University of Illinois Launches Website for Educators Teaching Birth Through 12th Grade Remotely

CHAMPAIGN, Ill., April 3, 2020 (Newswire.com) - ​​​​The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign has launched a website to help PK-12 educators effectively teach their students remotely, as commonly mandated in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.​

LearnAway (learnaway.education.illinois.edu), which officially launched on April 2, is filled with educator resources and curriculum ideas that will help teachers continue to meet the social, physical, and intellectual needs of children.

“The challenge is to create remote learning strategies that meet the same instructional goals that teachers have in face-to-face settings,” says Nancy Latham, executive director of the Council on Teacher Education at the University of Illinois. “Teachers remain responsible for and committed to their learners’ social, emotional, and academic growth, however, their toolbox for doing that has shifted overnight. We want to provide a space for them to find and explore the tools they now need for remote instruction.”

Soon, the site will also offer 10- to 15-minute webinars with educators from around the country who can share resources, innovative ideas, and inspiration for remote learning.

“LearnAway is a repository of curated, consistently updated online tools for teachers to use as they work to meet the needs of their learners within each individual family dynamic,” Latham says.

PK-12 educators, higher education faculty, and even college students preparing to become teachers are contributing to the site, Latham says.

“We see this as an incredibly challenging time, but also an incredible opportunity,” she says. “I hope what we see come out of this is a deeper than ever connection between families and schools, a connection that we maintain as we eventually move back to face-to-face instruction.”​

About the College of Education within the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Founded in 1905, the College of Education is one of the nation’s first land-grant schools of education, revered for its groundbreaking research, preparation of educator-leaders, and worldwide impact. U.S. News and World Report consistently ranks the College and its programs among the world’s best. Home of the late Dr. Samuel Kirk, the “father of special education,” and now more than 70 tenure-track faculty and over 2,000 undergraduate, graduate, doctoral, and online students — Great Minds Think Illinois.

The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, founded in 1867, has a total enrollment of over 47,000 students from all 50 states and more than 100 countries. Illinois pioneers innovative research to tackle grand challenges and expand the human experience. With interdisciplinary hubs of discovery including the National Center for Supercomputing Applications and the largest public university library in the nation, our transformative learning experiences are designed to produce alumni who make a significant societal impact.

Contact: Gina Manola, Director of Marketing and Communications, College of Education, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 217-300-5939 | [email protected]

Source: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign