A recent Rocky View Schools (RVS) partnership with Alberta Education and four school boards in the province continues the boards’ goal of producing 21st Century learners, said Nancy Lake, at the RVS board meeting on May 17.
“This project is almost like a bridge,” Lake said of the Collaborative Online Resource Environment (CORE).
“All those learning resources from multiple places go to one place.”
For Lake, RVS program specialist of 21st Century learning, CORE’s ability to provide teachers and students in Alberta with a single point of entry to a multitude of learning resources — digital books, newspapers, audio, video, database records — is a game-changer.
“The concept is really powerful and the nice thing is that it’s always changing, it’s never static,” Lake said.
Students and teachers will have access to CORE through Alberta’s SuperNet, and RVS will launch its Learning Object Repository (LOR) as part of the project in the fall.
LOR will allow students to get more personalized learning and give teachers from the five participating boards — RVS, Calgary Board of Education, Calgary Catholic School District, Golden Hills School Division and Canadian Rockies Public Schools — the ability to share lesson plans, resources and licenses. Lake said CORE would give students and staff at RVS the chance to “co-create their learning.” Throughout the process, RVS will continue to monitor the effects enhanced access to learning resources has on students.
Lake said RVS continues to pursue the best ways for the board to get access for its students to the newest learning technologies, and CORE is one more step towards making classrooms in Alberta state-of-the-art.
“We’re constantly pointing people to all these different places online,” said Trustee Bev LaPeare. “I love the concept of one-stop learning, this is just remarkable.”
