K20 Learn

 The University of Oklahoma has produced a website, K20 Learn, full of resources.  First, all of this is free,  largely under a Creative Commons License.  K20 has popped up in recent searches.  Let’s give it a look!

Look at Goodness Gracious, Great Balls of Fire! In order to access all of the materials I need to use the videos on the website and download the files to Google Drive.  The lesson is highly scripted.  (While I want to drive a fork into my eye whenever I read through scripted lessons, they are useful if you are unfamiliar with the material.) I like to stay on top of educational practices.  It doesn’t mean I adopt them.  I want to see what the method is, first.  I cannot see myself using Chain Notes.  When I taught I found Bell Ringers and Exit Notes anathema.  (I needed every minute of class time to teach!  Attendance takes about one minute.  If Admin insisted on Bell Ringers, we began with a question or problem germane to the lesson.)  The K20 science lessons are in 5E lessons.  (BSCS developed this model in the 1980s.  It’s a good approach!)    

Back to Great Balls of Fire and evaluating K20 Learn resources.  For whatever reason, the Lesson Slides are located on the website’s page at the bottom.  In the lesson slides are pictures of the videos, rather than embedded videos.  The teacher uses the script, video links, and resource links to teach.  This can be confusing.  Instead, let’s look at the resources.  Here is the background, Card Sort,   Card Sort Hand-out, Chat Station hand-out, and Chat Station Cards.  These resources and the video below are all useful.  What about the rest?  Not so much.  However, I don’t consider this sort of evaluation  a waste of time.  I hadn’t heard about S-I-T: Surprising, Interesting, Troubling.  Will I use it?  Doubtful.  I’m only interested in the materials which promote a lesson and help kiddos understand.  I’m willing to try the card sort and chat station to see if these help kiddos understand reactions and reaction types.  It’s also why I won’t immediately dismiss a new resource, even one chock-full of educational jargon and strategies.