategies to begin to transform their classroom and support their colleagues in building STEM instructional practices. The implementation of this progression will include 7 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

What does our STEM vision look like when effectively implemented? 

What would it look like to transform my classroom into the model STEM classroom of our vision? 

How can I engage and support my colleagues in building STEM instructional practices?  

Learning Targets:  

I CAN deliver challenging standards-based STEM learning activities.

I CAN utilize highly effective instructional strategies tying content to STEM careers and the real world.

I CAN use assessments in helping to measure creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication.

I CAN develop a learning lab environment and culture. 

Prerequisites?  Yes

STEM Leader Corps - Year 3

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

The focus of year three of STEM Leader Corps is to develop robust critical thinking instructional strategies while collaborating with grade level teams for the creation of robust transdisciplinary units. Transdisciplinary teaching and learning requires deliberate planning in regard to making organic connections to the real world and curricular standards. Participants will gain a deeper understanding of STEM transdisciplinary themes and strategies to lead their buildings toward the development of STEM transdisciplinary units. The implementation of this progression will include 7 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

Coming soon.

Learning Targets:  

I CAN increase opportunities for learning lab access and internal STEM coaching.

I CAN create and implementing standards-based STEM experiences through a transdisciplinary approach.

I CAN promote future career and college skills while exposing students to the possibilities of STEM. 

I CAN increase student discourse and the development of student-led inquiries. 

Prerequisites?  Yes

STEM Leader Corps - Year 4

Audience: K-12 Educators and Administrators

STEM Leader Corps is a four-year system for professional learning and leadership intentionally designed to build and sustain a culture of STEM teaching and learning.

STEM Leader Corps is built on the concept of gradual release to build sustainable practices in all classrooms. How do we keep building a culture of STEM through the introduction of new initiatives, mandates, and shifts within a school? The focus of year four of STEM Leader Corps is to implement sustainable practices that bring depth to instruction, emphasized through the integration of parallel initiatives, instructional strategies and continuous community connections. The implementation of this progression will include 7 sessions of professional learning along with 10 sessions of job-embedded classroom support for STEM teacher leaders. District and building administrators will receive 2 sessions of professional learning and 2 sessions of job-embedded STEM coaching support per school.

Guiding Questions:

Coming soon.

Learning Targets:

I CAN deliver challenging standards-based STEM learning activities.

I CAN utilize highly effective instructional strategies tying content to STEM careers and the real world.

I CAN use assessments that effectively and authentically measure creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication.

I CAN implement a learning lab environment to support the continued growth and sustainability of a STEM culture.

Prerequisites?  Yes

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Discovery Education Resources

This course collection provides educators with rich learning experiences designed to help them seamlessly infuse Discovery Education resources into their daily instruction and create meaningful learning experiences. We empower educators with a logical progression of digital learning that can be immediately transferred to classroom practice, effectively combining content knowledge, pedagogy, and technology.

Courses:

Math Techbook™

PROBLEMS WORTH SOLVING. MATH WORTH TEACHING.

Audience: Grade 6, 7, 8, Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2 Teachers

Discovery Education Math Techbook Professional Development highlights how educators can engage all students in deep mathematical thinking, modeling, and application using digital media and web 2.0 tools as they develop conceptual understanding and procedural fluency with real-world problems. Participants capitalize on the facilitation of instructional best practices in math to create pathways for all students to achieve a deeper understanding of mathematics.

Approach

We offer a flexible professional learning series that provides teachers with immersive experiences to develop effective math strategies, build meaningful digital practices, and grow instructional skills by:

  • Connecting the Math Techbook Discover–Practice–Apply learning cycle model to the three pillars of rigor: conceptual understanding, procedural fluency, and real-world applications
  • Exploring a variety of different Math Techbook implementation strategies
    that can be used with varying levels of technology access
  • Leveraging the real-time data collected in Math Techbook Dashboard to
    assess mathematical understanding and problem-solving
  • Encouraging exploration and investigation to develop students’
    understanding, modeling, and application of mathematics

Math Techbook™ Courses

Math Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option A

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement Math Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with Math Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Implementation Strategies for Math Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Using Formative Assessment to Adapt Instruction
  • Teacher Session 4:  Maximizing Student Engagement with Math Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Math Inquiry through Math Techbook™
  • Thirteen [13] Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support

 

 

Math Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option B

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will focus math educators not only on how to implement Math Techbook™ successfully, but also the integration of instructional math strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with Math Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Implementation Strategies for Math Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Using Formative Assessment to Adapt Instruction
  • Teacher Session 4:  Maximizing Student Engagement with Math Techbook™

Math Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option C

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement Math Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session:  Getting Started with Math Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Math Inquiry through Math Techbook™
  • Three (3) Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support

Getting Started with Math Techbook™

Audience: Grade 6, 7, 8, Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2 Teachers

Discover a textbook that contextualizes math learning and provides digital tools to help students develop lasting math proficiency!  In this course, participants experience the Discover-Practice-Apply learning cycle model and investigate the amazing resources embedded in Math Techbook™.  Participants explore interactives, reading passages, videos, the Coach Tool, the Play Tool, and Apply activities.

Learning Targets:

I CAN understand the philosophy, structure, and instructional approach of Math Techbook™.

I CAN make connections between the instructional approach of Math Techbook™ and the demands of the Common Core State Standards

I CAN utilize the Discover-Practice-Apply instructional model in conjunction with instructional strategies to develop a classroom lesson.

Duration: 6 hours

Implementation Strategies for Math Techbook™

Audience: Grade 6, 7, 8, Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2 Teachers

Discovery Education Math Techbook™ is a dynamic, exciting tool used to connect math to real world experiences. Through engaging mathematics learning experiences, participants will explore a variety of different Math Techbook™ implementation strategies that can be used with varying levels of technology access. Participants will engage in thoughtful hands on activities that showcase technology beyond the 1:1 environment and be able to adapt those experiences to their own classroom settings. Participant will make connections between the inquiry based approached Math Techbook™ and research based effective mathematics teaching strategies.

Learning Targets:

I CAN understand a variety of Math Techbook™ implementation strategies.

I CAN adapt the Math Techbook™ resources to effectively integrate them into their curriculum using various levels of technology.

I CAN understand a variety of Math Techbook™ implementation strategies.

I CAN adapt the Math Techbook™ resources to effectively integrate them into their curriculum using various levels of technology.

Duration: 6 hours

Using Formative Assessment to Adapt Instruction with Math Techbook™

Audience: Grade 6, 7, 8, Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2 Teachers

Discovery Education Math Techbook™ provides digital tools to empower teachers and students to use data to drive instructional decisions. Through engaging mathematics learning experiences, participants will experience how the Math Techbook™ Dashboard provides real-time student data to guide instruction throughout the Discover-Practice-Apply instructional cycle. Using the Math Techbook™ Dashboard, participants will analyze student data and explore strategies to differentiate instruction to meet the needs of all learners. In conjunction with teacher driven formative assessment, participants will become versed in using the student dashboard features to provide a rich variety of self-assessment avenues for their students.

Learning Targets:

I CAN apply formative assessment strategies to guide their instruction throughout the Discover-Practice-Apply instructional cycle.

I CAN analyze student data collected from the dashboard to capitalize on this real-time feedback to deepen conceptual understanding and immediately address student misconceptions.

I CAN create self-assessment checks for students

Duration: 6 hours

Maximizing Student Engagement with Math Techbook™

Audience: Grade 6, 7, 8, Algebra 1, Geometry, Algebra 2 Teachers

In this course, participants experience innovative teaching and learning that incorporates rigorous assignments aligned with the Common Core expectations. Teachers create a digital assignment that includes two or more digital resources along with a performance task that supports effective student demonstration of learning. Participants capitalize on the universal design features embedded in the Discovery Education Math Techbook™ and create pathways for all students to answer high-level essential questions and meet learning objectives.

Learning Targets:

I CAN construct a student performance task, which requires multiple media types.

I CAN create varied assignments based on student interest, readiness, and learning style.

I CAN create a classroom of students in “My Classroom.”

I CAN assign media directly to students

Duration: 6 hours

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Science Techbook NGSS

SUPPORTING THREE-DIMENSIONAL TEACHING AND LEARNING

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development offers a suite of courses focused on supporting teachers’ implementation of the Next Generation Science Standards. Participants are equipped with high-yield instructional strategies and pedagogical understanding essential to designing and delivering instruction that incorporates the science and engineering practices, disciplinary core ideas, and crosscutting concepts.

Approach

We provide teachers and administrators with a wide variety of immersive experiences to grow a foundational understanding of the pedagogical shift within NGSS. The Discovery Education NGSS Science Techbook content focuses on supporting three-dimensional teaching and learning by:

  • Deepening understanding of the architecture and framework of the Next
    Generation Science Standards
  • Exploring how to design performance expectations that translate into
    dynamic learning opportunities for students
  • Leveraging digital media to craft lessons that integrate the science and
    engineering practices, disciplinary core ideas and crosscutting concepts
    of NGSS
  • Developing engaging instructional strategies to pair with resources from
    Science Techbook for use with NGSS
  • Capitalizing on the features embedded within Discovery Education Science Techbook to create differentiated pathways for all students to answer high-level essential questions and meet rigorous learning standards
  • Fostering student choice in the classroom through the use of centers-based instruction

Science Techbook NGSS Courses

NGSS Science Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option A

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement Science Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Centers/Stations-Based Teaching and Learning with NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Maximizing Student Engagement with NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Scientific Inquiry through NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Thirteen [13] Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support 

NGSS Science Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option B

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will focus science educators not only on how to implement NGSS Science Techbook™ successfully, but also the integration of instructional science inquiry strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Centers/Stations-Based Teaching and Learning with NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Maximizing Student Engagement with NGSS Science Techbook™

NGSS Science Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option C

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement NGSS Science Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session:  Getting Started with NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Scientific Inquiry through NGSS Science Techbook™
  • Three (3) Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support

Getting Started with Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS

Audience: K-12 Educators

Explore how the new Discovery Education Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS supports three-dimensional teaching and learning. Understand the architecture of the Next Generation Science Standards, how to interpret the Performance Expectations, and how to translate them into dynamic learning opportunities for students in your classroom. Participants will experience what a media-rich, NGSS-aligned lesson feels like and analyze the classroom culture this creates. They will develop and practice engaging instructional strategies to pair with resources from Science Techbook™ to support their implementation of NGSS. Participants will walk away with a lesson that integrates the Scientific Practices, Disciplinary Core Ideas, and Cross-Cutting Concepts of NGSS, allowing them to immediately begin the transformation to NGSS.

Learning Targets:

I CAN analyze the architecture of NGSS.

I CAN explore how Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS supports three-dimensional teaching and learning.

I CAN describe the three-dimensional teaching and learning look and feel like.

I CAN utilize the model lessons to design three-dimensional lessons using digital media.

Duration: 6 hours

Transition to Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS

Audience: K-12 Educators

Through active engagement in inquiry, teachers will explore how Discovery Education Science Techbook™ can help cultivate scientific thinking in and beyond the classroom. Not only will teachers leave with an understanding of the Techbook™ features, but also they will be immersed in collaborative activities that provoke conversation and serve to ground them in the 5E Instructional Model. Engaging uses of digital resources will be modeled as an effective means of inspiring inquiry and meeting the needs of diverse learners. This day will include immersive experiences with instructional strategies, exploration of model lessons, and lesson planning time to support teachers in creating authentic learning experiences inspired by the Science Techbook™.

Learning Targets:

I CAN utilize digital resources in conjunction with instructional strategies to develop a classroom lesson.

I CAN intergrate Science Techbook™ resources and the 5E model in my scientific instruction

Duration: 6 hours

Centers Based Teaching and Learning with Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS

Audience: K-12 Educators

Learn how to foster student choice in the classroom. With Discovery Education Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS, participants use a centers-based instructional approach to experience a 5E model lesson. Moving through a variety of learning stations, participants experience learning through the role of a student. Student-facing directions, classroom management, curricular resources, and planning techniques that support centers-based instruction are examined. Educators create their own centers-based lesson appropriate for a one-to-one or one-to-many computer environment.

Learning Targets:

I CAN explain how center-based lessons relate to other best practices such as inquiry, problem solving, formative assessment, active learning, independent learning, and multi-sensory learning.

I CAN identify characteristics of classrooms that support successful center-based instruction.

I CAN design a highly effective three-dimensional lesson that is both standard-based and center-based and utilizes Discovery Education Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS resources.

Duration: 6 hours

Maximizing Student Engagement with Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS

Audience: K-12 Educators

Uncover the power and potential of the Discovery Education Builder Tools. In this course, participants experience innovative teaching and learning that incorporates rigorous assignments aligned with the Common Core expectations. Participants learn how to promote and differentiate student learning through the use of Discovery Education tools such as Assignment Builder and Board Builder. Participants capitalize on the universal design features embedded in Discovery Education Science Techbook™ for use with NGSS and create pathways for all students to answer high-level essential questions and meet learning objectives.

Learning Targets:

I CAN create varied assignments based on student interest, readiness & learning style.

I CAN create a classroom of students in “My Classroom.”

I CAN assign media directly to students.

Duration: 6 hours

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Science Techbook™

INSPIRING CURIOSITY

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development complements each Science Techbook adoption, providing foundational support as districts transition or expand their implementation of digital resources. Participants engage in unique learning experiences designed to build teacher efficacy and confidence in using digital resources to enhance science instruction. Immersive experiences bring learning to life and model the tenets of Techbook in action: inquiry, multimodal resources, and high-yield instructional strategies.

Approach

We empower learners with a comprehensive digital tool and the use of inquiry to deepen their understanding of the world around them, through student-centered instruction that:

  • Fosters scientific thinking and conceptual understanding
  • Provides multiple means for teachers and students to experience science
  • Inspires curiosity and links science to the real world through hands-on
    tasks as well as virtual explorations
  • Integrates argumentation writing through scientific explanation, as
    students routinely collect evidence, make a claim, and support their claim
    with evidence and logical reasoning
  • Provides multiple pathways for students to access content, experience
    science, and deepen their understanding of the world around them

Science Techbook™ Courses

Science Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option A

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement Science Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Centers/Stations-Based Teaching and Learning with Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Maximizing Student Engagement with Science Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Scientific Inquiry through Science Techbook™
  • Thirteen [13] Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support 

Science Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option B

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will focus science educators not only on how to implement Science Techbook™ successfully, but also the integration of instructional science inquiry strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Centers/Stations-Based Teaching and Learning with Science Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Maximizing Student Engagement with Science Techbook™

Science Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option C

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement Science Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session:  Getting Started with Science Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Scientific Inquiry through Science Techbook™
  • Three (3) Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support

Getting Started with Discovery Education Science Techbook™

Audience: K-8 Educators

Through active engagement in inquiry, teachers will explore how Discovery Education Science Techbook™ can help cultivate scientific thinking in and beyond the classroom. Not only will teachers leave with an understanding of the Techbook™ features, but also they will be immersed in collaborative activities that provoke conversation and serve to ground them in the 5E Instructional Model. Engaging uses of digital resources will be modeled as an effective means of inspiring inquiry and meeting the needs of diverse learners. This day will include immersive experiences with instructional strategies, exploration of model lessons, and lesson planning time to support teachers in creating authentic learning experiences inspired by the Science Techbook™.  

Learning Targets:

I CAN utilize digital resources in conjunction with instructional strategies to develop a classroom lesson.

I CAN integrate Science Techbook™ resources and the 5E model in my scientific instruction.

Duration: 6 hours

Centers Based Teaching and Learning in a Discovery Education Science Techbook™ Classroom

Audience: K-8 Educators

Learn how to foster student choice in the classroom. With Discovery Education Science Techbook™, participants use a centers-based instructional approach to experience a 5E model lesson. Moving through a variety of learning stations, participants experience learning through the role of a student. Student-facing directions, classroom management, curricular resources, and planning techniques that support centers-based instruction are examined. Educators create their own centers-based lesson appropriate for a one-to-one or one-to-many computer environment.

Learning Targets:

I CAN actively engage students in the learning process through centers-based instruction.

I CAN effectively use Science Techbook™ to create centers-based lessons that incorporate best practices.

I CAN describe classroom conditions and teacher behaviors that support successful centers-based teaching and learning.

Duration: 6 hours

Maximizing Student Engagement with Discovery Education Science Techbook™

Audience: K-12 Educators

Uncover the power and potential of the Discovery Education Techbook™ Builder Tools. In this course, participants experience innovative teaching and learning that incorporates rigorous assignments aligned with the Common Core expectations. Participants learn how to promote and differentiate student learning through the use of Discovery Education tools such as Assignment Builder and Board Builder. Participants capitalize on the universal design features embedded in Discovery Education Science Techbook™ and create pathways for all students to answer high-level essential questions and meet learning objectives.

Learning Targets:

I CAN create varied assignments based on my students’ interests, readiness, and learning styles.

I CAN create a classroom of students in “My Classroom” and assign media directly to them.

I CAN explain the importance of creating assignments with high expectations for all students.

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scientist - Session 1

Audience: 3-12 Educators

Begin to integrate literacy strategies into your science lessons. In this session, a Discovery Education Specialist will help participants learn how to foster this reciprocal relationship using rich text, digital media, interactive writing, and high-yield reading strategies. Through an inquiry experience, reading and writing strategies will be examined to guide the development of content knowledge and practice scientific thinking while enhancing students’ literacy skills. Participants will explore strategies for building the critical analysis skills applicable to written text, science labs, media, and more. 

Guiding Questions:

How do I facilitate inquiry-based reading instruction into my science instruction?

How can I effectively integrate reading strategies in my lessons through the use of multimodal texts?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN facilitate inquiry-based reading in science. 

I CAN select multi-modal text that encourages scientific investigation skills. 

I CAN integrate high yield reading strategies within science instruction. 

Prerequisites?  No

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Scientist - Session 2

Audience: 3-12 Educators

This session is an engaging follow-up to Read, Write and Think Like a Scientist, Session 1, and will focus specifically on the value of scientific thinking and how to make it explicit to students. Participants will engage in a scientific investigation. Strategies that highlight specific ways in which scientists approach and interact with text will be examined and applied through hands-on exercises. A Discovery Education Specialist will guide participants through the application of the scientific process to create a digital story and draft a written response describing specific understandings learned during the investigation. 

Guiding Questions:

How can I maximize the technology resources available?

How can I effectively plan lessons that integrate digital media, literacy skills, and engagement to promote scientific knowledge?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN explain how to make claims about multimodal text and the importance of using evidence to support them. 

I CAN help students convey arguments that cite valid and sufficient evidence. 

I CAN facilitate argumentative writing that presents a claim, sufficient evidence, and reasoning.

Prerequisites?  Yes

Duration: 6 hours

Flipped Classroom Academy Day 1: Why Flip

Audience: K-12 Educators

This three-day Flipped Classroom Academy focuses on how technology may be used to build a community that learns, creates, and innovates together. This first course of the series is a deep dive into and exploration of the research behind and implementation of flipped classrooms. Through inquiry, teachers will use this research to increase their knowledge and understanding of why and how they might utilize a flipped classroom approach, become increasingly mindful of why and how they can bolster engagement inside and outside their classrooms, and to denote the role of empowerment inherent in student-centered learning.

Learning Targets:

I CAN engage all students in learning, creating, and innovating.

I CAN utilize research on The Flipped Classroom in order to increase my knowledge and understanding of how it can be used in my classroom.

I CAN empower student-centered learning by flipping a lesson, a unit, and even my classroom.

Duration: 6 hours

Flipped Classroom Academy Day 2: How to Flip

Audience: K-12 Educators

This three-day Flipped Classroom Academy focuses on how technology may be used to build a community that learns, creates, and innovates together. This second course of the series is a hands on exploration of different tools and strategies teachers use to flip their classroom. Teachers will apply the research and strategies learned in day one to create flipped lessons. They will begin to think about their whole classroom approach to flipping while becoming increasingly mindful of why and how they can bolster engagement inside and outside their classrooms, and to denote the role of empowerment inherent in student-centered learning.

Learning Targets:

I CAN engage all students in learning, creating, and innovating by flipping an intro lesson and a video lecture.

I CAN ensure that the most cognitively demanding work happens inside of classroom by flipping my direct instruction.

I CAN use tools to flip a lesson, a unit, and even my classroom.

I CAN use Board Builder to begin planning for what my unit and classroom (incorporating flipped content) looks like.

Duration: 6 hours

Flipped Classroom Academy Day 3: Let’s Flip

Audience: 6-12 Educators

This three-day Flipped Classroom Academy focuses on how technology may be used to build a community that learns, creates, and innovates together. This third course in the series course is a personalization of flipped classroom. Through inquiry, teachers will consider ways in which they can foster and promote buy-in within their classrooms, in their buildings, their district, and the community at large.

Learning Targets:

I CAN engage all students in learning, creating, and innovating.

I CAN utilize research on The Flipped Classroom in order to increase my knowledge and understanding of how it can be used in my classroom.

I CAN empower student-centered learning by flipping a lesson, a unit, and even my classroom.

I CAN insure that the most cognitively demanding work happens inside of the classroom.

I CAN engage the research on the flipped classroom to promote buy-in in my building, in my district, and within my community.

Duration: 6 hours

Digital Storytelling in Science

Audience: K-12 Educators

Explore innovative ways for students to demonstrate understanding of scientific concepts. Digital Storytelling engages your students in higher levels of critical thinking as they create movies to show their level of understanding around concepts in science. In this course, a Discovery Education Specialist helps participants learn to combine text, images, audio, and video to tell stories that make scientific concepts stick. Participants create simple to complex digital stories as they explore the art of digital storytelling and the ways it can be used in an inquiry-driven lesson.

Learning Targets:

I CAN explore the background, research and application of storytelling across the curriculum.

I CAN apply the storytelling to a content driven lesson.

I CAN utilize graphic organizers in the storytelling process.

I CAN create instructional plans for the integration of digital storytelling.

Duration: 6 hours

Science 2.0: Powerful Strategies for Increasing Engagement

Audience: K-12 Educators

Turn on the creativity! In this course, participants focus on improving historical content knowledge acquisition using resources from Discovery Education Science Techbook™. Participants also learn how to use Web 2.0 tools to foster student collaboration, critical thinking, and engagement. A Discovery Education Specialist helps participants use digital media in conjunction with the principles of universal design to provide multiple means for students to represent and express their scientific understanding. Time is provided for participants to create their own projects and lessons.

Learning Targets:

I CAN identify how the 5E instructional model guides teacher planning and student learning.

I CAN recognize when it is beneficial to use a Web 2.0 tool for teaching and learning.

I CAN create engaging lessons that use the 5E instructional model, Web 2.0 tools, and Discovery Education assets in purposeful ways that enhance teaching and learning.

Duration: 6 hours

Driving Student Achievement with Assessment and Intervention

Audience: K-8 Educators

Dig deeper with Discovery Education Science Techbook™’s robust assessment management tool. The Discovery Education Assessment tool is designed to help teachers create custom, standards-based, concept-based assessments and interventions. In this course, participants learn how to assign concept assessments and review class assessment results to look for patterns in the data. During this full-day session, a Discovery Education Specialist helps participants use the 5E model to develop formative and summative assessments while developing the skills to use the assessment management tool to its fullest potential to drive instruction and student achievement.

Learning Targets:

I CAN create purposeful assessments using Assignment Builder.

I CAN use various strategies and digital resources to formatively assess my students.

I CAN develop writing prompts that allow for interactive feedback.

Duration: 6 hours

Building a Culture of Inquiry with Science Techbook

Audience: Instructional Leaders

Discovery Education Science Techbook is an exciting digital resource which provides multiple pathways for all students to cultivate scientific thinking both in and beyond the classroom. However, leading the transition from print to digital is not without its challenges. It is imperative that school leaders have a thorough understanding of the digital resource, how it will support the tenets of good instruction and how to manage the change process with their teachers. During this session, leaders will have the opportunity to delve into inquiry as a basis for science instruction, explore key features of Techbook and engage in a collaborative exercise designed to help leaders anticipate and address teacher questions and concerns. 

Guiding Questions: 

How do the multimodal resources and features within Science Techbook provide opportunities for inquiry-based learning? 

How can I support teachers in their use of Science Techbook for inquiry-based teaching?  

Learning Targets:  

I CAN describe how Science Techbook supports best practices in teaching science. 

I CAN support educators as they transition to a digital resource. 

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

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Social Studies Techbook™

QUESTION THE PAST, UNDERSTAND THE PRESENT

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development maximizes the implementation of each Social Studies Techbook adoption by equipping educators with meaningful strategies to integrate digital resources into their instruction. Participants are empowered through dynamic and engaging professional development that will promote student learning and the cultivation of historical thinking skills through rigorous tasks. Driven by an immersion in inquiry, student-centered learning, and meaningful use of digital resources, teachers will be inspired to make Social Studies Techbook a cornerstone of their everyday practice.

Approach

We empower learners with comprehensive digital resources and the use of inquiry to deepen their historical understanding of the world around them, through student-centered instruction that:

  • Promotes inquiry-based thinking and conceptual understanding
  • Strengthens literacy, critical thinking, and citizenship skills
  • Integrates varied multimodal texts to access and master content
    successfully
  • Utilizes research-based strategies aimed at meeting the diverse needs
    and abilities of learners
  • Models the effective use of digital tools to foster a collaborative and
    dynamic learning environment

Social Studies Techbook™ Courses

Social Studies Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option A

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement Social Studies Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with Social Studies Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Centers/Stations-Based Teaching and Learning with Social Studies Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Maximizing Student Engagement with Social Studies Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Inquiry through Social Studies Techbook™
  • Thirteen (13) Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support 

Social Studies Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option B

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will focus social studies educators not only on how to implement Social Studies Techbook™ successfully, but also the integration of instructional inquiry strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session 1:  Getting Started with Social Studies Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 2:  Centers/Stations-Based Teaching and Learning with Social Studies Techbook™
  • Teacher Session 3:  Maximizing Student Engagement with Social Studies Techbook™

Social Studies Techbook™ Bundled PD Package: Option C

This foundational package includes “Getting Started” types of sessions that will be integrated with job-embedded, in-classroom support.  The administrator session is also integral to providing building level administrators as well as support staff like coaches with not only the information they need to understand how to implement Social Studies Techbook™ successfully, but also strategies to support effective digital pedagogy.  The sessions in this package include:

  • Teacher Session:  Getting Started with Social Studies Techbook™
  • Administrator Session:  Building a Culture of Inquiry through Social Studies Techbook™
  • Three (3) Sessions of Job-Embedded Instructional Support

Explore the World with Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Integrate exciting content from a variety of media with critical thinking, reading, and writing skills to fuel a dynamic social studies classroom. In this course, participants explore a wide variety of resources that give students challenging and meaningful learning experiences in social studies, including engaging videos, digitally enhanced text, interactive investigations, brilliant images, and challenging primary source documents. A Discovery Education Specialist helps participants learn the organization of Discover Education Social Studies Techbook™ and provides directions for teachers to organize, assign, and use the resources in Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™ for instruction.

Learning Targets:

I CAN identify instructional strategies within the 5E instructional model that integrate a variety of media.

I CAN begin developing a lesson using a variety of media.

I CAN navigate the DE Techbook to locate a variety of Social Studies resources.

Duration: 6 hours

Centers-Based Teaching and Learning in a Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™ Classroom

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Learn how to foster student choice in the classroom. Using Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™, participants use a center‐based instructional approach to experience a 5E model lesson. Moving through a variety of learning stations, participants experience learning through the role of a student. Student-facing directions, classroom management, curricular resources, and planning techniques. Educators create their own centers-based lesson appropriate for a one-to-one or one-to-many computer environment. (Available strands: US History or World History)

Learning Targets:

I CAN experience centers by engaging in the social studies content of Discovery Education Techbook.

I CAN explain the advantages to using centers.

I CAN choose resources and plan a centers lesson.

I CAN create digital center activities that use several pieces of DE media with instructions for each activity.

I CAN integrate the centers lesson into a larger lesson with ideas for follow-up, application and elaboration ideas.

Duration: 6 hours

Maximizing Student Engagement with Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™

Audience: 6-12 Educators

In this course, participants experience innovative teaching and learning that incorporates rigorous assignments aligned with the Common Core expectations. Teachers create a digital assignment that includes two or more digital resources along with a performance task that supports effective student demonstration of learning. Participants capitalize on the universal design features embedded in the Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™ and create pathways for all students to answer high-level essential questions and meet learning objectives.

Learning Targets

I CAN construct a student performance task, which requires multiple media types.

I CAN create varied assignments based on student interest, readiness, and learning style.

I CAN create a classroom of students in “My Classroom.”

I CAN assign media directly to students.

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Historian, Day 1

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Begin to integrate literacy strategies into your social studies lessons. In this course, participants learn how to apply high-yield reading strategies in an engaging and meaningful way to help students learn social studies content while acquiring new literacy skills. Participants experience how the close reading and analysis of digital media, complex text, and primary source documents fosters critical thinking skills such as sourcing, contextualization, and corroboration. These skills, coupled with the reading strategies, strengthen critical analysis capabilities that make students more adept readers.

Learning Targets:

I CAN approach reading and writing in social studies from historical perspective.

I CAN model historical inquiry with a variety of materials including text, maps, secondary source documents, and digital media.

I CAN embed content area literacy routines within each lesson.

I CAN cite textual evidence to support historical analysis of social studies text and secondary source documents.

I CAN gather evidence from multiple sources to produce well-written, historical explanations.

Duration: 6 hours

Read, Write, and Think Like a Historian, Day 2

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Expand critical thinking with an engaging follow-up to Read, Write, and Think Like a Historian Day One, and focus specifically on the value of historical thinking and how to make it explicit to students. Participants engage in a historical exploration and analyze primary source documents. A Discovery Education Specialist shares strategies that highlight specific ways in which historians approach and interact with text. In this sessions, participants apply historical process skills to create a digital story and a written response describing specific understandings learned during the investigation.

Learning Targets:

I CAN reinforce historical thinking skills and inquiry based reading through the analysis of primary source documents.

I CAN use digital storytelling to encourage chronological thinking and convey interpretations of historical events.

I CAN create engaging student evaluation with embedded media.

Duration: 6 hours

Digital Storytelling with Social Studies Techbook

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Digital Storytelling is the art of narrative combined with digital media such as images, video and sound. This active learning strategy is the perfect compliment to the social studies classroom as it helps students internalize content knowledge and apply literacy skills, which are the hallmark of the career and college ready standards.  Participants will examine storytelling, the process of story creation and weigh the benefits and challenges of moving their students towards being content creators. This session will demystify digital storytelling through hands on exploration using a variety of low and high tech publishing tools.

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe the background, research and application of storytelling across the curriculum.

I CAN apply the storytelling process to a content driven lesson.

I CAN develop an instructional plan for the integration of digital storytelling.

Duration: 6 hours

Driving Student Achievement with Assessment & Intervention

Audience: 6-12 Educators

Dig deeper with Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook’s robust assessment management tool. The tool is designed to help teachers create various assessments and review class assessment results to look for patterns in the data and design interventions. During this full-day session, a Discovery Education Specialist helps participants use the 5E model to develop formative and summative assessments while developing the skills to use the assessment management tool to its fullest potential to drive instruction and student achievement

Learning Targets:

I CAN establish an understanding formative assessment as a tool to drive future instruction.

I CAN begin to accumulate formative assessment strategies using digital media.

I CAN develop the ability to create questions and tasks that require complex thought.

I CAN develop knowledge in how to use Board Builder, Writing Prompt Builder and the Assessment Manager to create rigorous assessments.

I CAN create standards based formative and summative assessments for use in conjunction with Social Studies Techbook content.

Duration: 6 hours

Cultivating and Supporting a Culture of Inquiry with Social Studies Techbook™

Audience: Instructional leaders

Through active engagement in inquiry, administrators will explore how Discovery Education Social Studies Techbook™ can help cultivate critical thinking that impacts teacher and student work inside as well as beyond the classroom.  Administrators will have the opportunity to develop a vision of what inquiry can look like in their school and gain an understanding of the key features of Techbook™.  They will be immersed in collaborative activities that provoke conversation and serve to support them in exploring how Social Studies Techbook™ can be a powerful resource to support their teachers in using inquiry-based teaching and students in inquiry-based learning.

Guiding Questions:

How does inquiry-based learning foster critical thinking skills that students need to be successful?

How do the multimodal resources and features within Social Studies Techbook™ provide opportunities for inquiry-based teaching and learning?

How can I support teachers in their use of Social Studies Techbook™ for inquiry-based teaching?

Learning Targets:

I CAN state why cultivating a culture of inquiry and critical thinking is essential to student success.

I CAN identify how Social Studies Techbook™ can support teachers and students with inquiry-based teaching and learning.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

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Streaming Plus

THE CONFIDENCE TO EMBRACE DIGITAL

Audience: K-12 Educators

Discovery Education Professional Development provides educators with rich learning experiences designed to help them seamlessly infuse digital media into their daily instruction to create meaningful learning experiences that will impact student learning.

Approach

We empower educators with a logical progression of digital learning that can be immediately transferred to classroom practice, effectively combining content knowledge, pedagogy, and technology that:

  • Inspires true student engagement through the use of
    meaningful and complex tasks that leverage media and digital
    tools to meet standards
  • Provides multiple access points to complex multimodal texts
    to meet the needs of all learners
  • Creatively utilizes a variety of tools to formatively assess
    student progress

Streaming Plus Courses

Session 1: Set the Stage to Engage

Audience: K-12 Educators

In this session, we will set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as the exploration of key features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ supports teachers in the engagement of their students.  Participants will explore each of the different assets and then determine how to use them effectively to engage all students in rigorous and relevant instruction, leaving this session with actionable plans to use Streaming Plus assets in their classroom immediately.

Guiding Questions:

What does student engagement look like in my classroom?

How can I use assets from Discovery Education Streaming Plus to create engaging lessons for my students?

How can I select the most effective instructional strategies to integrate with digital content to ensure the engagement of all students?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what student engagement looks and sounds like.

I CAN select, organize and manipulate the digital assets found within Discovery Education Streaming Plus to create engaging lessons for students.

I CAN apply and integrate modeled instructional strategies into my lessons to increase student learning and engagement.

Duration: 6 hours

Session 2: The Stage is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement

Audience: K-12 Educators

In Session One, we set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as through utilizing various search features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ supports teachers in their engagement of their students.  Day Two—The Stage is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement—enquires into the fact that we know we want our students to have fun learning and to be present during the learning process, but what does it mean to truly engage our students cognitively?  This course is designed to get at the heart of what cognitive engagement is and how we can insure that our students are connected to the content on a deeper level.  This session employs content specific immersions, a deep dive into Content Collections and Browse by Standard within Streaming Plus™, as well as opportunities for teachers to infuse their own lessons with cognitively engaging strategies and multi-modal texts.

Guiding Questions:

What is cognitive engagement and what does it look like?

How do we know our students are cognitively engaged?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what a cognitively engaged student looks and sounds like.

I CAN apply cognitive engagement strategies to my lessons to insure that my students are not just present, but intellectually engaged in their learning experience.

 

Duration: 6 hours

Session 3: The Power of Differentiation

Audience: K-12 Educators

During Streaming Plus™ Sessions 1 and 2—Setting the Stage to Engage and The Stage Is Set:  Why Cognitive Engagement—we worked to apply engagement strategies to our lessons to insure that our students were not just present, but intellectually engaged in their learning experience.  Streaming Plus™ Session 3, The Power of Differentiation, builds on our previous learning by capitalizing on the use of stations-based learning as a catalyst for unleashing the power of differentiation in student-centered learning environments.  During this session teachers will discuss ways and means of differentiation, explore how Streaming Plus™ supports student learning, and participate in a stations-based immersion experience.  Teachers will also have an opportunity to apply their learning through planning and implementation of stations-based lessons in their own classrooms.

Guiding Questions:

How can I create an engaging student-centered learning environment?

How can I meet the needs of varied learners in my classroom?

How can I effectively use stations-based learning to meet the needs of all learners?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe an engaging, student-centered learning environment.

I CAN design differentiated learning experiences that are responsive to student learning needs.

I CAN plan and implement effective stations-based learning in my classroom.

 

Duration: 6 hours

Digital Storytelling with Discovery Education Streaming Plus

Audience: K-12 Educators

This day enables participants to examine the role of storytelling and story creation to increase content understanding and develop literacy skills.  In addition, participants will develop an understanding of the role of digital planning and publishing tools in the storytelling process.

Guiding Questions:

How can Digital Storytelling enhance content understanding and develop literacy skills?

What makes an effective story?

What is the role of technology in storytelling?

Learning Targets:

I CAN explore the background, research, and application of storytelling across the curriculum.

I CAN apply the storytelling to a content driven lesson.

I CAN utilize graphic organizers in the storytelling process.

I CAN create instructional plans for the integration of digital storytelling.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 6 hours

The Stage Is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement for School Leaders

Audience: Instructional leaders

In Session One, we set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as through utilizing various search features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ supports teachers in their engagement of their students.  Day Two—The Stage is Set: Why Cognitive Engagement—enquires into the fact that we know we want our students to have fun learning and to be present during the learning process, but what does it mean to truly engage our students cognitively?  This session is designed to get at the heart of what cognitive engagement is and how we can ensure that our students are connected to the content on a deeper level.  School leaders will explore the specifics of cognitive engagement and leave this session with a plan to lead the implementation of cognitive engagement strategies in all classrooms.

Guiding Questions:

What is cognitive engagement and what does it look like?

How do we know if our students are cognitively engaged?

What strategies do I need to implement to ensure the cognitive engagement of all students?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what a cognitively engaged student looks and sounds like.

I CAN apply cognitive engagement strategies to insure that my students are not just present, but intellectually engaged in their learning experiences.

I CAN determine a “next steps” strategy to implement that promotes cognitive engagement of all students.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

Set the Stage to Engage for School Leaders

Audience: Instructional leaders

In this session, school leaders will set the stage by defining engagement and noting, through an immersion as well as the exploration of key features, how Discovery Education Streaming Plus™ will support teachers in the engagement of their students.  School leaders will explore each of the different assets and then determine how they should be used effectively to engage all students in rigorous and relevant instruction, leaving this session with actionable plans to support teachers in their use of Streaming Plus assets in an engaging way.

Guiding Questions:

What does student engagement look like in classrooms throughout my school?

How can I use assets from Discovery Education Streaming Plus to support teachers as they create engaging lessons for students?

What actions will I implement to ensure that teachers are effectively integrating instructional strategies into their lessons?

Learning Targets:

I CAN describe what student engagement looks and sounds like in classrooms throughout my school.

I CAN support teachers in using the digital assets found within Discovery Education Streaming Plus effectively to create engaging lessons for students.

I CAN lead the integration of effective instructional strategies into classroom lessons to increase student learning and engagement.

Prerequisites? No

Duration: 3 hours

Digital Storytelling for College and Career Readiness

Audience: K-12 Educators

Placing technology in the hands of students to create digital stories is a powerful practice that has the potential to greatly impact their learning. Throughout this course, participants will learn how digital storytelling engages students emotionally, behaviorally, and cognitively. Much of the time will be spent exploring and discussing how educators can use digital storytelling in tandem with their current curriculum to create fresh and exciting ways for students to demonstrate mastery of college and career ready standards. In addition, assessment practices for these types of learning products will be addressed through interactive and thought-provoking experiences with colleagues.

Guiding Questions: 

Why is student engagement a necessary component in effective instruction and assessment?

What implications can digital storytelling have on students’ learning and engagement?

Learning Targets: 

I CAN explain the various types and levels of student engagement.

I CAN describe how digital storytelling can help students demonstrate mastery of standards.

I CAN create and assess rich tasks worthy of the class time spent.

Prerequisites? Yes, Digital Storytelling with Discovery Streaming Plus

Duration: 6 hours
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About

Discovery Education Professional Development is recognized as one of the top ten professional development providers in the U.S. Our approach is unique, including research-based content aligned to our philosophy that honors the educators and administrators with whom we work.

We craft innovative and engaging experiences, immersing educators in purposeful learning that balances content, pedagogy, and technology. Digital is the differentiator in our world, allowing equitable access to learning, increasing student engagement, and offering opportunities for collaboration and feedback. We regularly position technology as a means to completely redesign a lesson—to create something otherwise impossible without it.

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