Blackstone Millville Regional School District, re-Thinking Social Studies
Blackstone Millville Regional School District is reinventing how they deliver social students curriculum by using online education resources to subsidize their outdated textbooks. The district will use the grant to support a focus group of 16 fourth and fifth grade teachers and 300 students at two district elementary schools. The group will use Thinkfinity.org for content and lesson plans in addition to other online content that align to the Massachusetts social studies standards, giving teachers more time to focus on delivery and assessment and less time on lesson creation. The goal is to improve student success in social studies.
http://www.bmrsd.net/ Edgar Davis K-8 Community School, Brockton; Davis Community Achievers
Edgar Davis K-8 Community School will use Thinkfinity.org to help improve student understanding of poetry, fractions, decimals and percents. The grant will be used to fund workshops that help teachers in grades four through eight use Thinkfinity.org to teach students who need improvement in the English Language Arts and Mathematics MCAS tests. Many of the students who will benefit have special learning needs and/or are from homes where English is not the primary language.
http://www.brocktonpublicschools.com/page.cfm?p=448 Fitchburg Public School District, Thinkfinity Project for Change
Thinkfinity Project for Change will address the need to improve teaching and learning in the Fitchburg Public School's 21st Century Scholars After School Program for students in grades two through eight. The funds will be used to train two Thinkfinity.org field trainers that will train teachers to use Thinkfinity.org to help close the achievement gap for the most challenged students, including English Language Learners. Teachers will implement a 10 week Thinkfinity-based program for students attending the after school program.
http://www.fitchburg.k12.ma.us/ Framingham High School, ThinkFramingham: Integrating Thinkfinity Resources to Improve the Teaching of Writing at Framingham High School
Framingham High School will thoroughly evaluate student performance on the MCAS English Language Arts open response questions and essays to determine trends in test scores. Once identified, they will train ninth through twelfth grade English teachers to use Thinkfinity.org lessons to help improve student achievement. Teachers will deliver Thinkfinity.org lessons on new technologies such as SmartBoards to enhance the school's writing curriculum and to improve students' writing skills.
http://www.framingham.k12.ma.us/fhs/ Hamilton-Wenham Regional School District, Thinkfinity & Beyond!
Over the past four years, the Hamilton Wenham Regional School District has seen little improvement in the percentage of students scoring proficient and above in the MCAS English Language Arts/Reading, Mathematics and Science tests. In fact, some grades have shown decreases. The district will use Thinkfinity.org as a platform that assists teachers in the development of standards based lessons that integrate digital media and promote 21st Century Skills to improve student achievement across the subject areas.
http://www.hw-regional.k12.ma.us/ Heath Brook School, Tewksbury; Heath Brook Thinks Ahead with Thinkfinity
To improve math MCAS scores across the school, the Heath Brook School will use Thinkfinity.org to improve math instruction in the classroom and in the after school program. The grant will be used to train the entire school staff to use Thinkfinity.org to deliver math curriculum. In addition, training will be provided for the after school program staff to reinforce classroom learning. Parents also will be introduced to Thinkfinity.org to help support classroom and after school program efforts.
http://www.tewksbury.mec.edu/heathbrook/index.html
J. Henry Higgins Middle School, Peabody; Thinkfinity Brings 21st Century Literacy Skills to the Classroom
The J. Henry Higgins Middle School will integrate Thinkfinity.org into teacher professional development. The project will encourage teachers to use the resource to incorporate 21st Century Skills into the curriculum. By encouraging teachers to use Thinkfinity.org, more than 1,500 students at the middle school will benefit. The school also will use Thinkfinity.org in an after school program for students who are struggling with math and English, making an even greater impact for those students who have not performed well on MCAS.
http://www.peabody.k12.ma.us/higgins/index.htm
Lawrence Public Schools; Wetherbee School
The Weatherbee School will use funds to train staff how to use Thinkfinity.org to support student achievement in math and literacy across all grade levels. They will train staff during summer workshops on how to best infuse the technology into daily classroom instruction and in extended day and summer programs. This program will help the school continue to improve student achievement and MCAS scores in math and English Language Arts.
http://www.lawrence.k12.ma.us/schools/wetherbee.html North Adams Public Schools/Brayton Elementary, Building a New Ele-middle Curriculum: Bringing 21st Century Resources to Curriculum and Instruction
North Adams Public Schools will use Thinkfinity.org to support curriculum development work for grades five through seven. A team of teachers will work over the summer to create professional development modules to be delivered to all teachers in during the school year. This work is critical as the school's population will grow from 350 to 450 students with the addition of grades six and seven to the current pre-K through 5 program. Thinkfinity.org will be used as content in four new course sequences for grades five through seven, including social studies, applied math, science and Spanish/cultural studies.
http://brayton.napsk12.org/ Plymouth Public Schools, Taking Stress Out Of Slopes Using Thinkfinity (tSOSut)
The Plymouth Public Schools will use Thinkfinity.org to improve student MCAS math scores and overall math grades for seventh and eighth grade students. Teachers participating in the project will receive a Flip Video to create math vodcasts using Thinkfinity.org resources that can be posted to the district web page for students to access. The vodcasts may be used for remediation, absent students, or test review of a particular topic. The program will engage math teachers from two district middle schools, two Technology Integration Specialists, the Coordinator of Educational Technology, the Coordinator of Mathematics, and more than 1,200.
http://www.plymouth.k12.ma.us/ Rafael Hernandez Elementary School, Roxbury; Two Way Bilingual School Science Literacy
The Rafael Hernández Two-Way Bilingual School (RHS) will support Thinkfinity.org professional development, integrate Thinkfinity.org lessons into the fourth and fifth grade science curriculum and expose all staff to Thinkfinity.org web resources. Thinkfinity.org will help RHS further achieve its goals of ensuring that all students pass the fifth grade science MCAS and fully embed computer technology into the curriculum and instructional practices. RHS will use the resource in all K -5 classrooms, all of which are staffed by a bilingual teacher and paraprofessional.
http://www.boston.k12.ma.us/hernandez/ Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School, Northampton; SVAHS Thinkfinity Project
Smith Vocational and Agricultural High School, which educates students from more than 40 communities in western Massachusetts, has an overrepresentation of special needs and at-risk students that need extra support preparing for MCAS. The school will use funds to provide Thinkfinity.org professional development for ninth through twelfth grade teachers and also will use Thinkfinity resources in its after school MCAS tutoring program. The project aims to improve students' MCAS scores in Biology, English Language Arts, and Mathematics.
http://smith.tec.ma.us/ Taunton Public Schools; Closing the Achievement Gap
The purpose of the proposed Closing the Achievement Gap Project is to help reduce the achievement gaps in English Language Arts for students who are underperforming at Parker Middle School. These struggling students lack the specific skills and strategies needed to access literary texts, and are struggling with the increasingly complex vocabulary and concepts in academic content areas. Teachers will participate in Thinkfinity.org professional development that addresses student learning needs and facilitates common understandings about the role of culture and diversity in the school to ensure they are meeting the social and emotional needs of all students.
http://www.tauntonschools.org/ Truro Central School, Thinkfinity at Truro Central School
Truro Central School believes that all learners vary in their readiness, interests, and learning profiles, and that it takes high quality teaching using state-of-the-art knowledge to address these needs. In order to improve and strengthen educational achievement of students, Thinkfinity.org will be embedded into the core curriculum. The goal is to prepare 21st Century learners who are able to think critically, creatively, innovatively, and collaboratively. Through the use of Thinkfinity.org, teachers will be better able to teach all students in a class effectively, by taking into account the variety of ways in which students differ from one another, and offer instruction that responds to these learning differences.
http://www.truromass.org/ Worcester East Middle School, Claymation Literacy Project
The Claymation Literacy project is a pilot program at Worcester East Middle School that will use Thinkfinity.org to allow students to explore literary concepts in a more active and engaging way. Using high interest readings, the project will teach students reading strategies that will improve reading comprehension in English Language Arts as well as in other subject areas. More complex dramatic elements such as theme, mood, point of view, setting and character development will be part of the direct instruction section of the project. Students will explore stop-action animation, sculpting with clay, visual literacy and multimedia concepts while working in small collaborative teams. Each team will create a storyboard and script of their reading selection, sculpt clay puppets of their characters, build sets, design special effects and then shoot and edit a stop action movie.
http://www.wpsweb.com/wems/ | 
