ThinkCERCA's Year in Review

For educators, the end of the school year means time for reflection. The same rings true for Team ThinkCERCA. We’ve spent the last week mining through usage data to learn more about our community and the progress we’ve made over the last year. So what did we learn? Let’s take a look at the stats.

During the 2015-16 school year, students wrote 40,293,778 words on ThinkCERCA. (Yep, more than 40 million!) And students answered 7,445,740 standards-aligned items. Hats off to all the hardworking teachers and students who made this progress happen.

Our most popular Applied Lessons of the school year were Peer Pressure: Pro and Con (grade 8), Malala Yousafzai: A Girl with a Voice (grade 7), and The Teenage Brain (grade 7).

The top independent reading lessons (QuickCERCAs) were Masters of Verse (grades 3-5), The Wolf on the Sofa (grades 3-5), and A Purr-fect Way to Build Up Bones (grades 6-8).

Back at ThinkCERCA HQ, we had some accomplishments of  our own. During the school year, we added Spanish lessons, embedded English language development supports, enhanced teacher and administrator data dashboards, new search filters to the lesson library, and 600 additional literacy lessons for English language arts, science, social studies, and math (new!).

In the upcoming school year, we’re planning to add more math lessons thanks to NewSchools Venture Fund, additional ELD supports, enhanced search features within the lesson library, and mastery over time data.

Looking back on the school year, we’re moved by the progress thousands of students made, and we’re thrilled at the continued support of teachers across the country. One of our favorite pieces of feedback we recently received came from Denise Bertolotti at Bethpage High School, who said:

My students have accused me of receiving a nickel for every time I say, ‘I love ThinkCERCA, it is amazing.’ I’ve promised them I am genuinely obsessed with your program and how helpful it is for the students! They are even realizing how much the scaffolding assists them in preparing for their finals. This program is game changing for my students, especially those who struggle.

We hope we continue to help your students think and write critically. Join the adventure with us by signing up for our weekly newsletter, liking us on Facebook, or following ThinkCERCA on Twitter. This summer, we’ll also be releasing a bimonthly newsletter centered on professional development for teachers. We can’t wait for what’s to come.

Until the next school year!