As educators, we sometimes refer to this time before the holidays as the "Mid-Year Slump." Your students may be getting a bit restless with less outdoor time due to the changing seasons, and we are all looking forward to the upcoming vacation days - to give our brains a little "break" from the structure of the school week. Building movement into your students’ day is important for so many reasons, but in the months of November and December it becomes a necessity. We suggest building several small "brain breaks" into your day. With 21st Century Skills in mind, Jill and Cathy from The Curriculum Corner share their tips for powering through this "slump"-like time, to get your kids moving and motivated to power through a restless time of year. With the help of the VariQuest Motiva®, Cutout Maker, and Perfecta® utilizing Engage Every Learner™ Content, they'll give you some great ideas to carry out in your classroom!

It's that time already - we're heading back to school! As with any transition, both you and your students can benefit from some organized activities to get comfortable with the new atmosphere and schedule of the day. That summer break was great, but now it's time to buckle down for learning! We've enlisted some expert help from the classroom to give you some ideas on how to make this transition as smooth as possible for all involved. With 21st Century Skills in mind, Jill and Cathy from The Curriculum Corner share 4 " tips" with us around the 4 Cs - critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, and communication - for easing back into daily classroom life with the help of the VariQuest Motiva™, Cutout Maker, and Perfecta® utilizing Engage Every Learner™ Content!

In the spring of 2019, we made a big commitment to our customers. We promised LOTS of new and revised content and we're happy to report - we've delivered. Just in time for back-to-school! We are thrilled to announce that our VariQuest® Design Center Software v8.0 is now available for download - packed with over 900 NEW templates, cutouts, graphics, fonts, and collections - bringing our grand total to over 19,000 content options for our nation's best educators to create with. And it's FREE for our customers!

It's hard to believe - but we're already coming up to the end of the school year! As you prepare students for their final weeks in your classroom, you may be thinking about how this year's class can "leave a legacy" for next year's students, or maybe you're trying to come up with activities to keep their minds sharp during the summer months to come. We've brought in reinforcements to help with both of those things! With 21st Century Skills in mind, Jill and Cathy from The Curriculum Corner share 4 " tips" with us around the 4 Cs - critical thinking, creativity, collaboration, and communication - for wrapping up end-of-year with the help of the VariQuest Motiva™, Cutout Maker, and Perfecta® tools!

When testing season is upon your classroom, it makes for a very anxious time. Not only are students worried about the disruption to their routine, where multiple-choice questions and long periods of quiet and sitting-still take over the school day, but many teachers struggle with the entire process as they throw all their energy into easing students' fears to enable success. With over 30 years of teaching experience between them, we reached out to Jill and Cathy of The Curriculum Corner to gather some tips for test-taking that align with 21st Century Skills for learning to invoke the "4 Cs" of creativity, collaboration, communication and critical thinking. With the help of the VariQuest tools, they'll show you how to prepare yourselves and your students for a successful testing environment. Check out their ideas in this video, download our free testing poster, then try things out for yourself! (And don't forget to like the VariQuest Facebook Page to stay tuned for more tips!)

According to the U.S. Department of Education website, the Title I Grant program is meant to provide funding to disadvantaged Local Educational Agencies (LEAs) to improve their academic achievement. The most common of these, Title I - Part A, "...provides financial assistance to LEAs and schools with high numbers or high percentages of children from low-income families to help ensure that all children meet challenging state academic standards." As these funds are meant to improve instruction and provide additional academic support and learning opportunities, they are often allocated towards reading or mathematics curriculum, supplemental programs to reinforce and extend the regular school curriculum, or additional staff members to lead and teach the students. And as we look at the bright future of the job market as it relates to STEM and 21st Century skills, we'd like to give you some ideas for tools that Title I Funding can be used for!

The newest additions to the VariQuest suite of solutions provide endless options for creating on-the-spot school-wide communication, recognition, and student engagement materials. (Brooklyn Park, MN) March 23, 2018 — Varitronics, creator of the VariQuest® suite of solutions and leading provider of visual and kinesthetic learning tools for the K-12 market, is pleased to introduce two new products to its robust line of educational offerings to promote student achievement, student engagement, and further schools in their pursuit of STEM and CTE development – the Perfecta® 2400STP and Motiva™ 400.