Student Learning Activities from Discovery Education

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By Kerri Lambert, OIT Teacher Specialist

(Before selecting any links below, make sure you have opened Discovery Education from Classlink first)

AACPS students and staff have had access to Discovery Education for over twenty years; in fact, a few of you out there may still refer to it as United Streaming! While the service is best known for its videos, Discovery has over 200,000 resources including images, podcasts, audio clips, virtual field trips, and interactives. This past summer, Discovery expanded their offerings even more, launching over 2,100 ready to use student learning activities that leverage the rich multimedia resources found within the platform. Like to create your own? You’re in luck. Discovery also added activity templates based on their popular SOS Instructional Strategies to Studio; teachers simply add their DE resources and within minutes have a high-quality lesson ready to roll. Let’s take a closer look at each of these options.


Ready Made Student Learning Activities

Image of Discovery Education's Shark choice board.
There are several ways to find the premade lessons. Right now, since they’re new, Discovery has placed
a large banner on the DE dashboard as soon as you log in. Select the blue “Explore Activities” and all of the options will appear. You can also do a keyword search, and find them within channels or collections. In all cases, use the filters across the top to narrow by grade level and/or content if needed. There are so many choices that you’re sure to find something to fit your needs! Some of my personal favorites include the choice boards- explore the world, learn about STEM Careers, or just topics that appeal to a specific age group (check out this option for high school!). And would it really be Discovery Education if there wasn't a shark option? There are over 39 choice boards alone that teachers can choose from, all supporting standards based learning.

October 6th Daily fix it slide from Discovery Education

Choice boards aren’t the only style of learning activity though; Background Builders, like this one on cells, are designed as introductions to science and social studies topics. Maybe you’re looking for a high interest daily warm-up? DE has that covered with their monthly Daily Fix It. These take high interest historical events as inspiration for daily grammar practice. Another option would be the activity calendars; find the one appropriate for your grade level and you have your centers, morning meetings, or brain breaks planned for the month!


SOS Instructional Strategies Templates
Whittle it Down Activity Template

Can’t find exactly what you’re looking for? Or maybe you have a Discovery Ed video from the
curriculum that you want to use? Then the DE Studio Templates are the answer. To get started, select Studio from the DE dashboard and then choose the Create New button in the upper left. The very first option is Activity templates. Choose a strategy, plug in your media and you've got an engaging standards based activity done in a matter of minutes! If you’re like me and like to make it “pretty”, there are plenty of customization options to add different colors and backgrounds. Discovery Ed has even conveniently linked the PDF and video explanation for strategy in the teacher note pane that opens when you first make a copy of the template. Want more information on the SOS instructional strategies? Click here.


Getting the Activities to Students

Now that you have this fantastic activity to share with students, how do you get it to them? Brightspace of course! Discovery Education integrates beautifully with our new LMS; students simply click the provided link and Discovery Education will open in a new tab. There’s no need to open Discovery Education from Classlink first! Complete directions on linking to Discovery Education resources in Brightspace can be found here.

So what are you waiting for? Check out Discovery Education’s new Student Learning Activities or create your own today!

Want to know more about Discovery Education? Visit OIT's Discovery Education's resource page on Teacher Intro to Digital Tools. Look for the "T" icon on Classlink.

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