Present and Future Trends in K-12 Learning Management Systems

1. Present and Future Trends in K-12 Learning Management Systems Adam Davy Blackboard Inc.

2. Agenda • What We Are Hearing From Clients • Top Learning Challenges and Technology “Musts” • Enter the Learning Management Platform • Blackboard’s response to the top 5 Learning Challenges • One-to-one computing tools in Blackboard • Q&A

3. What We Are Hearing

4. Which Part are YOU Touching? Assessment / Outcomes Remediation School to Home Professional Development AP Classes Multi-Media Content Virtual Schools Curriculum Mapping

5. A confusing landscape

6. Painful Consequences • Multiple silos of curriculum, tools and data that can: • Undermine cohesion and consistency across the full instructional cycle • Waste time for end users and those who support them • Limit evaluation and analysis by creating pockets of outcomes data • Curtail adoption and limit returns on investment

7. But Also Opportunities Somewhere in this mix, there is a path toward: • Engaging “Digital Natives” • Addressing diverse learners • Tapping into pipeline of educators familiar w/ online learning • Increasing return on infrastructure investment • Doing more with less • Realizing true interoperability

8. What We Hear from Students • Can I speed up the pace of feedback? • Do I know where I stand? • Can I collaborate with my peers? • Can I personalize the environment to fit my needs? • Do I have space to create & manage my own content? Will this help me learn?

9. What We Hear From Teachers • How does this improve my practice? • Is the technology itself a challenge? • Does it save me time? • Does it help me focus my attention where needed? • Can I draw in curriculum from a variety of sources? • Is ongoing support available? Does this help my students succeed?

10. What We Hear from Administrators • Is this boosting student achievement? • Can this recapture my students? • Can I use this to engage the support of the community? • Can I get my teachers and building leaders to buy in? • Does this support my accountability policies and mandates? • Is this a safe and secure environment?

11. Top Learning Challenges and Technology “Musts”

12. 5 The Top 5 Learning Challenges • Engaging Students and Parents • Enhancing Professional Development • Managing Student Progress • Enabling Alternatives and Opportunities • Creating Learning Communities

13. The Technology “Must Haves” • Any response to these challenges must be: • Easy to use and engaging for all end users or it will be inequitable • Scalable and Supported or it will have limited impact • Flexible to meet unique and evolving needs across and within school systems or risk irrelevance • Open to supporting innovation by clients and partners or risk obsolescence

14. The Evolution of the Learning Management Platform

15. What we are seeing… • Leading institutions are harnessing the power of information networks to connect people and resources in new and powerful ways. • In moving beyond classroom Web Sites, these institutions are deploying their core technologies in an effort to establish a dynamic and cohesive learning network that drives both learning and innovation. • Networks are growing beyond single schools and local districts to form dynamic consortia

16. Creating a Networked Learning Environment A true networked learning environment exists when any student or teacher can view instructional content, collaborate with educators and peers, evaluate academic performance, and access any learning resources at any time to achieve their educational objectives.

17. The Networked Learning Environment

18. The Path to the Networked Learning Environment INSTITUTIONAL GROWTH EXPLORATORY SUPPORTED STRATEGIC MISSION CRITICAL TRANSFORMATIVE:THE NETWORKED LEARNING ENVIRONMENT • Class web sites and pilot online classes • Enterprise course and learning management system • Online courses, organizations, and district services integrated with back-office systems • A full online district with learning communities and shared digital content resources • When any student or teacher can view instructional content, collaborate with educators, evaluate academic performance, and access learning resources at any time to achieve their educational objectives. Phase 5 Phase 2 Phase 3 Phase 4 Phase I TIME

19. Create Learning Communities Enable Alternatives Manage Student Progress Enhance Professional Development Engage Students and Parents The Benefits of aNetworked Learning Environment INSTITUTIONAL BENEFITS EXPLORATORY SUPPORTED STRATEGIC MISSION CRITICAL TRANSFORMATIVE:THE NETWORKED LEARNING ENVIRONMENT Phase 5 Phase 2 Phase 3 Phase 4 Phase I TIME

20. A new approach is required • To achieve true Networked Learning Environment will require a comprehensive new approach that: • Eliminates “silos” of data/curriculum and pockets of learning • Meets multiple learning challenges of diverse institutions • Embraces interoperability: administration, data and curriculum • Unifies and engages the entire learning community • And ultimately drives student achievement • A central online hub that unifies and enhances the key ingredients of K-12 instruction: • Instructional Delivery and Curriculum Management • Professional Development • Communication and Collaboration • Evaluation and Assessment

21. Blackboard’s response to the top 5 Learning Challenges

22. How to engage today’s digital natives? How do we address diverse learning styles? How do we channel and support parental involvement? Learning Challenge 1: Engaging Students and Parents

23. Challenge 1: Engaging Students and Parents -Course Authoring/Multi-Media • Visual Text Box Editor • WYSIWYG • Spell Check • Equation Editor • QuickEdit • Use external authoring tools including: • Macromedia Dreamweaver • MS FrontPage • any SCORM-compliant authoring tool

24. Challenge 1: Engaging Students and Parents - Blackboard Messages • Facilitates communication between Blackboard users • Enables sending and receiving of messages without use of email addresses

25. Challenge 1: Engaging Students and Parents - Group Projects • Groups work can work together to support peer collaboration • Each group can be given its own: • File exchange area • Discussion Board • Virtual Classroom • Group Email

26. Challenge 1: Engaging Students and Parents - Observer/Parent Role • Enables parents and others not officially enrolled in a course to view course work and course activities of a particular student • Observer has access to specific areas within the course such as content areas and grades.

27. How do we maximize the impact of face to face in-services? Can we increase capacity and options via online professional development? Is there a more efficient way to share and collaborate on curriculum? Are there online approaches to mentoring and supervision? Learning Challenge 2: Enhancing Professional Development

28. Challenge 2: Enhancing Professional Development -Learning Object Catalog • Search high-qualitycontent • Browse by category • Keyword searches • Find targeted content with metadata tags • Full-text search

29. Challenge 2: Enhancing Professional Development - e-Portfolios • Create a record of achievement • Create a website • Share with usersand courses • Send to usersoutside Blackboard

30. Challenge 2: Enhancing Professional Development - Discussion Board • Enables threaded, asynchronous discussions • Teachers can set up multiple forums around different topics • Forums can be sorted/viewed by thread, author, date, or subject

31. Challenge 2: Enhancing Professional Development - Workflow • Send files for approval • Review content to ensure quality • Route files to other users and allow the sender to track the progress on completion

32. How can I provide students with timely feedback? Can I manage ongoing assignments more efficiently? Can I assess and assign resources according to state and local standards? Can I create learning paths for students based upon their mastery? Learning Challenge 3: Managing Student Progress

33. Challenge 3: Managing Student Progress- Assessments and Surveys • Online assessments and surveys. • Question types include: • Calculated Formula • Calculated Numeric • True/False • Hotspot • Likert/Opinion Scale • Multiple Choice • Multiple Answer • Ordering • Matching • Fill-in-the-Blank • Short Answer • Essay • File Upload • Jumbled Sentence • Either/Or

34. Challenge 3: Managing Student Progress- Adaptive Release • Ability for a teacher to create custom learning paths through a course • Content can be released to students based on a set of criteria including: • Date / time • Username • Group membership • Institution role • Grade on a test • Assignment grade • Whether the user has previously reviewed another piece of content

35. Challenge 3: Managing Student Progress- Reporting and Performance Dashboard • Run reports on individual pieces of content • Provides usage data for an entire course • Indicates whether students have reviewed specific content items • Advanced System Reporting allows System Administrators to run comprehensive reports

36. Learning Challenge 4: Enabling Alternatives and Opportunities • Can we expand options for students of all abilities? • Can we draw upon resources across and outside of our district?

37. Challenge 4: Enabling Alternatives and Opportunities - Virtual Classroom / Collaboration Tool • Enables live synchronous interaction • Text-based Chat environment • Collaborative whiteboard • Group web browsing (web touring) • Private question-and-answer • Breakout room capability • Users can “raise their hand” to be called on Learn About Fish

38. Challenge 4: Enabling Alternatives and Opportunities - Assignments • Students can submit their assignments online • Teachers can grade the assignments and provide feedback for each student

39. How can we create a one-stop destination for our school community? How can students and teachers personalize their learning experience? How do we nurture (and monitor) extra- and co-curricular activities online? Can we create broader networks beyond our district? Learning Challenge 5: Creating Learning Communities Sycamore Community Schools

40. Sycamore Public Schools

41. Minnetonka Public Schools

42. Challenge 5: Create Learning Communities -Multi-Institution Branding and Management • Each school or group can be given their own domain and look-and-feel • Delegated Administration allows System Admins to assign administrative tasks to various individuals or groups

43. Challenge 5: Create Learning Communities - Channels / Modules • Deliver regularly updated headlines and content to users • Individual users can customize their personal web pages • Availability of modules is role-based • Deliver over 100 modules and channels • Build an unlimited number of additional ones

44. Challenge 5: Create Learning Communities - Multi-Language Support • Enables institutions to run multiple languages on the same system • Supports foreign language courses and students • Supports most European Languages as well as multi-byte character sets such as Japanese and Chinese

45. Challenge 5: Create Learning Communities - Building Blocks (Open APIs) • Free software development kit (SDK) • Documented application programming interfaces (APIs) • Create new functionality or integrate external systems with Blackboard products • Enables interoperability with other systems

46. One-to-one Computing tools in Blackboard

47. A Brief Overview of Blackboard Backpack

48. What is Backpack? • Blackboard Backpack provides students with a personal study and learning tool to: • Access • Organize • Interact with educational resources, anytime, anywhere

49. Annotate Course Materials • Using their laptops, students can personalize course and research materials in real time by: • Adding notes during lectures • Highlighting key research findings • For students with Tablet PCs, Blackboard Backpack as native digital ink support – making annotation even easier.

50. Questions?Adam Davyadavy@blackboard.com