Using Sophia for Instruction

Video Transcription

Hi everyone and welcome. Today we'll be looking at a system that I personally like to use, and you probably do too. We'll look at using Sophia for instruction. It's features, major strengths, and it's challenges too. Let's get started. The word Sophia is Greek for wisdom, and so it makes this learning management system aptly named.

Sophia is a cloud-based service that provides free teacher tools that are necessary for any K-12 blended learning environment. Lessons in Sophia are aligned to the Common Core State Standards as well as the Next Generation Science Standards. Let's take a look at some of the tools and features that Sophia has to offer.

Sophia believes that there are many ways to learn, therefore, they provide multiple instructors with varying styles and methods. Multiple instructors are often used to explain the same concepts, so students can select the instructor who aligns best with their own learning style. Sophia allows teachers to create groups of students so that they can access lessons, ask questions, and even chat.

This speaks to the collaborative nature of this particular learning management system. Teachers also have the freedom to design their own tutorials specifically designed for their class, or even an individual student, with text images, audio, video or screencasts.

Like other learning management systems, Sophia can create playlists of tutorials, ones that they have made or ones that they have selected from the over 37,000 tutorials that have already been created. The formative assessment quizzing tool lets teachers create their own quizzes. Monitoring student activity, as well as growth, is very important. Sophia's analytics allow teachers to do that in real time.

Sophia also offers professional development for teachers that can lead to obtaining CEUs through certificate programs. For example, flipped classroom certificate, tablets certification, which is using iPads, chrome classroom certification, and virtual classroom certification just to name a few with others on the way.

Now let's look at some of the strengths and challenges of Sophia. On a positive note, Sophia can interface with educational apps. It contains robust video content, currently at nearly 40,000, and it's mobile device friendly for learning on the go.

Some of Sophia's biggest challenges include since it lacks a comprehensive grade book, reporting, and scheduling it is considered more of a classroom-specific learning management system rather than a larger school community one. It's cloud-based, so content can be removed, and assessments are limited.

So in this video, we looked at the features of Sophia and we discussed the strengths and weaknesses of this particular learning management system. Here's today's food for thought. Tell a friend about your experience using Sophia. Now it's your turn to apply what you've learned in this video.

The additional resources section will be extremely helpful. This section is designed to help you discover useful ways to apply what you've learned here. Each link includes a brief description, so you can easily target the resources you want. That's all for this lesson. Thanks for watching. We'll see you next time.