Improving Reading and Writing Skills

At EdVisions Off-Campus, students improve their basic skills naturally. Because they need information for their projects, they actually seek out things to read rather than being forced to read a particular textbook. They each have a reading project as well, with the freedom to choose their own books and the responsibility to report on their reading to their advisor. They also use writing skills every day: they write their time logs, they take notes for projects, they make PowerPoint presentations & reports, and they communicate with their advisors in chat windows. Advisors help them learn to organize their writing, use punctuation, and become better at communicating through the written word. Research shows that using skills for a purpose is the best way to improve those skills.

Improving Math Skills

Math at EdVisions Off-Campus is individualized. Each student is placed in an appropriate level at the beginning of the year, and then they are given individualized assignments through a program called "Accelerated Math". Their math teachers are available daily online, and they take advantage of the Elluminate program's whiteboard to show students how to do any problems they are having difficulty with. Many students report that our school is the first place where they truly got the math help they needed, when they needed it.

Learning Computer Skills:

At EdVisions Off-Campus, students develop computer skills naturally as students learn to use all the different tools for research, record-keeping, reporting and communication.  Some of the many programs and tools students use include: webcams and microphones,  video conference programs, project-reporting programs like Project Foundry, educational web platforms like Elluminate, business-type  programs like PowerPoint,  and various types of files such as JPEG, PDF, and TIFF.

Expanding Curiosity

From writing ficitionalized diaries of an  Egyptian Pharoah to looking up the history of snowmobiles, students are encouraged to delve deeply into interests and find out more about things that interest them.  Advisors are always asking “What are you interested in?" and helping students to notice things and nurture their own curiosity.

Improving Research Ability

After they develop their curiosity again they need to practice and hone their research skills.  How do they decide which website to read and which might be biased, or boring, or even untrue?   Every project is presented to at least 2 other people, so the student has a mission of sorts, to find things to present to those 2 people that they will learn from and be interested in.  And at least 2 projects from each student will be presented to a wider audience each year, so they will be teaching the wider community about something that they are now “expert” in, quite a different task from writing a paper for a teacher that will be read once and thrown into the recycle bin.