Google "photosynthesis" and you'll see a long list of links to everything from Wikipedia to PBS to the University of Illinois, with plenty of YouTube videos thrown into the mix.
To streamline this somewhat random page of results for both educators and learners, a group of education content providers is teaming up to create a better defined framework for education-related searches online.
In a move that brings together for the first time traditional content companies and free, open content sites, the Association of Educational Publishers (AEP) and Creative Commons (CC) are partnering to improve search results online the through the creation of a metadata framework specifically for learning resources. That means teachers looking for content -- much of it aligned to Common Core standards -- will be able to more easily find information they need. At least that's the hope.
"Easy access to high-quality learning resources is the end goal of this project," said Charlene Gaynor, CEO of Association of Education Publishers at the Context in Content conference today.