Let’s say your child is having trouble learning multiplication. You want to find some entertaining videos and resources that will help your child learn, but Googling “multiplication videos” turns out to be more complicated than you thought because you have to screen each video, determine if it’s appropriate for your child, and save a list of those you like. Or, instead of spending hours doing this, you can head on over to OpenEd.io! At OpenEd, they’ve already done the searching for you on thousands of topics relating to math, reading and more. All of the resources on their site have been “teacher-approved” and even sorted into categories based on the Common Core Standards. I had the privilege recently of speaking with Lisa Blum, co-founder and VP of Marketing and Product Management at OpenEd. Like many valuable resources, she and her husband developed this site based on their own personal frustration in finding learning materials for their son. Their research bloomed into the development of OpenEd, which now contains more than 120,000 videos and 80,000 educational games, which are searchable by keyword, grade and Common Core Standard. They’ve even developed a learning management system (LMS) whereby teachers can personalize their own “class” on the site, which they can then pass on to their students and parents for additional learning. OpenEd is also valuable for home-schooling families, tutors, and fighting the summer brain drain. As Lisa told me, her son watched one or two videos a day one summer, and he enjoyed it so much that he didn’t feel like he was being given extra homework.
OpenEd is a valuable resource both for teachers and parents. It’s just getting launched, so it will be growing and expanding even more in the future. And an iPad app is coming, too! Summer is a great time to help your children stay focused on learning, look ahead to the concepts they’ll be learning the next year (which will help build their confidence in the classroom), and develop lesson plans and curriculum for upcoming classes. Visit OpenEd at www.opened.io today.
