Go to the EdMedia 2023 Vienna Conference »

Free Deeply-Digital Curriculum from the University of Michigan Center for Digital Curriculum

Posted by Anne Tapp on June 29 2020 at 3:34 a.m.

I wanted to share information about a free online platform with ready-made deeply-digital curriculum, Roadmaps from the University of Michigan Center for Digital Curriculum. In addition to creating your own user-friendly modules, there is a year of standards-based online curriculum for Social Studies and Science for grades three through five and many existing modules for P-12.

My graduate-level Early Childhood Special Education students just each created a Roadmap Brainventure for their classrooms and provided input about their experiences

Creating a Roadmap Brainventure was really easy to learn how to do and a fun way to organize and present learning activities to students. I loved the collaborative piece that allows the creator to edit the document with any co-collaborators. The phone feature for group calls while on the document made it convenient. I will not teach any other way. Traverse City Public Schools, Michigan USA

Roadmaps/BrainVentures are orderly lessons geared towards the whole child through fun and meaningful learning activities. It allows for interaction between the student and the content and assessments through interactive activities, videos, photos, and written work. Further, it allows for teachers to give a child many deep learning experiences surrounding a theme. Children are encouraged to be creative and use their imagination while engaging in higher-order thinking. St. Lorenz School, Frankenmuth, MI USA

Roadmaps allowed me a way to organize lessons to use in the classroom. It provides interactive lessons that students can explore to develop deeper thinking. They are easy to use for all ages with their talk to text feature for beginning readers. YouTube videos are without ads or recommended videos, which I love because as an educator, I can control what my students see. Roadmaps will be a key component of my curriculum delivery.” Early Childhood Special Education Teacher, Saginaw Township Schools, Saginaw, MI USA

Roadmaps allows for a systematic and meaningful way to deliver an  inquiry-based curriculum. It’s user-friendliness is perfect for the learner and families at home. In this time of at-home learning, this is more important than ever. Every teacher needs to use Roadmaps to deliver their curriculum in this organized, interactive, and deep-learning platform. Saginaw Public Schools, Saginaw, MI USA

This way of delivering activities to my students is beneficial because the Roadmap system was so easy to use for parents and students of any age. As a teacher, I enjoyed that I had total control over what my students were accessing, and it was easy to navigate. I think my favorite part of creating the roadmap was how quickly I could put one together. It was really fun to create and was addicting! Throughout these unprecedented times, as educators we have to adapt quickly and respond appropriately to best educate our students. I am confident to say that I will be using Roadmaps to help my students stay connected and learning the material in a meaningful way. I loved working with the Roadmaps team and will be using this program next school year! Washington Elementary, Bay City, MI USA

You can find information here https://cdc.engin.umich.edu/, https://cdc.engin.umich.edu/daily-brain-venture/, https://cdc.engin.umich.edu/schedules/, and  https://roadmap.center/#/. They offer free, online information and training sessions. Here is a short news article that was recently written. https://news.umich.edu/k-12-online-learning-platform-from-u-m-sees-dramatic-rise-in-use/ I am adding a chapter about it in my text, Technology in the Early Classroom.

Please let me know if you have any questions or contact them directly. They are a great, friendly team of experts!

Dr. Anne Tapp Professor Saginaw Valley State University

Comments

Log in to post a a comment in this discussion.