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Getting the Most Out of K-12 Online Resources and Repositories

Ashley Fellows headshot

Ashley Fellows

The Learning Accelerator

As technology continues to advance, online resource repositories – that is, the websites, hubs, libraries, or other platforms used to find and implement resources and practices – have become increasingly popular tools for educators. Repositories can offer a wealth of resources to help improve teaching methods, lesson-planning, and overall effectiveness in the classroom. However, with so many repositories and such little coherence among them, it can be hard to know where to start when it comes to finding, choosing, and implementing effective, high-quality, and evidence-based resources.

These challenges were brought to light in a recent project led by The Learning Accelerator (TLA) in partnership with a national philanthropic foundation. We gathered input from 70 individuals and organizations in order to learn more about educators’ experiences with repositories, honing in on the perspectives of school-based educators – that is, classroom teachers and the administrative/coaching staff who support them. Our study centered around how they identified, evaluated, and ultimately implemented resources and practices from these platforms, with the goal of learning how to better bridge the needs of teachers with evidence-based practices they find online.

As we listened to those most proximate to the issue, we realized that using repositories to improve teaching practice was, in essence, a process of innovation adoption. This goes beyond simply finding a resource to try out in the classroom, and includes several steps before and after, including:

  • Step 1 - Motivate: Recognize a need and feel driven to address it.

  • Step 2 - Search and identify: Scan repositories and select those with relevant content, resources, and/or practices.

  • Step 3 - Evaluate and try it: Upon reviewing resources, determine the extent to which they might meet a need and then implement them in a classroom setting.

  • Step 4 - Confirm decision and continue to use: Determine if the resource successfully met the need, potentially integrate into long-term practice, and continue to use repositories.

Successfully completing these steps with high-quality resources can be powerful for educators and students. They are a way to connect to evidence-based practices with the potential to both enhance student learning and save teacher time. However, as we learned more about the ways educators were using repositories, we quickly identified a lack of coherence among the field of resources and evidence-based practices that exist. Additionally, each step of the process comes with hurdles that at any point could cause one to give up their search, and thus the opportunity to innovate and improve for their students. To address this problem, we share common challenges with each step and offer suggestions to help overcome them, making this process easier and ultimately more effective.

Challenges to Step 1: Motivation to Change

Why this is challenging:

Often, the first challenge to innovation that educators face is a failure to recognize the opportunity. Online repositories can offer a wealth of information, connecting them to evidence-based best practices and resources for their classrooms. However, given issues of sustainability and growing levels of burnout for teachers, it’s not surprising that educators may lack the proverbial “gas in the tank” to seek out new processes and activities for their students. Additionally, many may have previously attempted to use online repositories only to find them out-of-date, too overwhelming to navigate, or otherwise a poor fit for their specific needs. These concerns can affect the motivation phase of the process and result in a state of inertia; if they feel too affected by factors like these, educators may find themselves too tired or skeptical to try again.

How to address it:

Generating the will to change is no small feat. Educators should first reflect on and then center their search around their specific needs, identifying ways to build capacity and save time specific to their unique context. Consider the following reflections to identify areas of a teaching practice that may benefit from external resources by incorporating strategies for effective – and potentially rapid – improvement:

  • Reflect on existing materials: Any easy place for educators to start is with their current curriculum – and considering whether their instructional materials are leading students towards meaningful outcomes. If current materials are lacking in some way, educators might end up pouring more energy into planning, scaffolding, and remediation. Reflecting on these gaps could help identify places where resources can increase student learning and save teacher time and energy in the long run. For example, If an educator knows their curriculum lacks conceptual or scaffolded examples, they could search for “conceptual examples of fraction division in the real world” or “scaffolded practice of fraction division.” A search like this could bring up more aligned resources or generate new ideas – which may motivate additional searches. Educators should also consider the rigor, relevance, and alignment of their materials to learning goals. If they see major gaps, new resources could be supportive in closing them.

  • Consider new and promising practices: What strategies or activities might an educator be interested in trying but hasn’t been able to prioritize? What does the latest research around pandemic recovery, unfinished learning, and learning science tell us about emerging best practices? These considerations may lead educators to new ideas, innovations, or practices that can improve the effectiveness of their teaching. Searching for practices like high-impact tutoring, guided questioning, or project-based learning can prevent educators from recreating the wheel while simultaneously providing frameworks, guidance, and even concrete resources to kick off their experimentation.

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    Challenges to Step 2: Search For and Identify Resources

    Why this is challenging:

    Once an educator is motivated to innovate and ready to start searching, there may still be a number of barriers in their way. In its recent study of the current landscape of online repositories, TLA found very little coherence – meaning each repository approached resource-sharing in a unique manner. Differences in philosophy, vision, paywalls, target audience, format, and even evidence varied noticeably, with little consistency from site to site. To an educator with a specific need, it can be overwhelming to navigate a growing number of websites, each with its own search functions, taxonomy, and institutional language/naming conventions. Even when they do find something promising or fitting for their classroom, they might encounter paywalls, causing them to either invest in a resource (often without fully seeing what they would be able to access) or give up the search. Both of these outcomes can affect motivation to try again and can result in missed opportunities moving forward.

    How to address it:

    Beyond aligning search terms to specific needs and/or opportunities, there are a couple of simple steps educators can take to not only improve their chances of finding high-quality resources, but also decrease the likelihood of giving up the process entirely:

    • Start with networks: Nearly all teachers we talked to noted that peers were the first source they turned to when looking for reliable and accessible repositories and resources. Educators should consider asking colleagues directly, discussing their needs in department or grade-level meetings, browsing professional discussion boards, or posting on platforms like LinkedIn or Facebook to crowdsource recommendations from their networks. This increases their chances of identifying free, open-source resources or getting a better idea about which paid repositories may be worth the investment.

    • Improve solo-searching behavior: Finding resources and practices from repositories is its own form of research, and the process can be improved by building specific skills. Multiple classroom teachers we talked to noted using tools like Google Images to scan a large number of resources at once, quickly identifying which resources stick out to them. They then noted information like sources, titles, descriptions, and formats (e.g., presentations, documents, PDFs) to begin building a picture of what might fit their needs. Finally, they began looking at individual resources. Even if they didn’t wind up using one of the resources, it quickly gave them a better understanding around what may be out there and helped them narrow in on the right terms to search and repositories to explore.

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      Challenges to Step 3: Evaluate and Try It

      Why this is challenging:

      After an educator identifies a specific need and finds a promising resource to address it, putting that resource into practice requires work and effort – sometimes more than an educator may have capacity for. At a minimum, most resources require time to customize and embed them into existing materials and platforms. Larger-scale practices often lack concrete resources that illustrate them in practice, leaving the educator to on their own devices to determine how to apply it to their unique needs and context. In all of these cases, the educator must invest their energy into transforming a base resource from a repository into something ready for implementation. At this point, they may run a cost-benefit analysis and end up deciding that trying it out just isn’t worth the time and effort.

      How to address it:

      In confronting this challenge, the goal is to minimize the time and effort educators need to expend in order to successfully select and implement resources. Some steps educators can take to streamline this process include:

      • Know your specific need(s): As educators conduct their search, they should focus concretely on what they need (tip: go back to “Step 1: Motivation to Change” if unsure). For example, they should decide in advance if they’re looking for ideas/inspiration, real-world applications, extension activities, or concrete student-facing resources. Understanding this need can help guide their search.

      • Evaluate resources for those needs: Educators should use their specific context and ideal use cases to quickly rule out resources that don’t fit the bill – and more easily identify those that seem most promising. For example, if an educator is looking for student-facing resources, they should avoid sites that strictly offer pedagogical material, and vice versa. Additionally, if they know they have exactly two days to teach a concept, unit and/or project-level plans are unlikely to be a good fit. Avoid resources that may look flashy and appealing if they lack the substance students specifically need.

      • Build fluency in adapting resources: In talking to classroom teachers, it became clear that the perfect resources may not exist. Rather, teachers typically expect to engage in some level of adaptation and customization when implementing a resource from a repository. To become more effective, educators should hold time in their planning blocks for personalization and build familiarity with processes like document-formatting, tool conversion (e.g., PDF to Google Documents for editing), and other platform-sharing features (e.g., web browser extensions)

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        Challenges to Step 4: Confirm and Continue to Use

        Why this is challenging:

        After an educator has worked their way through this process, it may be tempting to stop at implementation. After all, with so many potential challenges and barriers, this is no small feat in and of itself! However, if trying it out was challenging or poorly received by students, this could result in the decision that the resource was either unsuccessful or too difficult to implement or sustain. In this case, they may be reluctant to use repositories or external resources again in the future – perhaps prematurely cutting themselves off from a valuable resource.

        How to address it:

        Taking the time to reflect on the process (including its effects on students) can be an opportunity for educators to codify what they learned about both their individual and student needs – and may even result in increased motivation to try the process again.

        • Confirm the impact on students: Before determining whether a resource fully met their needs, educators should gather input about the resource’s impact on students. While it may be natural to focus on the use of the resource, it is important to orient towards outcomes. Execution might have felt rocky – something that educators can understandably experience when implementing a new resource – but what does exit ticket data say? What are students saying about the lesson? How did student engagement in this lesson compare to other lessons? Educators should look for indicators throughout implementation – and if they aren’t sure about what they’re seeing, they can ask their students directly.

        • Perform a cost-benefit analysis: Educators should consider the impact of the resource or practice and whether it was worth the time spent on searching and adaptation. Be mindful about the potential time that could be saved if an educator decides to repeat this process. That is, their search might have taken a long time if they were unclear on what they were looking for, and adaptation might have resulted in unexpected hurdles. Repeating this process to find additional resources will likely go faster the next time around.

        • Use this information to improve skills and practice: Educators are encouraged to reflect on what they learned through this process – about their needs, search behaviors, helpful and aligned repositories, and/or the adaptation and implementation process. They can use this information to hone their approach and strengthen their skills in finding the best-fit online resources for their specific needs.

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          Elevate the Potential of Online Resources

          Given both the unique needs of educators as well as the lack of coherence in online repositories to support them, it’s understandable that many educators find it challenging to successfully discover and use new resources and practices. However, with an intentional reflection on needs and context, strong searching and evaluation strategies, increased fluency with adapting materials, and honest reflection on student impact, educators can make this process more effective and efficient – and strengthen the process further as they engage in it moving forward.

          While imperfect, online repositories can contain a wealth of information, resources, and evidence-based best practices with tremendous potential to improve learning experiences for students. When navigated and implemented effectively, they also have the potential to save educators time and energy, providing access to tools that may even speed up processes like lesson-planning, assessment creation, and independent practice activities. It is our hope that these tips can help educators overcome these common challenges in order to tap into the immense potential of evidence-based repositories to improve their teaching practice.

          Ashley Fellows headshot

          Ashley Fellows

          The Learning Accelerator

          Ashley Fellows is the Partner, Practitioner of Learning at The Learning Accelerator (TLA). She brings over a decade of experience in teaching, coaching, and school leadership in service of equitable outcomes for all children.