A Quick Tour
School Loop Groups are about collaboration and sharing, but Curriculum Groups are specifically about the creation and sharing of curricular content. Group members can create units, lessons and assignments that teachers can copy and publish for their students. Curriculum groups do of course have all the standard features of groups: shared lockers, calendar, and discussions.
Create a Curriculum Group
Simply choose "Curriculum" for the Group Type option when creating group. For more help with creating groups, see our groups overview page.
Group Page Layout
Unlike Standard Groups, Curriculum Groups use a tabbed layout. The tabs divide the group into three sections: Curriculum (the default view), Locker, and Group Tools.
Curriculum
A map of all the documents created by the group sits on the left side of the page. Document types include Units, Lessons, and Assignments and may be nested by dragging and dropping - Units contain Lessons which contain Assignments. Above the document map, you'll find an orange button that allows you to create any of the three document types or import content from another Curriculum Group. To edit an existing document, click the name of the document in the map.
The rest of the Curriculum page is devoted to creating and editing documents. This region is split into two view: Display & Plan. Display is the view that can be shared with students and parents. Plan is for the instructor.
Locker
All members may upload resources to the group locker. The resource in turn can be shared by creating links in Units, Lessons and Assignments. More information about using School Loop lockers is available on this site.
Group Tools
This section of the group houses group news, the calendar of events, projects, a summary of ongoing discussions, and all of the membership tools.
Create & Edit Content
The three types of documents you can create in a Curriculum Group are Units, Lessons and Assignments. The documents may be nested such that Units contain Lessons and Lessons contain Assignments.
To create new content:
1. Click the orange Add Content button
2. Click Add Unit, Lesson or Assignment
3. Fill out your content in the right pane, then either Save Draft or Publish.
The content creation area is divided into two regions: "Student View" (content published here is intended to be displayed for students and parents) and "Instructional Plan" (for teachers and curriculum developers only). To switch between content regions, simply click in the minimized region and it will slide open.
To edit existing content:
1. Click the title of the desired document in the left pane.
2. Click the Edit button at the top right.
To add more modules to your content:
1. Click the blue plus icons positioned above and below every module in a document
2. Click the type of module. All of the module types are the same rich text editor tool, but the "Titled" option gives you some pre-canned titles to choose from.
3. If you want to rearrange the module order, click and hold on the darker bar at the top, drag to the new spot and release the mouse button.
When you first create a new document you will see a single rich text editor module in the "Toolbar" region. The module has a toolbar with familiar text editing functions including the ability to embed video from sources like Teacher Tube and Kahn Academy and create links to resources uploaded to the group locker. In the upper right of the editor module there are icon buttons for save, cancel, and delete.
Use the Publish button at the top right of the content editing area when your document is ready to be shared with teachers or other Curriculum Groups. Once published, saving changes in any module automatically republishes the document.
Each time you save changes module or use the Publish button, a version of your document is stored in the system.
Share Content
Curriculum Groups may copy published content from other Curriculum Groups and teachers may copy content between their Course Centers and Curriculum Groups.
Here's how to share curriculum:
1. Click the Add Content menu
2. Click "Import from" your desired group
3. Check the boxes for the documents you wish to import
4. Click Import
Imported documents are copies that may be edited independent of the originals. Additionally, you may also reorganize by dragging and dropping documents in the map on the left side of the page.
Restore a Previous Version
All published versions of units and lessons are saved in the revision history and can be restored.
1, Click the title of the document in the map on the left.
2. Click the Clock icon on the right to view a list of all saved versions.
3. Use the links in the revision history to view a version
4. Click the Make Current button to restore the version.
Curriculum Discussions
Curriculum discussions make collaborating with your colleagues easier. Individual assignments, lessons, and units can have their own running discussions.
1. Click on any document in the map.
2. Click the speech bubble icon on the right.
3. Type your message and click Submit.The discussions are sent to all members of the group.
The number in the speech bubble indicates the number of posted discussions associated with the current document.
