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It's not possible for parents to be too involved in their child's education, in the opinion of Lois Rapp, assistant superintendent of Greenon Local School District.

That's why she is encouraging more Greenon parents to take advantage of an online tool that lets them track children's course work.

Rapp will become interim superintendent Feb. 1 after Superintendent Denny Howell retires.

Several thousand "curriculum maps" on the district's Web site outline the concepts that students learn in every subject and grade in middle school and high school. At the elementary school level, maps are posted for classes in language arts, math, computers, art, music and physical education.

Updated quarterly, the maps allow parents to see exactly what assignments their children should be working on each month.

Rapp said the maps have been a work in progress since they were posted online two years ago and the district now is using newsletters to encourage their use.

The maps are tied to the state's content standards to ensure there are no gaps in the curriculum, Rapp said. The Ohio Department of Education lists curriculum maps as a research-based strategy to improve student achievement.

Rapp credits the maps with helping to improve the district's scores on achievement tests and the Ohio Graduation Test.

Years ago, the district had fourth grade teachers who loved teaching their students about dinosaurs, but dinosaurs weren't part of the curriculum at the fourth grade. School leaders identified problems like that using the maps and fixed them.

Many districts around the state use curriculum maps as a way to guide instruction, but Greenon took the initiative to design software to make the tool available to parents online, Rapp said.

It's useful to parents as well as teachers, she said. Teachers can use the maps to see what other teachers of the same grade are assigning their students at the same time, or what concepts students are taught in older or younger grades.

"It's a great communication piece," Rapp said.

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See the curriculum maps at www.greenon.k12.oh.us/parents/curriculum.htm