Instructional Minute

We know you’re always thinking about how to prepare your students to be the next generation of responsible citizens. You can’t go wrong by teaching them about role models that came before them. And with Martin Luther King Jr. Day this week, it’s the perfect time to weave discussions about equality, justice, and compassion into your lessons.

We have a great group of resources to help you celebrate the life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Let students experience his “I Have a Dream” speech, learn more about the March on Washington, and see how the civil rights he fought for are still relevant today.

Happy planning!
-Newsela Team

PS: Don’t forget to check out the January Content Calendar for more lessons all month long.

Take the guesswork out of standardized tests by mastering the vocabulary you'll likely see in test directions and questions. Practicing these lists from this link will help boost comprehension and confidence on test day — no matter what test you're preparing to take.

Test prep. Vocabulary.com. (n.d.-a). https://www.vocabulary.com/lists/test-prep/

The attached video offers 3 tips to use with your students in order to improve their accuracy in answering multiple choice questions.

1. Read the question carefully
2. Look for key words in the question itself
3. Mentally answer the question before reading the answer choices

Check out this video for a more detailed explanation and examples!

Developing students literacy of infographics is a fundamental skill needed to be successful on standardized tests. There are 3 recommended strategies for teaching infographic comprehension to students: defining structure, understanding content, and interpreting design.

SCD Strategy for Understanding Infographics V2 - Easel, www.easel.ly/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/How-to-read-infographics-PDF.pdf. Accessed 10 Jan. 2024.

Lansing School District Instructional Council has approved the use of the teaching materials and content of the Michigan Open Book Project as a resource. The Michigan Open Book Project is a part of the #GoOpen Michigan content that lies within the OER (Open Education Resources).

The MI Open Book Project was a multi-year initiative funded as part of the Technology Readiness Infrastructure Grant (TRIG) which empowered groups of master teachers to come together, collaborate, and develop an open education resource for use in classrooms around Michigan. This resource is a curricular tool created by teachers for teachers!

The content of the Michigan Open Book Project has been approved as a viable Social Studies curriculum during the time period that our Social Studies Steering Committee completes a curriculum review and pilot for the next adoption cycle. The pilot will be taking place during the 2023-2024 school year, but while in the pilot phase, we needed to have a curricular resource and tool for all teachers to use and have immediate access to.

All K-5 classroom teachers can immediately begin to use the content and resources to teach grade level social studies standards. This link will get you to the Michigan Open Book Project resource page.

This link will take you to the Michigan Open Book Project through the Go Open Michigan collective where you can access all parts of the project and filter by grade level.

You can also review this video for a quick tutorial on how to use the resource.

Once you have accessed the resource page, you can review the tabs across the top of the page to learn more about the resource and begin using the content.

Please reach out to Heather Guerra with any questions or additional needs that arise while utilizing this curricular tool for social studies instruction.

Open Educational Resources (OER) are teaching and learning materials that are freely available online for everyone to use, whether you are an instructor, student or self-learner. Examples of OER include: full courses, course modules, syllabi, lectures, homework assignments, quizzes, lab and classroom activities, pedagogical materials, games, simulations, and many more resources contained in digital media collections from around the world. (PBWorks, 2013)

Some facts about OERs:

They are free to use and reuse.

Some can be edited or changed depending on their license

The content can be remixed or revised into something different

They can be shared openly

Open educational resources are and always will be free in digital form, but not all free resources are OER. Free resources may be temporarily free or may be restricted from use at some time in the future (including by the addition of fees to access those resources). Moreover, free resources, which may not be modified, adapted, or redistributed without express permissions from the copyright holder, are not OER.

The document attached outlines 9-12 curricular resources, standards and pacing. This can also be found by clicking here on the LSD website.

This on-demand professional learning resource provides micro-learning videos about every IXL feature and best practices for implementing IXL. Teachers must be signed into their IXL accounts to access these videos. https://www.ixl.com/resources/elearning-library

A resource to use as you see fit.