Discovery Debuts New Online Service
Discovery Channel School, located within Discovery Channel Online (school.discovery.com), offers numerous resources to support curricula, including Learning Communities for collaboration among teachers, students and community leaders. This spring's semester, for example, had Learning Community projects on African American history and achievements.
The service also showcases educational programming from The Discovery Channel and The Learning Channel. For example, Video Vault contains 25-second previews of all 35 episodes of "Assignment Discovery," Discovery Channel's commercial-free series designed to be taped and used in 6th-12th grade classrooms.
In addition, 11 experienced online educators, known as Subject Area Managers (SAMs), provide peer-to-peer support in science, social studies, humanities and other areas. SAMs suggest activities and recommend related Internet links for further exploration.
Piloted last year on America Online and AskERIC, Discovery Channel School regularly invites teachers and students to enter contests and submit projects relating to cable broadcasts.
Discovery Communications, Inc., Bethesda, MD, (301) 986-1999.
This article originally appeared in the 06/01/1996 issue of THE Journal.