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From https://learninglab.si.edu

Smithsonian Learning Lab is an interactive website for the discovery and creative use of the Smithsonian's digital collections and tools – more than a million images, videos, texts, audio recordings, and activities. The Learning Lab is rich with multimedia resources and tools to aid users in customizing the content for personalized learning experiences. It is also a community of experts and users, both within the Smithsonian and across the world, who collaborate, create, and share with each other new resources for learning.

Tess Porter, Education Support Specialist at the Smithsonian Center for Learning and Digital Access, writes, "Sorting activities are not only a simple—and interactive—way to engage students with resources, the acts of sorting and classifying also develop skills essential to analytic thinking and problem solving. For young students, sorting teaches how to differentiate, notice patterns, and make connections between resources. As students get older, sorting with more complex resources and ideas helps deepen their relational thinking and problem solving skills so that they can more easily apply previously learned concepts to new situations. At all ages, sorting activities also provide valuable opportunities for class discussion.

"Using the Learning Lab’s Sorting Tool is a simple way to create these types of activities right within the platform. The tool enables the creation of an interactive activity where students can sort resources into several categories (for example, animal habitats, coniferous vs. deciduous trees, etc.) or in linear order with labeled endpoints (for example, 1950 to 2000, largest to smallest, etc.). These activities can be completed by students independently, in small groups, or as a full class—it’s up to you!"

Read the full article about sorting activities and access them at https://learninglab.si.edu/news/create-interactive-sorting-activities

Learn more about the Smithsonian Learning Lab at https://learninglab.si.edu/