New York and Boston (PRWEB) September 08, 2011
Pearson, the leading learning company, and Tikatok, the leading childrens publishing platform and a Barnes & Noble company, today announced a long-term, strategic partnership to fully integrate an interactive digital platform for creating personalized online storybooks with Pearsons new myWorld Social Studies elementary grades program. The new curriculum is available for review by educators now and will be in classrooms for the 2012-2013 school year.
The partnership represents a major breakthrough as teachers can -- for the first time -- incorporate the latest digital storytelling technology from Tikatok into the Pearson social studies curriculum. With the storytelling process embedded at every step of the curriculum, students will continually make personal connections, develop critical thinking skills, and express themselves in writing all aimed at engaging and motivating them to excel.
Social studies teachers testing the myStoryBook platform said it was an excellent way to highlight what students learned - so many excellent features are incorporated and that digital storytelling would be a powerful motivator and a great instructional tool.
A growing body of research points to the effectiveness of digital storytelling as an educational tool to engage students, to empower them as writers, and to ensure they can retain and comprehend information. Digital storytelling ensures students know their facts, make decisions about the key elements, and shape those within the parameters of telling a story. Such work involves high-level information literacy, critical thinking and creativity; the result is an original and authentic product of the child's knowledge and imagination," said Dr. Lesley Farmer, Professor California State University, Long Beach, in her report Using Technology for Digital Storytelling: Tools for Children.
By fully integrating Tikatoks StorySpark proprietary system, myWorld Social Studies will enable students to develop critical skills including
