FAQ

What is so great about open educational resources (OERs) and Curriki?

  1. It’s free. Yes, that’s right. Curriki is completely free for teachers, students, and parents.
  2. The OERs have been created and contributed by educators, curriculum designers, curriculum partners, and school districts.
  3. They are ”mashable.” You may select resources (lesson plans, videos, animations, photos, units, e-texts, etc.) you want to use, access them, mix them up with other resources if you wish, and generate your own custom teaching tools.
  4. Many OERs have already been mapped to both state and Common Core standards.
  5. And finally, Curriki encourages you to add, subtract, and edit anything that will make the resources better for your purposes.

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What is Curriki?

Curriki is an online community for creating and sharing curricula and teaching best practices. Curriki:

Provides High Quality Free Resources – Curriki contains over 46,000 free K-12 lessons, units, assessments, and multimedia learning resources across all subject areas.

Empowers Educators – Curriki’s free platform enables educators to build their own curriculum by assembling Curriki resources, as well as their own, into collections.

Helps Eliminate the Education Divide – Curriki originated from the idea that technology can play a crucial role in breaking down the barriers of the Education Divide – the gap between those  who have access to high-quality education and those who do not. Curriki helps bridge this divide by providing free and open resources to teachers who need them most. The Curriki community is composed of millions of users and hundreds of collaborative networking groups.

Leads the Open Education Resource Movement – Curriki is a leading organization behind the OER movement—a movement based around the idea that educational resources should be freely available for educators and students to use, mix, modify, and share.

Engages in Dynamic Partnerships with a Global Reach – Curriki is working with partners around the world to develop multilingual educational content that supports local education initiatives and goals.

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What do educators do on Curriki?

When you join Curriki (at no cost), you can:

Build a Personal Library – Teachers can replace their file cabinets with a personal space in Curriki to store and organize their lesson plans, units, e-textbooks, assessments, videos, animations—virtually any type of learning object. Again, free of charge.

Find Resources – Curriki allows users to search for K-12 educational resources by subject, grade, rating, instructional type, and more.

Contribute Resources – Curriki empowers teachers across the globe to share their best lessons or units of study. By contributing to the Curriki repository, the global community can find the resources they need, when they need them, free of charge.

Connect with Other Educators – Curriki invites teachers worldwide to work together to create new curricular materials and share best practices using the site’s easy-to-use collaboration tools.

Here are some real-life examples of teachers using and contributing OERs.

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How does Curriki help teachers?

“I think that teachers are constantly looking for resources and communities that can enhance their teaching. Curriki has many great resources compiled from a variety of subjects that are helpful when planning new lessons or sprucing up old lessons.” – Curriki Educator

Free and Comprehensive Resources – Curriki’s repository contains full courses, units, lesson plans, multimedia files, assessments, and more—all free of cost, saving valuable time and money.

Global Community of Educators – Curriki allows teachers to connect with like-minded colleagues around the world and form communities around shared curricular goals.

Helping ALL Students Succeed – Curriki allows teachers to join a worldwide community to help all students succeed by sharing the knowledge they have with others around the world.

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How does Curriki help administrators and district leaders?

  • Cost Savings on Teaching Resources – On average, school systems spend $4,500/teacher on teaching resources. It is estimated that by using the free OERs available on Curriki, schools and districts can reduce that cost by approximately 50%.
  • Dynamic Teaching Resources – Curriki liberates school systems from static methods of teaching and learning, and helps all educators bring innovation in their classrooms on a daily basis; this leads to increased student achievement.
  • Innovating at All Levels – Curriki connects principals and districts to a community of innovative educational professionals from around the world.
  • Managing Valuable Knowledge – Curriki ensures that even if teachers leave the system, their knowledge is still available for use in schools.

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Can I find practice sheets, quizzes, outlines, and lesson plans?

Yes, Curriki hosts various Instructional Component Types and types of media including:

  • Curriculum
    • Assignment/Test
    • Full Course
    • Lesson Plan
    • Rubric
    • Scope & Sequence
    • Standards
    • Study Guide/Notes
    • Syllabus
    • Tutorial
    • Unit
    • Workbook
  • Books
    • Fiction
    • Non-Fiction
    • Readings/Excerpts
    • Text Book
  • Asset
    • Animation/Simulation
    • Article/Essay
    • Audio/Speech/Lecture
    • Diagram/Illustration
    • Glossary/Vocabulary List
    • Index/List
    • Photograph
    • Reference
    • Script/Transcript
    • Study/Data/Research
    • Table/Graph/Chart
    • Template
    • Video/Presentation/Slides
    • Webcast/Podcast
  • Activities
    • Assignment/Homework
    • Exercise
    • Experiment/Lab
    • Game
    • Graphic Organizer/Worksheet
    • Problem Set
    • WebQuest

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Are these materials copyrighted?

All Curriki editorial content is copyrighted by Curriki. These materials are shared under a Creative Commons Attribution License. Click here for more information about Copyright & Open Licenses.

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Does it cost anything to join?

No, membership is free! Join here.

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Do I have to pay to download any resources?

No.

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Do I have to be a member to download resources?

You can browse Curriki’s learning resources without logging in, but when you are ready to download a resource, you will be asked to login or join.

 

Does Curriki offer training on how to use Curriki and OERs?

Yes, Curriki offers both free and paid options for training on every feature of Curriki, as well as ways to incorporate Curriki OERs into your classroom, school, library, and district. Start by visiting our library of free Tutorial Videos.

Curriki Professional Development Workshops focus on innovative concepts and practices related to open education curriculum, and digital and social learning. Curriki will show you how to use OERs with simple, step-by-step tools. Each workshop can be delivered face to face at your facility, asynchronously online, or as a hybrid of the two delivery methods.

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I’ve heard that free and open means low quality. How can Curriki ensure high-quality?

While some say that low-cost (or free) comes at the expense of quality, Curriki is different. Curriki has the advantage of being free of cost, while, at the same time, providing greater value to users. In fact, many Curriki contributors are teachers who use these materials themselves, so they have a strong interest in keeping the quality as high as possible.

Curriki’s Content Review Team of subject matter experts and teachers review and rate resources on Curriki. The Content Review System allows those seeking high-quality materials to find resources on Curriki that have already been vetted by subject matter experts.

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How can I easily keep up with any new resources?

Sign up for Curriki’s monthly newsletter and subject-area emails (opt in when you join), subscribe to Curriki’s blog via RSS, and join us on Facebook.

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Why was Curriki started?

Curriki was conceived from the idea that technology can play a crucial role in breaking down the barriers of the Education Divide—the division of inequality that prevents children worldwide from access to quality education.

Today, educators are searching for ways to deliver first-class, cost-effective learning resources and opportunities to their students. Learners are becoming discouraged by the mounting costs for textbooks, and the availability of other credible resources.

Curriki makes learning possible for anyone, anywhere in the world.

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How can I contribute to or edit curricula on Curriki?

There are a variety of ways to contribute curricula to Curriki. You can use our unique online tools to share resources you’ve found with others. On a larger scale, you can write a textbook or build a curriculum.

For instance, groups of teachers or professors can take a curriculum framework and use the tools to create and edit a book, or develop sections and pages of an instructional textbook.

Our online editing tools enable users to select individual lesson plans, course syllabi, learning activities, scope and sequence hierarchies, and other educational elements found on Curriki to build a complete, fully-integrated curriculum.

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Is Curriki the same organization as the Global Education & Learning Community (GELC)?

Yes. In March 2004, Sun Microsystems launched the Global Education & Learning Community (GELC). In 2006, Sun spun GELC off as an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit to focus on building a repository of curricula and to create an online community for this repository. The organization changed its name to Curriki in 2006 to capture the spirit of community-driven learning excellence and the delivery of Open Source Curricula.

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Why should I get involved?

You should get involved with Curriki because helping others to learn and overcome the Education Divide is simply the right thing to do. With your input, we can help foster the exchange of ideas, whether among students and parents, or curriculum developers and educators, all in a global, interactive community that makes it fun and rewarding to make a difference.

Your assistance can take many important forms. Actively participate in our community. Use the curricula. Provide us with feedback. Support the community financially. And most importantly, spread the word.

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How can I contact Curriki?

Click here to send an email to Curriki.

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