Wednesday, March 9, 2011

OnTRACK for College Readiness: Digital Tools & Resources #SXSWedu

Notes from SXSWedu 2011 breakout session...

Paula Moeller
University of Texas Institute for Public School Initatives

OnTRACK will be available free through Project Share for all students in Texas.

Join onTRACK Advocacy Group in Epsilen for announcements about onTRACK roll out: http://www.epsilen.com/grp/119586

OnTRACK overview
  • Online learning tools (lessons) for students in math, science, ELA, and social studies developed to increse student preparedness and performance on STAAR high school assessments leading to a higher degree of College and Career Readiness.
  • All learning tools are being developed within TEA's Project Share platform.
  • It's free - use as much or as little as you need. Students don't have to take an entire history course, they can just review the part on the Civil War if that is what is needed
Project Goals
  • Help students exceed the minimum score required on each high school STAAR assessment in order to meed graduation requirements.
  • Prepaer all students to meet the college-readiness component of the Algebra II and English III STAAR assessment.
Math courses
  • Algebra I - 6 units, 61 lessons
  • Geometry
  • Algebra II
Science Courses
  • Biology
  • Chemistry
  • Physics
Social Studies Courses - Available May 1st
  • US History
  • World History
  • World Geography
English III - Coming in April
  • Based on the 5 CCRS Content Standards
Search for onTRACK in courses in Epsilen to find offerings.

The onTRACK courses do not cover ALL TEKS. They are not replacements for actual instruction. It is supplemental to current instruction.

Firefox is the recommended browser for these courses. Each course has a plugin checker to make sure you can check your computer for compatibility.

All videos and applets that they had permission for are embedded in the course - this should help with districts that have YouTube blocks. Externally linked content is only used when there was not permission fromt the owner to embed in the course.

All science lessons were written by Texas science teachers.

In some courses, students work using Take Notes in Epsilen so teachers can look at their work later.

Teachers can have access to see the assessment results from the end of each lesson.

Ultimately, teachers will be able to copy the course to their own account and manage it for students they are instructing.

Can be used for whole class instruction (via projector) or assigned to individual students and monitored through Take Notes assignments in Epsilen.

Mutiple interactives throughout all of the courses - video, audio, drag-and-drop.

These resources look very well developed! I can't wait to share this with our teachers!