People are always recommending new online sites that are useful for classroom teaching and learning. However with so many available options I find myself gravitating towards resources that are easy to use as I don’t have the time to learn the ins and outs of every resource. After someone recently recommended Gooru, I decided to check it out and having done so I definitely think it is one to watch out for and certainly is easy to use.
Gooru is a search engine designed for education. Simply type your query into the search bar and you will be presented with resources in the following forms:
– videos
– interactives
– exams
– textbooks
– handouts
– lessons
– slides
Gooru allows you to refine your search by categories. Then, once you’ve found fantastic resources, you can save them in your collections to keep safe for next time.
As a Gooru member you have access to hundreds of resources according to subject areas such as science maths social science and language arts. Within each subject area you can look for resources according to media type such as video, interactive display, slides, text, and lesson plans. When you find resources that you want to use, drag them to the resources folder within your account. Gooru also offers you the option to add resources to your folders even if you did not find them within Gooru.
All resources are vetted and organized by teachers or Gooru’s content experts, so you don’t have to sort through the mess of subpar educational resources available online yourself.
Gooru also makes it easy for you to connect with your worldwide peers to make learning a social experience. Post questions to an active community of students, teachers and experts, or find friends and peers to study with.
Best of all, Gooru adapts to you. Based on the topics you study and your performance on self-assessments, Gooru suggests resources and study guides that will help you master the concepts. You can track your study habits and monitor your performance on any of the topics you study.
Gooru harnesses the power of the web by organizing free, online education resources into searchable collections, accessible from any web or mobile platform. Gooru is developed by a non-profit organization with a mission to honour the human right to education and make high quality education free and accessible to the world’s one billion students by 2014.
I recommend you give it a try… think of a topic, enter it in the search bar, and see what is available.