How CELLT Began

March 24, 2009 by Thom

CELLT began, like so many projects, over a cup of coffee. Greg Brown, Eileen Meers and I were exploring ways to share the successful experiential curriculum that they had developed over seven years at The Graham School in Columbus, Ohio. I don't remember a thing about the coffee. I do remember having one of those "ah ha" moments. We have always wanted to have an impact on improving student learning. As we thought of ways to expand the school, the obvious appeared. We should expand and share the experiential program with the help of new and innovative technology. So we've begun that journey.

We have written and tested 72 interactive lessons in open source software (Sakai) and we have made the content available to everyone through the digital commons. The electronic portfolios for both students and faculty are having an impact. We were greatly assisted in this work by a federal dissemination grant through the Office of Community Schools of the Ohio Department of Education. The students at The Charles School at Ohio Dominican University have been our co-designers.

We are now forming strategic alliances with technology providers, network managers, school consortia, instructional designers and the like. We need to make new learning technologies and the skills needed for the 21st Century available and useable for students and teachers. Our immediate focus is on the student arc from high school to college. We'd love to hear from you. Come visit. Tell us if you have needs that we might be able to help you solve.

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