Before Labor Day weekend, Boclips’ Content team spent the last few weeks of summer rounding out CourseSpark’s newest videos. For the 2022–23 school year, course creators and instructional design teams will find new podcasts and videos on CourseSpark, ranging from ELL for K–12 students to coding for post-traditional learners.

For a look at a few samples of instructional videos added to the platform in August, check out the videos below.

Discover beautifully curated, curriculum-aligned educational videos and podcasts from world-class content creators on coursespark.io

Photo by Photoholgic. Description: Photo of wrinkled newspaper, business cards, and other historical documents.

Think of an important event in history that occurred during your lifetime. You probably remember watching the news on TV or seeing the newspaper headlines related to the event. These primary sources are part of our collective cultural memory. 

Primary sources can also serve as important learning materials for students. Helping learners step within inches of historical events and the news, primary sources are invaluable. Not only do primary sources bring benefits for learners, but they are also versatile. 

In this guide, learn how to pick out the best primary sources for your course needs. Then, discover activities you can leverage to get the most out of primary sources in instructional design.

July tends to be a slow time in education (summer holidays, we're looking at you). This past month, though, the team at Boclips was busy. We added several new content partners and instructional videos that courseware creators might use in the fall.

From English language learning to career training to the physics of popping a wheelie, our newly added content covers quite a lot of ground. Check out the previews of five videos below, all new to Boclips’ platform this month.

Photo by Utsav Srestha. Photo description: Close-up of a stack of newspapers.

When presented with the question above, any educator may answer with something like “In theory, yes, current events belong in the core curriculum.” In practice, educators and curriculum designers may wrestle with the decision. What if the news is too controversial? What if the news changes within hours? How would instructional content be sourced so that it’s appropriate and age-appropriate for multiple grades?

Despite some drawbacks, including current events in courseware can bring many benefits to students. What’s more, with the right approach, adding current events can enhance curriculums to build context around course content and care for students in a holistic way.. 

Read on to discover the benefits of studying current events and historical news reports. Plus, we’ll include some tips on how to include journalism in courseware in a way that meets standards, boosts student achievement, and more:

While Boclips’ Content team recovered from a month of conferences (hello, VidCon, ISTE, and NCSC!) and prepared for a long Fourth of July weekend, we also managed to add videos and podcasts from our favorite new and old content partners.

For a look at some of the new-to-Boclips content from June 2022, check out the video clips below.

Photo by Robo Wunderkind: Flat-lay photograph of brightly colored toys on a white tabletop, and a child's hands touching an iPad.

Multimodal learning engages learners, makes learning more effective, and also improves accessibility. Any educator would be glad to offer these advantages to their students. But, incorporating multimodal learning into courseware or making use of it in the classroom isn’t always straightforward. There are many possible ways to use multimodal learning, and not all of them guarantee the best outcomes. 

To help instructional designers and other education professionals, we’ve put together 5 tips to support multimodal learning when designing courses, curriculum materials, or planning for its use in the classroom: 

Description: A woman in a green turtleneck and glasses sits at a wooden table, smiling down at a colorful laptop.

As recently as twenty years ago, university and ongoing education courses relied on lectures and textbooks alone. Today’s students immerse themselves in course material through a wide range of multimedia resources and interactive courseware. 

A multimedia or multimodal approach to learning is not only more interesting for students but also brings learning benefits. Multimedia tools and resources can help bring abstract concepts to life, boost student motivation and interest, and introduce large amounts of information efficiently, among other advantages.

As a courseware or instructional designer, you naturally want to bring all of these benefits to your students. Here are five practical ways to create a multimodal environment in your courseware:

The Content team at Boclips is gearing up to attend VidCon in June. In preparation, they’ve been building up our content pipeline — opening applications for video commissions, launching a quarterly newsletter for educational content creators, and adding new content to the roster.

For a look at some of the latest videos added to Boclips’ collection, check out the clips below.