“The Common Core State Standards provide a consistent, clear understanding of what students are expected to learn, so teachers and parents know what they need to do to help them.” –http://www.corestandards.org
The Common Core Standards
If you are a teacher from the US, you will no doubt be familiar with the Common Core State Standards. I have been introduced to this great lesson planning app which focuses heavily to these standards. Here in British Columbia, Canada where I teach, learning standards will be found in the BC Prescribed Learning Outcomes.
Check out this video which will show the main features of the app:
Here is a snippet from the developer, Thomas Story, a teacher of over eleven years himself:
The Common Core Lesson Planner is must-have app for teachers who want to fully utilize their iPad into their daily teaching routine. The Common Core Lesson Planner was created by a teacher for teachers to help make planning and assessing with the Common Core Standards more effective and efficient.
Features that have been developed are new ways for educators:
-view the Common Core standards they have taught and how often they have taught them throughout the year,
-to quickly score standards while being mobile in the classroom with tablet in hand
-to overall bring Education to a new level using better functional and accountable teaching practices.
Your Daily Lesson Plans At Your Fingertips
Never again try to filter through chicken scratch hand writing or write super small to fit in your lesson content into the tiny boxes. Type or speak your lesson (speaking is Droid only, with plans to add to iPad in the near future) plans into the application, and carry them around your classroom with ease on your iPad or Droid tablet.
One Touch Standards Based Grading
After selecting your standards for the day that you are teaching, select the Assess button. Type in the details of your assessment. .i.e. .. “Students will read 10 multi-syllable words.” Then walk around the room and quickly assess students by touching Red, Yellow, Green, and Blue for Minimal, Basic, Proficient, and Advanced. Stars next to the standard show a class average of that assessment.
View Students Progress Per Standard
When it comes to report card time, nothing is worse than to spend hours sorting through scores and proficiency levels that were taught during the quarter. The CCLP app makes it easy to view every student and how well they have done on each standard over the last 10 assessments. Report cards will never be quicker.
The Standards and Standard Count In Plain View
Have you ever wondered if you have hit a Common Core State Standard enough times? Utilize the “Standards” tab to view the standards of the grade levels you teach as well as scan how many times you have put the standard into your lesson plans throughout the year.
Paper or PDF?
Sometimes you need to print plans for a substitute, or for a back folder. The CCLP App allows you to put in any email, select the week, and send/share a PDF of your weekly plans. Your plans will display the days of the week, the classes you teach, your lesson objective, lesson content, and the standards in a very readable format.
Lesson plans are easy to type-in, clearly laid out and saved for future reference:
Here is a sample screenshot of the common core standards for Grade 5 reading:
Further Reading:
Check out the comprehensive website for this app here, with much more information.
Read more about the Core State Standards Initiative here.
Conclusion:
This app is a must-have for teachers who wish to correlate the Common Core standards with lesson planning on the iPad. Set up of classes is easy. The learning curve is steep, but that is normal for an app with such great features. As soon as your classes are set up for the year, it is smooth sailing from there, and you will be able to quickly access, assess, and review the standards assigned to each grade. What I love about the Common Care Lesson Planner App ($4.99USD) is the PDF and print function for those who like to still keep paper records of plans. Your search for a great lesson planning app is over. I also appreciate that this app is developed FOR teachers BY an actual teacher, not some developer who has never taught in the classroom. Give this app a shot now.
Promo Codes
Thomas has graciously offered, on a first come, first served basis, promo codes for those interested in this app. Check out this link to enter your information to get on the list.
