Utilize Actively Learn: A Guide for Effective Reading Instruction in the Classroom
Actively Learn, an innovative educational platform developed by McGraw Hill, is revolutionizing the way students learn by promoting active engagement with content across various subjects.
The platform's key features include an interactive reading and annotation system, personalized learning options, peer collaboration, and real-time teacher analytics.
With Actively Learn, students can read texts, answer embedded questions, annotate, and reflect, fostering deeper comprehension and critical thinking. The platform supports a variety of subjects by providing tailored reading materials and embedded multimedia, enabling contextual learning relevant to each discipline.
Personalized learning is at the heart of Actively Learn, allowing educators to assign content adapted to individual student needs. This supports differentiated instruction and addresses diverse learning styles and proficiencies, thereby boosting confidence and motivation.
Actively Learn also facilitates peer-to-peer interaction within the platform, encouraging discussion and collaboration that enhance understanding through multiple perspectives. Teachers can track student progress in real-time, identify learning gaps, and provide targeted feedback, making it easier to guide students effectively.
As an online tool, Actively Learn can be used in various settings—classroom, remote, or hybrid learning—offering flexibility in how students engage with learning materials.
The benefits of using Actively Learn are numerous. Research shows that active learning increases knowledge retention, student satisfaction, and academic outcomes by involving learners directly in the knowledge-making process. This active engagement promotes critical thinking, collaboration, and motivation while reducing disengagement common in passive learning approaches.
Actively Learn also leverages the broader benefits associated with e-learning, such as tailored instruction to meet diverse needs, global collaboration opportunities, and cost-effectiveness by enabling learning anytime and anywhere.
Actively Learn offers a free version and a paid plan, called Prime, with additional features. The free version includes access to hundreds of assignments, student reading aids, real-time written feedback, and rental of more than 10,000 ebooks. The Prime plan offers thousands of additional resources, state-specific standards alignments, customization options, automated, personalized feedback, real-time data, student and educator collaboration, LMS integrations, priority customer support, and unlimited ebook add-ons.
Tips for using Actively Learn include using polls in reading, monitoring student progress live during class, and uploading personal media. Polls embedded in the platform can help gauge class opinions and spark discussion points.
Actively Learn was founded by Dr. Deep Sran and Jay Goyal in 2012, based on their work in educational psychology. It is an online reading and comprehension system designed specifically for education, offering access to over 10,000 ebooks, with the option to upload custom materials. The platform integrates seamlessly with Google Classroom and Canvas for easy sharing of reading tasks.
In summary, Actively Learn's key features—interactive content, personalized assignments, peer-to-peer learning, and real-time teacher analytics—combine to create a dynamic, engaging educational experience across different subject areas, harnessing the proven benefits of active learning to improve student outcomes.
- Actively Learn, initially developed by McGraw Hill, has significantly improved student learning by encouraging active engagement with content, particularly in subjects like STEM.
- This digital education-and-self-development platform fosters deeper comprehension and critical thinking through interactive reading, annotation, and embedded questions.
- It supports personalized learning options, enabling teachers to assign tailored content based on a student's individual needs for differentiated instruction.
- Actively Learn facilitates online-education by seamlessly integrating with Learning Management Systems like Google Classroom and Canvas, allowing for efficient sharing of learning materials.
- The platform cultivates collaboration among students, encouraging discussion and understanding through multiple perspectives, while teachers can monitor student progress in real-time for targeted feedback.
- With features like real-time teacher analytics and interactive learning tools, Actively Learn is transforming traditional learning methods, enabling a more effective and engaging digital educational experience.
