FAREWELL NOTE

 

 

 Ran annim,

I am happy to say “farewell” to you all knowing that the word is just a marking point to the end of this short but challenging session, and am looking forward to seeing you again in the next session. A farewell is necessary before we can all meet again.  Today I am especially pleased to convey a word of thanks to you all for the great learning time we shared together.  All your Moodle sharing and blog posts help me understand the class materials better. Now that it is time we leave again the classroom door, I am sure we all have something to take with us. The knowledge and tools we learn have become our very own.   I am grateful that this class has enriched me with the new knowledge to use technology in many different ways. This course offers more to help us become confident teachers.

My sincere gratitude extends to the professor for the fascinating design of this class and all her wonderful ideas for learning. This class is very inspiring.

Last but not least, I would like to wish you all the best for all that you accomplished.

“May the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be ever at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields. And until we meet again, may God hold you in the hollow of his hand.”

 

KH

 

Farewell

 

Goodbye means  to depart from each other but things we studied, discussed, and learned will never part us.  ED638 has come to an end, I could not explain how I appreciated all your contributions in forums, effective literacy reviews, and blog posts.  All of your sharings is indeed a great help to my teaching career.

And To Dr. Rivera, from my heart this challenging experience is Worthed!

Thank you all and Kaselehlie!

~Farewell ED638 Fall Intercession 2023~

 

This course was a challenge for me. So many times I needed clarification. I learned an incredible amount from this course! The reviews we all shared with each other has only added to my list of "teacher approved" resources. Using Blogger for the first time, was actually fun. It is nice to see archived work. I look forward to being able to use those resources. Hope you enjoyed and learned alot from this course. Happy New Year everyone! 

IRA WEBSITE #6: READ THEORY

 

- ReadTheory -

        ReadTheory [https://readtheory.org/] is a K-12 online reading comprehension program that assesses reading ability and builds reading comprehension by providing texts for students to read at a "just right" level. There are informational and narrative passages leveled by grade and Lexile level. The quizzes assess and adjust passages to target student need. To begin, teachers create a free account and then create a new class (which can support a maximum of 35 student accounts). Students log in (providing their teacher's email so that they can be added to the class) and take a 20 minute pretest on vocabulary questions, and reading comprehension questions. This pretest establishes a student's initial reading level and reading comprehension abilities. After the pretest, students then work through passages and quizzes tailored to their level. Teachers monitor progress on the Progress Reports page, which shows data based on reading level progression as well as performance on each of the ELA Common Core-aligned reading comprehension question types. Unfortunately, lessons aren't provided on ReadTheory, but teachers can check out an associated site for those materials. ReadTheory does provide a limited list of free printables, great for RTI or other reading interventions.

The goal of ReadTheory is to address discouraged and frustrated readers by helping teachers assess students' reading abilities, so that teachers can better connect them to relevant reading activities. ReadTheory makes differentiation easier for a classroom of students. It is useful and time-saving, especially the data teachers get on each student. Some quiz questions are a bit challenging, but students receive feedback including explanations for any wrong answers. The passages and questions provided are similar to those students may encounter on standardized tests, which makes this a particularly great resource for test prep but not so much for engaging students or developing reading habits.

 

The design of the platform is a test-like format and is not an engaging way to read, support student choice or creativity. There is an option to choose a larger text size, and students can work at their own pace. Students are encouraged to read to earn Knowledge Points, which they receive for answering questions correctly, answering challenge questions, and completing written response questions that are then graded by their teacher. The directions are easy to follow, and students see correct answers and explanations when they answer incorrectly. The teacher dashboard provides useful reports and worksheets for extension. ReadTheory is a good tool to use for assessing, monitoring, or as a supplement to your existing reading program.

IRA WEBSITE #5: PHONICS & STUFF

 

- Phonics and Stuff -

I discovered Phonics and Stuff when I was looking for resources to use for my class of ESL students. Teaching them phonemic awareness, and how to decode words; taking some ideas from the Science of Reading and using “heart” words and word maps, this site was able to provide premade tools I can choose from to utilize during instruction. Developed by a Montessori teacher and reading expert, it is a website with many available learning tools and resources for teachers. There are games, read-alongs (rhyming poems that are read aloud), decodable stories that focus on specific phonics elements, tools for teaching phonics, and articles about phonics. 

The website itself is still in development, but many tools are available and ready to use. Visually it looks nice, simple, and the variety of texts is minimal. I would say the best part of the site are the interactive games and teaching tools. I like how you can customize your selection with the grapheme or phoneme you want to focus on. The games have instructions, which can be set up by the teacher or allow a student to customize their practice activity. There is a read aloud function available, and a points tracker in the corner of the activity.  There is a sentence building app which are simple sentences but is good for practicing decoding, fluency, and maybe even as a writing activity. To me, this is an effective tool for teaching literacy.

 

 

IRA WEBSITE #4: FRECKLE READING/ ELA

 

- Freckle Reading/ ELA -

Freckle [https://freckle.com/en-us/] is an online learning platform that allows students to practice Math and English Language Arts at their own level. Freckle continuously adapts to each student's individual skills, so each student is getting the appropriate challenge, whether they're working at, above, or below grade level. I will be reviewing the ELA portion of Freckle. With the Freckle program. The teacher will be able to support the student, as the lessons and assignments are student and teacher led. The program helps to accelerate literacy equitably with differentiated resources. From K-12 coverage of standards and skills, Over 1,000 nonfiction and fiction passages that adapt to each student’s level, and teachers can assign a specific standard for some or all students to practice. Students will find the website easy to navigate and visually appealing. If teacher hasn’t given an assignment, there is an opportunity for students to choose their assignment for the day. They will mostly enjoy choosing their character and earning incentives such as coins to go to the “store” and buy items for their character.

 The first time students practice in each domain, they'll take a brief pre-test that determines their starting level. Every time students practice, Freckle automatically adjusts to give them the appropriate challenge. Students can practice independently at their level. The teacher can also assign by standard or skill. Students log in to their dashboard, select English or ELA, and choose a domain. Practice Skills are available for informational articles & fictional stories at the student's level.

Teachers can assign a specific standard for all students to practice, or there are individualized practice based on word patterns. Students can build fluency using decodable texts, which are simple stories with phonetic spelling patterns & sight words. There is also a spelling and recognition practice with the most common sight words. Great to use for independent practice, during centers, or for homework. What is also beneficial is that you can assess your students' progress on specific standards to check for understanding and measure growth over time.

Assess student growth over time. Assess your students' progress on specific standards to check for understanding and measure growth over time. Keep in mind, that the free account provides one assignment per week, per class/roster. You can apply them towards any assignment type, including printables, for any subject. Data report will be provided for three students only. The premium account allows for unlimited assignments of all types, and data reports on all students. 

I have personally used Freckle in my classroom. Both the Math and ELA. I like how student and teacher friendly the platform is. It has audio capability, it is interactive, and visually appealing, using large font, highlighting ability, and most importantly it is a great tool to use for student practice and monitoring their progress. The tasks are not too long that the students gets bored. I have the free version so I dislike the limitation of only being able to view a few students’ data, or that I can’t post a week’s worth of assignments- that’s why it is a supplemental tool and not to ideally used for an actual lesson.

IRA WEBSITE #3: LALILO

 

- Lalilo -

Lalilo is an innovative, visually engaging, standards-aligned literacy software program for K-2 students and teachers. The program supports literacy learning and instruction through interactive and developmentally appropriate exercises for students and extensive data tracking and planning tools for teachers. It supports learning and instruction across all components of literacy, including phonological and phonemic awareness, letter and word recognition, comprehension and fluency, vocabulary, writing, and social literacy.

In the free version of Lalilo, students work on phonics, sight words, word families, reading comprehension and grammar lessons. In the student platform, children “travel” through a world of individualized, self-paced exercises. There is a sequence of lessons and content levels to ensure that students are working on developmentally appropriate exercises, individual needs, and grade level literacy standards. Students receive both positive and constructive feedback, while ensuring they are working on skills that are not too easy or too hard. It can show the teacher their areas of strength and growth, while suggesting lesson ideas and offline activities to reinforce skills.

The teacher dashboard organizes and analyzes student data. Teachers can view students’ progress in individual skills and literacy components, create groups of students for instruction, and plan for correlated lessons. Teachers can also assign student levels or particular skills, which are taken into account in the student’s progression in the program. You can view a calendar that shows student individual activity. You can see a detailed view of the activities students completed, how many questions the student answered correctly, as well as how long they spent on each activity. You can also access an error analysis for each lesson. The free teacher dashboard displays all the phonics data. With the premium plan, you will have access to even more student data, such as the data for sight words, word families, reading comprehension and grammar lessons are available too.

I really like that the program allows for the student to progress, from sounds, to words, to stories. There are sight words, sentences, stories, and rhymes. The student earns badges after each segment is complete. The questions are not long, they are short, about 3 questions each, and the activity changes, allowing for variety to keep the learner interested. The voice overs are clear and animated tone. It is engaging to the student and sounds friendly. All activities have audio capability. You can even record yourself reading. The feedback given allows for self-correction, it is encouraging, and the learner can also rate how they are doing with the lesson. I really enjoyed this website! The students will love it too because it is easy to use and it is game-based, and most children enjoy having fun while learning. The student demo is available at this link: https://student.lalilo.com/#/map/3/ready .

IRA WEBSITE #2: INTO THE BOOK

 

- Into the Book -

Into the Book was developed by PBS Wisconsin Education, with the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction and a team of experienced educators. It is a reading comprehension resource for elementary students and teachers. It provides practice activities that focus on eight research-based strategies: using prior knowledge, making connections, questioning, visualizing, inferring, summarizing, evaluating, and synthesizing. Into the Book includes: a student website featuring interactive reading comprehension activities, teaching videos, feedback, audio or read aloud capability, and rewards; the teacher website features video clips, posters, teacher guides, lesson plans, and matrix linking each activity with Common Core State Standards in English Language Arts (ELA).

When you log onto the student website [https://reading.ecb.org], you will be asked if you are a returning or first time user. You will enter your name or key (which the site will generate for you). Into the Book does not collect any personally identifiable information. The name students enter to log in to the site is used only to save their work on the site. E-mail addresses provided at the end of an activity are not collected or saved, but is used to send work. However, you can also skip logging in and use the site for practice only, but work will not be saved or tracked. 

Once you enter the keycode, or enter as a guest, you will choose from the strategy icons. From there is an instruction or teaching page where there is an explanation of the strategy and a video to watch the strategy demonstrated. The videos are not current or modern looking, but are quite helpful and straight to the point. Afterwards, you can choose the text you want to practice. Each practice activity is different, some require you to find text evidence, some you can create pictures. Once the activity is completed, the user can choose an award. After all strategies are learned, there is a culminating activity. Which can also be used as an opportunity for higher order thinking or as a fun challenge.  

 

I find the website easy to navigate through, and very user friendly. Even for non-native English speakers, it is easy to use and the lesson videos are helpful. The task of finding evidence in the text to answer the questions, is assisted/ guided giving the user immediate feedback. At the end of the task, you will receive a reward of your choosing. I really enjoyed this website! I find it valuable to use in the classroom as it is quite engaging, and effective in teaching strategies and reinforcing skills in a simple yet interactive way. There are not a lot of resources for practicing specific reading strategies, so I am glad I found this site. There are some minor issues with the program freezing, especially during the drawing activities, but for the most part, most of the activities can be completed.  

 

 

IRA WEBSITE #1: UNITE FOR LITERACY

 

- Unite for Literacy -

In an attempt to provide children access to an abundance of books that celebrate their languages, cultures, and cultivate a lifelong love of reading, Unite for Literacy has low cost, print and digital book distribution options that support organizations in eradicating book scarcity in their communities. To accomplish their vision, the Unite for Literacy team brought together expertise from the fields of literacy education, business innovation, strategic planning, and early childhood development. The project builds home libraries and support families to develop a daily habit of reading, both of which are key factors in growing lifelong readers. To support their mission, the Unite for Literacy bookshelf  (https://www.uniteforliteracy.com/) provides engaging digital picture books complete with audio narration options in a variety of languages and is available on any device (computer, tablet or smartphone).  You can search for books by categories or by titles.

Teachers/users may select their preferred language and may select more than one language at a time.  This is a great feature for ESL students (English as a Second Language), as they can select to play each page in first their native language and then English or vice versa.  Students who have some understanding of English may choose to select the English narration for most pages and only select their native language when they come across a word or concept that is not familiar.  I like how inclusive the topics and book suggestion are. Some books have the option of American Sign Language; when selected, these books have video clips of a person signing current page of the book.  Selecting the narration options from the bookshelf will display all the books available in that language. Students with low vision enjoy the beautiful images, large font text and non-visually clutter pages.  Students can chose to read the text themselves or press the audio button to listen to the appealing narration. At the end of the book, there is a page that has two follow-up questions or activities to do. There is also a display of suggested books relating to the topic that was just read. I also noticed that the books vary in reading levels, from simple 2-4 word sentences, to more complex sentences. The website itself is very user friendly, that even a young child can navigate it. Unite for Literacy’s online bookshelf is a great way to increase literacy at home, and anywhere it is accessible. Most importantly, it is at no cost and there is a large selection of books for different interests. 

 💖💖

Ran annim,

I am happy to say “farewell” to you all knowing that the word is just a marking point to the end of this short but challenging session, and am looking forward to seeing you again in the next session. A farewell is necessary before we can all meet again.  Today I am especially pleased to convey a word of thanks to you all for the great learning time we shared together.  All your Moodle sharing and blog posts help me understand the class materials better. Now that it is time we leave again the classroom door, I am sure we all have something to take with us. The knowledge and tools we learn have become our very own.   I am grateful that this class has enriched me with the new knowledge to use technology in many different ways. This course offers more to help us become confident teachers.

My sincere gratitude extends to the professor for the fascinating design of this class and all her wonderful ideas for learning. This class is very inspiring.

Last but not the least, I would like to wish you all the best for all that you accomplished.

“May the road rise up to meet you, may the wind be ever at your back. May the sun shine warm upon your face and the rain fall softly on your fields. And until we meet again, may God hold you in the hollow of his hand.”

 

KH