School closure resources for parents

Parents, teachers, and kids are adjusting to life at home and learning online. Battelle’s education team, which manages the Ohio STEM Learning Network, has pulled together a list of some of our favorite education resources.

Many of these feature special promotions created to help out during the COVID-19 crisis. Know a great resource? Submit it in the comments below with a link and a one to two sentence description. Throughout the next month, each new Ohio STEM Learning Network post will include a new, updated set of resources, based on your suggestions.

We’ve divided this list into three sections: 1) Resources for everyone 2) Ohio specific resources 3) Resource collections from other organizations.

Finally, don’t forget our 2020 OSLN Student Essay Contest. Essays are due Sunday, April 5th via Typeform at the following link (https://tiny.cc/8621iz).

Stay safe out there!

Resources for everyone

Organization Description
American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society has ChemMatters magazines, targeted for high schoolers, available online. In addition to chemistry, there are article that are biographies of chemists, and historical articles.
Bedtime Math Bedtime Math is a national nonprofit that ignites kids’ curiosity and learning by unleashing the fun in math. It offers playful online math problems for parents to do with their kids every day, as well as lively hands-on games.
BrainPOP:

Fill out this form on the website and watch for an email with instructions.

BrainPOP is a playful, educator focused platform that has learning games, animated movies, and activities that cover universal topics.  There are three platforms: BrainPOP Jr (K-3, encourages young learners to ask questions and form their own ideas in STEM, Social Studies, Reading/Writing, Health, and arts); BrainPOP (Upper Elementary and Middle School, STEM, Social Studies, English, Health, Arts & Music); and BrainPOP ELL (proficiency-based English language learning program appropriate for all ages with vocabulary, grammar, listening and reading & writing activities).
Britannica Britannica has made available COVID-19 emergency resources to every school in the U.S. Get free access to Britannica LaunchPacks, for social studies and science.
Canva For Education Create presentations, infographics, websites, reports, worksheets, posters, flyers and signage
Children’s literature elementary STEM design challenges Each lesson has a reading passage, videos, optional review questions, and self-graded practice questions. The lessons can be assigned to Google Classroom and it puts the grade in that students got on the practice questions (Students must get 10 practice questions correct to get 100%).
CK-12 Foundation Each lesson has a reading passage, videos, optional review questions, and self-graded practice questions. The lessons can be assigned to Google Classroom and it puts the grade in that students got on the practice questions (Students must get 10 practice questions correct to get 100%).
Comcast Parent Resources A variety of resources including details on free hotspots and unlimited data caps for many plans.
Cuyahoga Valley Environmental Education Center Facebook Live video events, quizzes, and educational videos from field instructors at the center.
Discovery Education Discovery Education Experience is an online K-12 service combining curated curriculum resources with on-demand teaching strategies. Its standards-aligned content is assignable and meets the varying needs of diverse student populations in a safe and secure environment.
Discovery K12 Discovery K12 provides a complete online curriculum for pre-k to 12th grade. All main subjects are covered, plus extra curriculum courses.
Disney’s Imagineering in a Box via Khan Academy  32 videos in which Disney Imagineers share how they use a wide range of skills – from story development and conceptual design, to math, physics and engineering – to create immersive experiences.
Cincinnati Zoo Home Safari Videos (Facebook Live streams, YouTube videos, online)
Genius Hour Journal (a do-it-from home PPT) Step-by-step resource for doing genius hour at home
GrowNextGen E-Learning Courses These self-guided digital resources allow students to work independently. Pre- and post-tests can be used to check knowledge gains.
Henry Ford Archive of American Innovation Explore artifacts and stories about Agriculture and the Environment, Design and Making, Power and Energy, Communications and Information Technology, Mobility and Society and Social Transformation.
Khan Academy Daily livestreams on Facebook, YouTube and Twitter for students, parents and teachers navigating school closures and parent guides.
KiwiCo Home resources for kids and their grownups
Learning Blade STEM4Parents are parent-ready handouts designed to stimulate STEM conversations at home and encourage research and simple at-home experiments.
Mystery Science To help all these teachers during school closures, Mystery Science pulled the easiest lessons to do from home and published them all for free on a page to make it easy. No signup required, no student login.
NASA STEM @ Home For Students Grades K-4 Activities and projects from rocket launches to space-themed coloring patterns.
National Geographic Resource Library/The Real Time Curriculum Project Curated access to relevant news and events as they happen
National Institute of General Medical Sciences
STEM and informal science education projects for pre-K through grade 12. Aligned with state and national standards for STEM teaching and learning,
National Inventor’s Hall of Fame  Blog offers ideas for at-home STEM activities
National Science Teaching Association Free 30-day membership with access to online materials and web seminars
OASIS Free online STEM Club for STEAM kids, parents, and educators
Ohio History Connection Find activities to engage your child in Ohio’s history from home
PAST Foundation The PAST Foundation is compiling resources for parents/guardians and educators with a series of at-home activities that can be downloaded.
Scholastic Scholastic has created a learning hub that provides 20 days of learning experiences for students in grades PreK-9+ across the content areas. The company is also providing free access to other digital learning programs. Information provided in this link. Please feel free to share
Scholastic Learn at Home ‘Learn From Home’ website with four categories: PreK and Kindergarten, Grades 1 and 2, Grades 3-5, and Grades 6+. Each section is already equipped with one week of content for students with 15 additional days on the way.

Each day of content is filled with exciting articles and stories, videos, and fun learning challenges. The students can even go on virtual field trips or meet best-selling authors.

Science Journal for Kids Hundreds of scientific articles. Written for kids. Approved by scientists. Articles and STEM teaching resources are free to download.
SciGirls SciGirls is a show for kids ages 8-12, showcasing bright, curious, real tween girls putting science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) to work in their everyday lives. In each half hour episode you’ll meet a new group of girls, whose eagerness to find answers to their questions will inspire your children to explore the world around them and discover that science and technology are everywhere!

Each episode goes beyond science “factoids” to highlight the process of science and engineering. Girls can see how choosing, questioning, planning, predicting, observing, interpreting and communicating actually take place.

Smithsonian Learning Lab The Smithsonian Learning Lab puts the treasures of the world’s largest museum, education, and research complex within reach. The Lab is a free, interactive platform for discovering millions of authentic digital resources, creating content with online tools, and sharing in the Smithsonian’s expansive community of knowledge and learning.
STEMisElementary  Integrated lessons, resources, professional development opportunities and other events can be found relating to elementary STEM
Storyline Online Members of the Screen Actors Guild read children’s books online.
Texas Instruments Range of free resources from Texas Instruments including math, think-like-a-scientist experiences, and easy-entry programming.
USA Science and Engineering Festival XSTEM video collection includes presenters from prior festivals
Virtual Field Trips Virtual Field Trips offers videos covering K-8 social studies, life science, geography, and ancient civilization curriculum content. Videos are standards-aligned and provide quizzes. Site includes 300+ learning activities that have been designed to accompany videos.

 

Ohio focused resources

Organization Description
“Keep Learning” by Ohio State University OSU’s tips and resources for helping shift to online learning. (These are geared toward OSU students and instructors has some transferable info.)
Columbus Virtual Events Calendar Lots of cool online activities, many free. Specific to Columbus.
Columbus Metropolitan Library Online resources, books, tutorials, movies, etc.
Cincinnati Zoo Home Safari Videos (Facebook Live streams, YouTube videos, online)
Cincinnati Museum Center Wonder Zone bring experiments and museum experiences into your home. It’s a trove of at-home science experiments and activities. Videos in the Wonder Zone include meeting different animals or creating something like slime!

Resource collections

Organization Description
SchoolClosure.org List of 100 enrichment activities
American Federation of Teachers Range of resources for both parents and teachers on guiding learning at home.
Thomas B. Fordham Institute Expert-curated list of the best YouTube channels, educational videos on streaming services (Netflix, Hulu, Amazon Prime), podcasts for kids, and free online instructional materials.

 

 

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