By Andrew Miller
The online educational video game site iCivics, created in 2009 by former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor that features civics curriculum, has partnered with EverFi, an ed-tech company focused on K-12 and higher ed. And through the partnership comes a new initiative Commons – Digital Town Square, offered free to all K-12 schools.
The focus of Commons – Digital Town Square is to provide schools with standards-based educational gaming, aligned to the Common Core, with social components. Students who play iCivics games will be able to move along at their own pace, according to Kara Hedges-Sasse, Executive Vice President of Product Development at EverFi. “We intend to utilize adaptive-pathing techniques as well as evidence-based practices to help guide each student differently as they learn and ultimately change behaviors,” she said.
So how is Commons – Digital Town Square different from iCivics? In addition to having the adaptive feature, it will have a variety of media including simulations and animations as well as pre- and post-assessments and behavioral surveys that “measure changes in students’ attitudes and behaviors regarding a variety of civic matters.”
Of course, an implicit requirement of using this game is student access to computers. Students Continue reading