Curriculum, Assessment and Professional Development
bigchalk.com announces several new products: three new curriculum, assessment and professional development solutions and bigchalk Retriever 3.0. K-12 schools can now subscribe to bigchalk Critical Issues, a series of professional development courses, as well as bigchalk Classmate Language Arts, an online curriculum tool. In addition, educators can evaluate and subscribe to Homeroom.com through bigchalk's education hub.
Critical Issues is powered by Blackboard 5 e-Learning software platforms, and offers three 31/2 CEU-level courses that focus on aligning standards with curriculum and assessment, creating online learning environments, and enhancing home-school communication. Classmate Language Arts provides teachers with the building blocks they need to create thematic, standards-based language arts lessons. Materials include primary and secondary sources, Internet content and related Web links and lesson plans. The Homeroom.com connection lets educators test the online solution from the bigchalk homepage to experience how Homeroom.com works.
Retriever 3.0 is a library search engine that simultaneously searches across all of a library's electronic data in order to deliver relevant results from a single query. Users can utilize a simple or advanced search to narrow their search by publication, online resource, author, title, and more. It is also possible to search local holdings independently with Retriever 3.0. The search engine is customizable to meet libraries' specific needs. bigchalk.com, Ann Arbor, MI, (800) 860-9228, www.bigchalk.com.