V
irginia
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apitol
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onnections
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pring
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20
than 91,000 teacher accounts have been issued to date, with more
being added every week. The goal is to ensure that every teacher in
the Commonwealth who wants an account gets one. Schools are also
free to create as many student accounts as they would like. Virginia’s
colleges and universities have begun to take note of eMediaVA,
particularly the teacher preparation institutions, and are requesting
accounts for their undergraduate students so that they are prepared to
use it in their classrooms immediately upon graduation.
Developed in close consultation with classroom teachers,
eMediaVA features—such as keyword and standard of learning
searches—help teachers find exactly the right content in seconds.
Playlists let teachers organize content by subject, class, grade level,
etc., the quiz creator provides a vehicle for teachers to gauge student
understanding, and the local content upload feature allows teachers
to add digital content they or their students have created to their
personal playlists. New features that are already in development will
allow teachers to share their content and playlists with others in their
school, division or even statewide, depending on local policies.
Two other innovations
make eMediaVA an easy-to-
use, cost-effective option for
schools: single sign-on and a
local host appliance. Single
sign-on allows teachers to
access eMediaVA directly
from their school networks
without having to resubmit
usernames and passwords:
they can simply click and
go. The local host appliance
is a server that contains the
content found in eMediaVA
that can be installed on
the school’s network to
minimize
the
amount
of
Internet
bandwidth
necessary to stream audio
and video content. New
content is added each night
when rates are the lowest.
Both of these options save
schools time and money.
When coupled with
online courses such as those
offered by the Virginia
Department of Education’s
Virtual Virginia program
and WHRO Education,
eMediaVA offers a powerful
21st
century
learning
tool, which teachers can
use to create customized
curriculum units quickly and
easily, and which students
experience as learning that is
relevant and timely.
For more information on
eMediaVA, please contact
or call 757.889.9407.
eMediaVA, a service of the Virginia Public Media Association, is
quickly becoming the one-stop-shop for high quality digital content
for Virginia’s K-12 teachers and students. Featuring the best purpose-
built content from leading educational, cultural and scientific
organizations—such as PBS, Colonial Williamsburg, NASA, the
Smithsonian Museums, the National Archives, the University of
Colorado, Virginia Foundation for the Humanities’ Encyclopedia
Virginia, Virginia’s public media stations, the Norfolk Public Library,
SAS Curriculum Pathways, NPR and others—eMediaVA currently
offers more than 21,000 educational learning objects, and is adding
4,000 to 5,000 new assets each quarter. Content includes audio
and video files, images, lesson plans, games, simulations, mobile
device apps, etc. Virginia’s public media stations are partnering with
respected institutions statewide to digitize their educational content
for distribution to schools via eMediaVA.
Thanks to a combination of public and private funding,
eMediaVA is available free of charge to all Virginia educators—
public, private and homeschool—for at least the next five years. More
eMedia
VA
A Library That Never Closes
By Bert Schmidt
V
