In California’s San Diego County, the Poway Unified Schools District is using e-learning software to help it create the culture and conditions to empower world-class learners.
In the case study produced with edtech vendor Instructure, the district organisation explained that its previous learning management system (LMS) had delivered “hit or miss” results, particularly at elementary level – roughly equivalent to early and primary school years in the UK.
According to Brenda Gillies, technology and innovation coach for the schools district organisation, a “more modern, user-friendly” tool could streamline communication and course content delivery. Poway chose the Canvas LMS from Instructure, which it said helped it in “crafting consistency”.
“We were working with this small group of teachers, and once they felt comfortable with the tool, they were telling [their colleagues] ‘hey, you’re missing out on this’. [Canvas LMS] is where we need to start moving and housing our content,” she added.
Canvas LMS also helped deliver professional learning to educators themselves, helping connect the best practices of virtual instruction to in-person learning, according to the schools organisation.
Since Covid, the schools district leaders had been keen to “expand their mindsets about learning”, committing to several initiatives based on stakeholder feedback, including from classroom teachers, teacher leaders, principals, directors, and students.
Dr. Jennifer Burks, associate superintendent of technology and innovation at the Poway schools organisation, said: “We encouraged all teachers and students at our schools to use Canvas LMS…this was one of the silver linings that came out of the pandemic.”
Michael Gizzo, a high-school assistant principal in the organisation, said a single learning management system such as Instructure’s Canvas LMS streamlines content delivery and communications with students and families.
“Shared virtual schedules provide teachers and students with a structured way to organise their learning and access resources from a central location,” Gizzo confirmed via the case study.
Remote learners benefited from quizzes in Canvas LMS for formative assessments, and the grade-book allowed teachers to document student assignments, quizzes, and test scores in one place.
External tool integrations with Canva, Nearpod, and Google Drive were also helpful, according to the schools organisation.
In other news, Instructure is about to hold its ‘Making Moments’ InstructureCon meeting for 2023 in Denver, Colorado from 26 to 28 July inclusive – with speakers including Deepak Chopra, Arianna Huffington and futurist Jordan Nguyen on the future of learning and learning tech.
The e-learning firm is expected to announce its Q2 2023 results on 31 July.
( Photo by Kenny Eliason on Unsplash )
