edmodo.com

Edmodo is the world’s largest, free social learning platform that provides a safe way for students and teachers to connect and collaborate.

Engage Edmodo is designed to get students excited about learning in a familiar environment. On Edmodo, teachers can continue classroom discussions online, give polls to check for student understanding, and award badges to individual students based on performance or behavior.

Connect On Edmodo, teachers are at the center of a powerful network that connects them to students, administrators, parents, and publishers. This network surfaces the world’s best resources and tools, providing the building blocks of a high quality education.

Personalize Edmodo surfaces up engaging, easy-to-use apps that personalize learning for every student. These apps help teachers amplify their lesson plans and integrate seamlessly with Edmodo, delivering all digital content in one place.

Measure Edmodo makes it simple to track student progress. All grades and badges assigned or awarded through Edmodo are stored and easily accessible. Teachers can get the pulse of their classrooms through student reactions to quizzes, assignments, and discussion posts that capture understanding, confusion, or frustration.

edmodo.com

District Spotlight

Chesterfield County Public Schools, VA Edmodo helps district support “Design for Excellence 2020” strategic plan and scale blended learning.

The Opportunity In early 2012, Chesterfield County Public Schools (CCPS) identified a need for a teaching and learning platform that could:

1. Meet a variety of communication and instructional needs

2. Integrate with existing district systems like Google Docs

3. Roll out to the entire district in less than a year

The district created a Request for Proposal and considered investing a large portion of its budget in the development of a next-generation learning management system (LMS)—until it discovered that a large number of teachers were already using Edmodo, a social learning platform built by educators for educators.

The Solution CCPS found that teachers favored Edmodo because of peer recommendations and for its:

Familiar and intuitive user interface Seamless communication between teachers and students Easy-to-build formative assessments Engaging educational apps Accessibility from any device Informal professional development opportunities Teacher-contributed open educational resources

Number of Students 58,800

Number of Schools 62

Number of Teachers 4,200+

Trajectory of Teacher Adoption 44% in August 2012 98% in August 2013

Data Visualization

Chesterfield County Public Schools District Network on Edmodo

Teacher

Connection Between Teachers

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One of the most important adoption factors was increased student engagement. Experience with similar platforms meant that students quickly and easily embraced Edmodo. Through message notifications and access to the mobile app, students could communicate with their teachers and learning experience.

CCPS decided to move forward with Edmodo as its introductory and primary tool for blended learning. To start the process, CCPS established an Edmodo subdomain, which gave district administrators the ability to manage and support site usage, as well as foster district-wide communication and collaboration. They then trained 4,200 teachers over the course of three days during summer break, in preparation for the 2012-13 school year.

The Results With Edmodo’s free platform, CCPS now has a successfully executed blended learning strategy and:

Budget that can be reallocated Increased student engagement Near district-wide adoption

In addition to demonstrating its value inside the classroom, Edmodo helped CCPS understand the importance of selecting a tool that:

Lets teacher preferences guide the process (bottom up supported by top down)

Emphasizes the simple and flexible over the complex and cumbersome Helps push the envelope by taking blended learning to scale

What’s Next? Building on this momentum, CCPS is working to scale its blended learning efforts in the 2013-14 school year, through an expanded digital ecosystem in which Edmodo serves as the hub. The district is also purchasing supplemental curriculum materials through the Edmodo Store, in response to increasing student use of integrated apps.

To encourage further collaboration, the district is developing a network of Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) within Edmodo. Organized by subject area, these PLCs will enable districts to disseminate core curriculum resources in a collaborative space where teachers can also share best practices and ideas with each other.

“ Not going with a traditional LMS turned out to be a great decision, not just from a fiscal standpoint, but also in terms of teacher satisfaction and usage. If we purchased a more traditional LMS, a large percentage of our teachers may never have used it, or at least not to its capacity, without extensive training.”

Dr. Adam Seldow, CCPS Executive Director of Technology