Common Sense Education
Helping students make smart choices online and IRL

The award-winning Common Sense Education K–12 Digital Citizenship lessons are used in 62% of U.S. schools in 50 states and internationally. It addresses top concerns for schools, from cyberbullying to sexting.

Every day kids go online. They access wonderful and terrible things — and everything in between. Parents and teachers can’t be there to guide them every step of the way. These lessons help students gain the skills needed to make smart choices online.


The Curriculum Refresh Project

Goals

Update the K-12 curriculum to reflect the changing role and prevalence of media and tech in students’ lives. And use Google Classroom for easy access and personalization.

Results

The curriculum is used by over 70% of schools in the U.S. in 50 states and around the world, and is a go-to resource for millions of parents and caregivers, researchers, and advocates.

My Role

As internal brand and design leader, I oversaw the creative and product design team through 5 key steps:

  • Step 1. Deep dive into research

  • Step 2. Create and present concepts aligned with the product vision

  • Step 3. Develop the positioning, and define the look and feel

  • Step 4. Design and production

  • Step 5. Update the website experience

Internal Team

Creative Director (me), art director, photographer, illustrator, designer, copywriter/strategist, video team, product designer, and product manager


Curriculum Design

The look and feel of the curriculum is grounded in the fact that online life is real life for kids and teens. The curriculum shows photos from their point of view, hand drawings, and handwriting. The topic badges speak to skills that prepare students for life — online or off.

The curriculum is free and easily accessible with decks in Google Slides and handouts in Google Docs. Most lessons have a student-facing video and teachers’ discussion guide. Take a look at a lesson.


For little learners

Students in grades K-2 learn with the Digital Citizens as they explore mindful tech use. In addition to videos and slides, there are song sheets, posters, storybooks, and coloring books.

“Kristin is a wonderful Creative Director who helped bring to life several large-scale projects for our K-12 educator and student audience. She and her team collaborated with us to deeply understand our users in order to create a vision with a look and feel that our audience loves. Kristin takes time to listen and bring her analytical and creative perspective to come up with solutions, as well as new ideas we hadn't even thought of. She's also great at figuring out what's possible under certain constraints. Kristin is also a strong and caring leader who puts together a strong team that delivers beautiful products. It's been great working with Kristin to create beautiful and functional resources for our audience.”

Kelly Mendoza, PhD, VP Education Content and Programs at Common Sense Media