Adaptive Curriculum is a new supplement to the Science Department. It is an interactive learning program that is designed to create a replica of real life scenarios that coincide with the material learned in class.
“We adopted Adaptive Curriculum last year, we went to a workshop and looked at several different types of curriculum that were supplemental to our curriculum right now, and we chose adaptive curriculum because we felt like it had the best animations, the best information, and it worked the best with our textbooks,” biology teacher Julie Johnston said.
Adaptive Curriculum has proved, for the teachers, to be a worthwhile investment, especially with it’s many uses.
“We have used it in class as a whole group, and you can assign a particular lesson to particular students,” Johnston said. “I have done that as a corrective; going back and studying for a re-take, but I haven’t used it as a homework assignment although I know physics has.”
However, some students don’t see the benefits of Adaptive Curriculum as readily as the teachers do.
“I like Adaptive Curriculum but I don’t think it’s necessary because I feel like we learn enough in class,” sophomore Damon Printz said.
Other students agree that in class learning is more beneficial than Adaptive Curriculum.
“It’s annoying. It’s such a hassle, just give us a worksheet,” junior Becky Cummings said.
The teachers understand the student’s perspective on Adaptive Curriculum, but they still believe in it’s benefits.
“I haven’t had a lot of feedback from students on what they think about it. Students aren’t going to think it’s very cool to be on an academic website for school and say ‘oh this is the coolest thing,’ they’re not going to give that kind of feedback,” Johnston said. “But what I have noticed is that it does increase their learning. I used it as a review last unit the day before the test, we watched all of the animations on the different biomolecules and I did have students tell me that it helped them on the test.”
This website is not only helpful for the student’s learning, but also to help teachers check up on student’s progress on specific subjects.
“On the teacher’s side, the teacher can then go through and quickly and easily assess how are my students doing, are they getting this subject, do they understand what’s going on, so it’s a quick assessment tool for us,” Johnston said.
All in all, Adaptive Curriculum is a learning supplement that has proved it’s worth.
“The biggest advantage of adaptive curriculum is the visual representation. It’s talking about it, and then you see it. For a lot of kids, that’s the key. that’s what helps it click for them,” Johnston said.
