Create a Plan to Pilot CommonLit’s ELA Curriculum, CommonLit 360

Considering CommonLit 360 for your upcoming curriculum adoption? Connect with our Partnerships Team to get your teachers set up for success!

CommonLit 360 is a comprehensive and standards-aligned ELA curriculum for grades 6-12 that comes complete with highly engaging units, fully developed lesson plans, and more. The curriculum supports all learners and has been shown to accelerate student learning.

We know that choosing a new ELA curriculum is a major decision for schools and districts. It’s often important to build teacher buy-in and ensure that the curriculum is effective for your team.

In this blog post, we’ll explain how we lead schools and districts through an effective pilot of the CommonLit 360 curriculum. We’ll provide your team with the Professional Development, digital tools, and consultation they need to ensure a successful pilot.

Step 1: Schedule a Planning Call with CommonLit

At CommonLit, we pride ourselves on the customized support that we provide to our partners. During this initial call, we’ll learn about your team’s curriculum adoption timeline, team goals, and familiarity with CommonLit 360.

Once we have this information, we’ll work with you to create a pilot plan. We’ll discuss key details like the pilot’s dates, the date of your team’s kick-off training, and digital setup for your team.

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Step 2: Finalize Your Team’s Digital Setup

Before teachers and students begin their CommonLit 360 pilot, we’ll make sure that your team has full access to our digital tools.

First, we’ll ensure that your team has digital classes and accounts set up for all teachers and students taking part in the pilot. Once your digital classes are set up, students will be able to complete lessons online, and teachers will be able to quickly grade student work and track their progress.

Next, we’ll also unlock access to CommonLit’s Professional Development Portal. Within the Portal, educators will find trainings that help them internalize each CommonLit 360 unit, best practices for every type of CommonLit 360 lesson, strategies for tracking student progress, and much more.

Step 3: Complete the CommonLit 360 Kick-Off Training

CommonLit’s professional development team will lead your team through a 60 minute training that will set teachers up for success with their first CommonLit 360 unit.

During this hands-on session, teachers will quickly learn some of the key design principles of the curriculum. They’ll learn how units are built around essential questions, how reading and writing are interconnected, and how engagement strategies are embedded in the curriculum. Next, teachers will learn how they can assign lessons through CommonLit’s digital platform and access downloadable lesson plans and student materials. Finally, teachers will conduct a self-guided exploration of their first CommonLit 360 unit. They’ll learn about their unit’s content, the key writing outcomes, and create a unit pacing plan.

Step 4: Encourage Teachers to Attend Office Hours with CommonLit

Once teachers begin using CommonLit 360 with their students, questions will pop up. We’ll be on hand to help!

Here’s how it works: together, we’ll design a schedule for open office hours at several points throughout the pilot. During those sessions, your team will have the opportunity to chat with a CommonLit 360 expert who’s eager to provide tips on navigating CommonLit’s digital platform, differentiating instruction, monitoring student progress, engagement strategies, and much more.

Step 5: Schedule a Pilot Debrief and Plan Next Steps

After your team completes the pilot, we’ll debrief with you and discuss whether CommonLit 360 is the right fit for your team. We’d love to hear what teachers and students enjoyed and if there are any areas where our team can improve or provide your team with additional support.

For schools and districts that are excited to adopt CommonLit 360, we recommend our School Essentials PRO Plus package. For $5,500 per school year, this package includes everything your team needs to effectively roll out 360 - robust Professional Development, benchmark and unit assessments, school-wide data tracking, digital integrations, and more.