Thousands of teachers use LearnZillion every day to help their students learn. But how do they do it? How can a 5 minute math or ELA video lesson help to drive high quality Common Core instruction? These teachers think of LearnZillion lessons as orange juice concentrate: they’re short but if you add water – in the form of questions, practice problems, and tasks – they expand into an amazing whole lesson. In other words, these lessons are a perfect starting point for their whole class planning and instruction.
How LearnZillion Works
Each lesson on LearnZillion has been created by a member of our Dream Team directly from the language of the Common Core State Standards. As a result, every lesson is grade-level appropriate, visual, and focused on explaining the concepts at the heart of a standard. In other words, it’s dense with high-quality, easy-to-understand Common Core content. It’s also practical – each lesson comes with a set of power point slides that can be downloaded and customized to your particular class.
Learn how to customize downloadable slides
Turning LearnZillion concentrate into juice
Here are a few tips from our community about how to turn our short videos into powerful whole class instruction:
- Add stopping points and questions to the video lesson. For example, stop at the “Common Misunderstanding” part of the video lessons and ask, “why do you think students make that mistake?”
- Use the guided practice and extension activities at the end of many of our slides as a basis for in-class practice.
- Personalize and customize LearnZillion’s downloadable slides to create practice worksheets (see 5 ways to leverage LearnZillion’s Downloadable Slides for more ideas)
For more ideas, check out the lesson plans we’ve developed for the essential 3rd-8th grade math standards, or watch this engaging video discussion with Nick Pyzik, an elementary school teacher and math coach at Tuscarora Elementary School in Ballenger Creek, Maryland. Nick gives specific examples about how he uses LearnZillion to streamline his own planning, reflects on student reactions to using LearnZillion lessons in the classroom, and shares how he’s using LearnZillion as a coach.
What else can you do with the lessons?
When LearnZillion lessons are the building blocks for whole class instruction, it’s even easier to use them for differentiation, for homework, or for parent engagement. Students will benefit from that direct link to what happened in class, and parents can finally make sense of the standards-driven shifts. Administrators, too, are using LearnZillion Premium as the backbone of a digital Common Core curriculum, and to help drive high-quality professional development.
Here is a parent/guardian letter that you might send home with each unit in math and/or ELA.
Parents and Guardians,
Many of you have asked how you can support your student’s learning at home. Here is an important way you can do that.
Many of you have asked how you can support your student’s learning at home. Here is an important way you can do that.
Go to www.learnzillion.com. LearnZillion is a website that provides teachers and parents with video lessons showing what your student needs to learn each year. The lessons include a 3-5 minute long lesson video, downloadable slides, and other resources for practice and assessment.
When you get to the site, type the following lesson codes into any search bar on the site. The codes will bring you directly to the lessons for your student.
Place LearnZillion Codes here (You can find the LZ Codes on each lesson page when you click on “quick code” underneath each lesson video). It’s recommended that you include 2-3 codes for the upcoming week.
Your student can watch the videos alone or with you. Have your student take notes while watching. I have provided a notes sheet to help. If your student doesn’t have the notes sheet with them, he/she can recreate it by taking a piece of paper and breaking the front page into the following sections:
Your student can watch the videos alone or with you. Have your student take notes while watching. I have provided a notes sheet to help. If your student doesn’t have the notes sheet with them, he/she can recreate it by taking a piece of paper and breaking the front page into the following sections:
- What is this lesson about?
- Review
- Mistakes to avoid
- The main thing to learn
He/she can use the back of the paper to work on the “guided practice” video or other activities that come with the lesson.
Thank you for supporting your student’s learning at home. Let me know if you have any questions.
Sincerely,
Sincerely,
Eric Nichols
Harney ESD Region XVII
Model Lesson:
Teaching Fractions with ManipulativesResources for Model Lesson:
Instructional Plan
Fraction Strips
Circle Graphs--Student Work
Student Work Intro Text
Student Created Tools
Handout Circle Graph Folding Instructions
Teacher Commentary
Videos to check out!:
One Stitch Closer (3 min) GREAT STORY!
Steve Jobs--The Crazy Ones (1 min)
January Theme: Identifying Similarites and Differences (7min)
Not a Taylor Swift Fan?....you might be after watching this (5min)
Articles you might want to check out:
Jan 16-Indistar Gathering at ESD
Feb 10--Learning Walk at Slater Elementary
Feb 13--Division 22 Standards Report Due--see EXECUTIVE NUMBERED MEMO:
004-2014-15 DIVISION 22 ASSURANCES 2014-2015
Feb 13--Alice Nine @ Harney ESD--register with J. Caldwell 541-573-4834
Feb 26-27 K and Early Literacy Summit
March 9-11 CCSS Regional Trainings
April 10--Harney County Tech Conference 2015 @ BHS
April 30-May 1--Kevin Feldman Learning Walk and Training info to come soon
Feb 10--Learning Walk at Slater Elementary
Feb 13--Division 22 Standards Report Due--see EXECUTIVE NUMBERED MEMO:
004-2014-15 DIVISION 22 ASSURANCES 2014-2015
Feb 13--Alice Nine @ Harney ESD--register with J. Caldwell 541-573-4834
Feb 26-27 K and Early Literacy Summit
March 9-11 CCSS Regional Trainings
April 10--Harney County Tech Conference 2015 @ BHS
April 30-May 1--Kevin Feldman Learning Walk and Training info to come soon
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