Tiered Instruction
Only when students
work at appropriate challenge levels do they develop the essential habits of
persistence, curiosity, and willingness to take intellectual risks.
How to Build Background Knowledge
Building World Knowledge: Motivating Children to Read and Enjoy
Informational Text
Exposing young children to informational text early on can help them to handle the literacy demands of fourth grade and beyond. Three techniques described in this article — Text Impression, Guiding Questions, and the Retelling Pyramid — can help children become familiar with the language and structure of non-fiction books.
Summarizing teaches students how to discern the most important ideas in a text, how to ignore irrelevant information, and how to integrate the central ideas in a meaningful way. Teaching students to summarize improves their memory for what is read. Summarization strategies can be used in almost every content area.
Tiered instruction allows all students to focus on essential concepts and skills yet still be challenged at the different levels on which they are individually capable of working. Ideally, tiered learning tasks engage students slightly beyond what they find easy or comfortable in order to provide genuine challenge and to promote their continued learning.
Here's how it works: The platform presents video and a variety of written content and then asks multiple-choice questions. Based on student responses, and patterns of responses from other, similar students, the next piece of content is served up.
Knewton currently offers programs in math, biology and English language arts, mostly for middle school and high school grades. The company plans to expand soon with history and other curricula.
Struggling Reader? Target the Problem!
Online tool is designed to help parents and teachers pinpoint the problem a struggling reader is having and discover ways to help.
* this short video demonstration of using Immersive Reader in Microsoft Edge.
* How to Highlight, Annotate, and Share Pages in Microsoft Edge
ShowMe As a student looking to learn about a particular topic you can search Show Me by topic and subject. As a teacher, you can create your own videos or assign one from the community for students to view. If you would rather share your knowledge with your class, you will need to download the free iOS app. Currently (2/2012) there is not an app available for Android device but Show Me has plans to develop one in the future.
Three Level Reading Guide
Three Level Reading Guide Use format where put text in table and include a right column Ideas, connections, questions (Similar to Cornell Notetaking Method Instead of using the previous template, you can simply have students fold their paper)
Readworks.org high quality reading passages for students. This website offers a wide range of lesson plans, comprehension units, and reading passages organized by skill and Lexile level. Whether you’re looking for a fiction passage for a guided reading group or want to find a informational text when teaching test taking skills, Readworks.org may be a worthwhile resource
Story Shares offer free, age-appropriate stories for struggling teen and young adult readers. Browse their full library of titles!
Self Questioning to Support Comprehension Proficient readers typically engage with a text by asking themselves questions as they read: Who is speaking? Why did the author choose this example? What's important here? Do I understand what I am reading? In contrast, struggling readers, and those with disabilities, are not likely to pose these questions. Learn about before, during and after reading strategies that work, as well as ideas for embedding technology supports.
Read Mode puts your Chrome into a pleasant reading experience.’Just click on the glasses icon in the address bar, the current page will turn into a nice-to-read black on white page allowing you to read without forcing your eyes. Ads and Flash animations are also removed while on read-mode. Click the icon again and everything will go back to normal’
News-O-Matic is a daily newspaper for kids available on both iOS and Android devices (the app will soon be available on the Amazon Kindle Fire tablets). It provides engaging nonfiction text for young readers to help them learn about the world around them. With topics including election news, sports coverage and science discoveries, there is plenty of exciting content to capture the attention of your students. Their new update (coming soon!) will be specifically designed for use in schools. It will include custom reading levels for individual students, built-in assessments that are customizable, and analytics including quiz scores, reading levels and time spent reading. News-O-Matic will be able to support differentiated instruction while giving students access to high-interest, informational text.
Multileveled Science News Articles
Science in the News, published by Science A–Z, engages students in the ever-changing world of science. Each issue features compelling news stories for students written at three reading levels to allow for differentiated instruction.
After creating an account, teachers create the student accounts. This allows kids to write comments / teachers to moderate comments, teachers can manage/track quizzes students take based on stories, and lets kids access a cool photo captioning tool. (This is a lot like the New York Times “What’s going on in this picture?” feature.)
Step 1: Go to the Chrome Store and install it on your Chrome browser.
Step 2: As you travel the Internet, create a Google Doc, or read a PDF, an icon will appear on your address bar. This icon lets you know that Read&Write can be enabled. Select the icon and you will see a variety of tools to help your struggling readers.
Play and listen to a document (highlighted sections of the text) being read to me by a non-electronic sounding voice.
- See the meaning of words explained with text and picture dictionaries
- Hear text translated into other languages
- Get suggestions while you are typing for words to type
- Highlight text in documents or webpages to use in other documents later.
- Simplify and summarize text on web pages
PowerUp WHAT WORKS resources for struggling students and those with disabilities are now available in the OpenEd resource library. OpenEd is the creator of the world’s largest online collection of standards-aligned resources that I shared earlier this year. PowerUp provides customizable materials, lesson plans, instructional strategies, videos and more to enhance learning for students with diverse needs, and to personalize learning with technology and Universal Design for Learning.
Tildee is a free tool to help you create and share instantly and easily tutorials on any subject. With a clear and user friendly interface, you go straight to the point: write your own tutorial. More than that, you will be able to add maps, images and even videos to any step in a tutorial.
Frolyc a tool for teachers looking to design their own lesson-based activities. Teachers can create activities for students like: completing a graphic organizer, identify cause and effect in a passage, draw a response to a question or take a quiz. Students can access activities that are assigned to them by a teacher using Frolyc’s iPad app Activity Spot. As students complete the activity, teachers will receive feedback on student progress in real time! You can access a library filled with Common Core aligned activities created and shared by other teachers. You can create a unique learning experience for your students. a learning and assessment tool, Froylc is a powerful platform for increasing student engagement and monitoring student progress. Since Froylc lets users assign activities to students individually, it’s easy to differentiate student tasks.
Lexile scores are listed for each article along with grade levels and Common Core standards.
With a free ReadWorks account you can search for lessons and reading passages by grade level, lexile score, reading skill, subject area, and text type (fiction or non-fiction). In your ReadWorks account you can create digital binders of the lesson plans and reading passages that you want to use.
Clever Island - A site that covers a wide range of subjects: Math, Reading, Science, etc. Also, CI is geared for students to learn at their own pace as well adapt to children's different learning styles. -
- Example of Three Level Reading Guide that goes with above article.. click here
Power My Learning - differentiate instruction by customizing the learning experience for students using Power My Learning
Our Little Earth a free international online newspaper for kids. It is delivered every two weeks directly to email Past editions of Our Little Earth can be found on the site for students to read and explore. Each issue helps students stay informed about what current events are happening in the world around them. Every edition has a map showing students where the news came from for the issue. The articles are easy for students to read and do a great job of offering enough background information so that students can make connections to the text and better understand it.
Teachers
use tiered activities so all students focus on essential understandings and
skills, but at different levels of complexity, abstractness or open-endedness
1. Supplemental Reading of Romeo and Juliet (High School)
Using the Web allows tiered groups
to access differentiated texts to enhance their study of Romeo and Juliet. Students who are struggling with the play might
work together in groups to read articles about current teen marriage rates in
the US. They might use these articles to present the data in charts using a graphic organizer. Articles of interest can be found here
and tiered one here.
Students who are on-track might study a collection of quotations about marriage
from the Folger website here.
They might choose to categorize the data they collected in an Inspiration
bubble map or other graphic organizer. Finally, students who need an extra
challenge might work with a reproduction of a primary source here
These students might
also use an Inspiration program to represent the information they learned.
2. Shakespeare
for Kids gr. 6-12
Explore full texts of plays in PDF format, word games and puzzles,
historical lessons (some are interactive), and fun facts about Shakespeare
and his theater. A word of caution: many of the activities on this site
require prior knowledge of Shakespearean plays and characters. Choose
wisely based on the level and language skills of your students, and the
depth of your study of Shakespeare. Use to introduce the Elizabethan era,
review important concepts, or extend a literature unit with a bit of history.
Reading Tools
Video on Reading Tools
Twurdy Organizes searches by reading level, Better than Google reading level option
Just in time for the Common Core emphasis on nonfiction reading, NEWSELA provides daily current events articles written specifically for K–12 students. Each day the site adds three new articles to the collection. Categories include War & Peace, Science, Kids, Money, Law, Health and Arts. For every article, there are versions written at different Lexile levels. With just a few clicks, a teacher can provide the same story leveled for students of differing reading ability.
Rewordify is a great web tool that you can use with your students and kids to help them read difficult passages. Rewordify simplifies complex passages and render them reader-friendly.
News in Levels offers news stories that are on the lighter side of things. The stories are available in three versions so that you can choose the version that is appropriate for your students. The stories include a list of potentially difficult words along with definitions of those words. Each story is also accompanied by a video.
Dogo News Leveled news articles can also get vocabulary definitions as you read
Newsla news and nonfiction at various grade levels.
Common Lit a collection of free texts for upper elementary and middle schools classrooms which are organized thematically.
Listen and Read is a set of 15 nonfiction read-along stories. The stories feature pictures and short passages of text that students can read on their own or have read to them by each story's narrator. The collection of stories is divided into three categories: Community Club which would be better described as "careers," animals, and the President.
Lyrics2Learn is a website that hosts hundreds of 15 minute, interactive reading lessons for students. These teacher created lesson plans were designed to improve elementary reading skills while keeping kids engaged.
Connect Plugged-In Students to Classic Literature
A recent trend in online storytelling may offer opportunities for teachers looking to help connect students to literature. The Literary YouTube series seeks to transform classic works into video blogs set in the modern day. One of the earliest such series is also one of the most popular: The Lizzie Benet Diaries, an adaptation of Pride and Prejudice. In this modernized version of Pride and Prejudice, Elizabeth Bennet is a 24-year-old grad student with a video blog, and the Bennet sisters—reduced to three rather than the original five—are just as concerned about jobs and school as they are about marriage. Frankenstein, MD, which teaches viewers about biology while following the exploits of Victoria Frankenstein, a medical student struggling to make a name for herself in a male-dominated field.
Click Here to Access Lizzie Bennet Diaries Click Here to Access Frankenstein, MDClick Here to Access Classic Alice
Click Here to Access The New Adventures of Peter and Wendy
Click Here to Access The March Family Letters- Word Auto Summary Tool - Look under the Tools menu
- Word Readability Tool - Word 2007 instructions | Word 2003 and Macs instructions
-
Add audio to Powerpoint - To record your own sound clip (you must have a microphone attached to your computer) and add it to the slide, on the Insert menu, point to Movies and Sound, and then click Record Sound. Word Auto Summary Tool
-
SmartArt (Word 2007 & 2010) Visual organizers help students to study and organize information for writing. Word 2007 contains basic organizers for creating list through more complex Venn Diagrams click here for a handout on instructions.
- Text to Speech
on a Mac: Go to Preferences; select speech; check speak selected text and
choose a key to activate it. You can also select a voice.
- Text to Speech Windows - 2003 | 2007 | 2010
- Comment Feature - Insert Menu
Readability Test Tool Get the readability of Webpages or Text
Readability Bookmarklets Scrubs web pages of distractions and provides a clean, comfortable view. Handy for reading longer articles.
- Microsoft Reader (2.0) is a free e-book reader that will read any available e-book on your Windows computer and Pocket PC. After the Reader is installed, add the Text-to-Speech option to hear any eBook read aloud. In addition, you can create eBooks from any MS Word file by installing the Add-in feature; an icon on the Word toolbar will provide the means to do this. Using this feature, you can locate any e-text file (e.g. from Project Gutenberg website), copy/paste/save it as a MS Word file. Click the new toolbar button and the file is converted into the eBook format for Microsoft Reader; it is added to its library.
Adobe
Acrobat eBook Reader
This free eReader allows you to read with 1 or 2
page format and brings in clear graphics. eBook publishers determine if a book
can be printed or read aloud. Has both PC and Mac versions.
Scribd, a PDF publishing service, has now integrated Apture search technology to make PDFs interactive. Now anytime you're reading a document on Scribd and you come across and unfamiliar term just highlight it and click "learn more" to have text references, images, and videos pop-up on the document. You can then click the links, read the pages, and watch the videos within the pop-up on the document. video
Literature Map provides a web of authors you might like based on authors that you already enjoy reading. To use Literature Map
just type an author's name into the search box and webbed list of
authors will be displayed. The authors' names closest to the author
whose name you entered are the authors whose work you're most likely to
enjoy.
Readability
Options on the Web
Twurdy is search tool that automatically
displays the readability of your search results for you. Twurdy uses a simple
color-coded system to indicate how easy or difficult it is to read a particular
website in your search results. There are three types of Twurdy searches; Just
Twurdy, Simple Twurdy, and Twurdy with Pop. Here's how Twurdy defines the three
search types: Just Twurdy - searches
using Twurdy's basic algorithm with medium speed and medium results. Simple
Twurdy - searches using Twurdy's simple algorithm for fast speed but less
accurate results. Twurdy with Pop -
searches using Twurdy's most complex algorithm which includes looking up the
popularity of words within the text. It has a slower speed with more accurate
results.
Tools to simplify articles on the Web and save paper
Print What You Like is a simple web tool that lets users select just a portion of a website. This is particularly useful for printing articles from websites or blogs that do not have a "printer friendly" option.
PrintFriendly strips away all of the ads and side bar content allowing you to print only the article on the page. There are two ways to use PrintFriendly. You can copy and paste an article's url into the PrintFriendly homepage or use the PrintFriendly bookmarklet. I tried it both ways and much prefer using the bookmarklet as it doesn't require any toggling between browser tabs or windows. Video
Printliminator is a handy little bookmarklet for Firefox, Chrome, and Safari. Printliminator allows you to highlight a webpage and select only the elements which you wish to print. You can install Printliminator in seconds by just clicking and dragging it into your browser's toolbar. video
Print Edit is a Firefox add-on that allows you to edit the content of a webpage in your "print preview" screen. With Print Edit installed once you enter the print preview screen you can highlight and delete sections of a webpage before you print them
Text to Speech Tools
Read The Words - Convert text to speech, including words you type in, Web pages and upload files. Also can embed in email or Web page.
YakItToMe -Upload documents, cut and paste text or link to feeds. Text reader converts text to speech automatically. Download audio and podcasts.
iSpeech - converts any text on the Web into clear natural sounding audio free. Take your reading on the go
Vocalyze is a service that reads the content of popular websites to you. You can subscribe to popular sites across twelve different categories. Vocalyze works on your computer, Android device, and iOS device. Applications for Education Vocalyze makes news and other content available to students with vision impairments that prevent them from reading online. Vocalyze could also be used to support struggling readers as you use current events stories in your classroom.
ReadPlease Windows-based screen text-to-speech reader. It will read text aloud.
VozMe Type in some text, click the Create MP3 button, and it will open a new window and play a male or female voice (your choice) reading the text. You can download the file as an MP3 using right-click save-as (PCs) or CTRL-click save-as (Macs).
Carryout Text - A great way to convert text to speech, good for converting blogs, emails or documents.
HearWho Convert text into an mp3 file by copying and pasting it into the main window on the right. Choose your voice and click on Start Conversion. RIGHT click / Save Target As to save the mp3.
PowerTalk PowerTalk is a free program that automatically speaks any presentation or slide show running in Microsoft PowerPoint for Windows.
Natural Readers The Free version allows you to experience listening to your emails, web pages, reports or any text on your PC.
e-Speaking An easy software solution to enable you to control your computer, dictate emails and letters, and have the computer read documents back to you.
CLiCk Speak is an open source, freely available extension for the Firefox web browser. It features a mouse driven interface, and it reads web pages.
iSpeech - converts any text on the Web into clear natural sounding audio free. Take your reading on the go
Click, speak - reads websites for the improvement of literacy
Read the Words Website Website that allows the (registered) user to upload documents in a variety of formats, including Word, Adobe PDF, websites, etc. in order to have the text read aloud. Finished readings can be accessed from the Read the Words website or as an mp3 file or podcast. The site also claims that users can embed the readings onto their own websites, wikis, and blogs. I see this as a powerful tool when dealing with struggling readers or English-language learners.
Speech-to-Text
Google Voice Students can leave voice messages that can be downloaded or saved as text. Helpful for students whose storytelling skills out distance their writing skills.
TalkTyper is a tool for speech recognition in a browser (only Chrome). All a person has to do is enable their microphone on their computer and start talking into the browser and the text should appear on the screen. It can then be edited, printed, and shared w/ others.More Reading Tools
- Awesome Highlighter Tool
- Just as the name implies, this website allows users to highlight important information on any website. And since typed notes can also be added, I see this as a great tool for teachers who want to direct students to specific information on a website, then have the students respond to a series questions. Teachers can direct students to the highlighted website with the provided URL, or post it as a hyperlink on their website, wiki, or blog. Of course, teachers could also assign students to highlight information relevant to a specific topic, etc.
- Wiki Summarizer is a site that allows you to search Wikipedia, have articles summarized by key points, and provides lists of articles that are related to your original search. Here's how it works; let's say I enter the search term "Mount Everest," when I do that Wiki Summarizer provides a list of key points about Mount Everest. I can also get a list of related search terms and related articles through Wiki Summarizer. Wiki Summarizer could help students who have a very broad research topic narrow down their searches.
- Lyrics Gaps learn a language through song. Lyrics Gaps hosts songs that you can listen to and read the lyrics of. Each song has a few activities accompanying it. The activities ask you to fill in the blanks in the songs with the correct word or words that are missing. There are currently activities available in ten languages.
- Reading Bear
is a free service that offers narrated lessons on recognizing and
pronouncing letters and words. There are also some lessons on prefixes
and suffixes. Students can control the pace of each lesson to match
their needs.
- Lingro Choose a website you want to read, place it into Lingro and then the whole site becomes clickable and you can find the meanings of any word on the site with just a click of a button. So if you are reading El Pais or Le Monde or The Times, then you can make any of the text clickable and it will immediately bring up a dictionary and tell you the meaning of the word. It keeps a record of all the words you clicked on and even creates games to practice and work with the words!!! You can choose from a variety of dictionaries too.
- Audioboo record what you read to practice for language, presentations ...All browser-base
Digital Text
There are numerous internet resources for digital text, with more sources being developed all the time. Many books and historical documents have been converted to digital format, for access via computer. New writing is being done to take advantage of hyperlinking and multi-media. See Digital Book Libraries (over 90 sites listed).
Examples of Free Books Online K - 12
Internet Public Librarynternternet
Public Librarynet
Public Library provides links to books, documents, magazines,
and more, organized by topic. KidSpace at the site links to picture books,
children's books in Spanish or French, kids poetry, elementary science, and
other curriculum areas.
Books That Grow has a
library of texts that have each been edited to be made accessible to
different reading levels. And it has some other unique features —
teachers can create virtual classrooms to assign and/or monitor what
students what are reading and students can click on words that are new
to them to see definitions and hear how they are pronounced. They are
also planning on adding comprehension questions. The texts can be read
on any device.
Project Gutenberg provides over 6000 books. A search for exploring the west produced 17 titles on the Oregon trail, Buffalo Bill, crossing the Rocky Mountains, etc. Each document is downloadable in plain text or zipped format and will then open in your web browser. They can also be opened in any application that can read plain text, including all word processors.
University of Virginia's E-Book Library features 2,200 publicly-available e-books including classic British and American fiction, major authors, children's literature, the Bible, Shakespeare, American history, African-American documents, and has a new center on religion and democracy. Material can accessed in HTML (web version) for online viewing (or cut and pasted into a word processor), and can be downloaded as both an E-book for Microsoft Reader and Palm-readable text for the Palm Reader.
The Baldwin Project provides customizable display for online reading of children's literature from 1880 - 1922, including over 350 Nursery Rhymes, Fables, Folk Tales, Myths, Legends and Hero Stories, Literary Fairy Tales, Bible Stories, Nature Stories, Biography, History, Fiction, Poetry, Storytelling, Games, and Craft Activities.
Search EBooks is a service dedicated to helping you find free ebooks. When you find an ebook on Search EBooks you can view a preview of it, download, or grab an embed code without ever leaving the search results page.
Neotake - eBook search engine for all languages
Digital Book
Index: Digital Book Index provides links to more than 165,000
full-text digital books from more than 1,800 commercial and non-commercial
publishers, universities, and various private sites. More than 140,000
of these books, texts, and documents are available free.
Feedbooks:
Read anywhere. Feedbooks distributes over 3,000,000 books
every month to smartphones, tablets and eReaders.
Novels 375 free ebooks listed alphabetically
Read Alouds
Read Alouds K-3 Read Alouds
Storyline
Online - Watch and listen to stories read by famous actors and
actresses.
Mighty Books - Numerous selection with unique titles
Speakaboos - Watch and listen to different stories, some which are read by famous celebrities! Choose from 6 different genres.
Reading is
Fundamental’s Reading Planet for Kids.
This website allows students to listen to books being read aloud, create their
own books to print, review books, write stories with other kids, and play games
that reinforce reading skills.
StoryNory - audio files of stories
Book Zone - Watch and listen to animated stories and songs.
The Story Home is a site for listening to children stories. This is all done via an audio file which is linked to a description of a story. These stories can be commented on and shared w/ others, and people can even subscribe to podcasts to get their stories. This is an ideal site for young learners and a great way to share the joy of reading.Goodnight Stories - These stories are fluently read with enthusiasm. The words
on the screen are highlighted as each word is read.
MeeGenius - There are 6 books in the free collection. They can be
read aloud by the computer and they can be personalized with your favorite
names! Other books are available for purchase.
Story Time for Me -
Reading can be just as fun (if not more!) than watching TV and playing video
games!
Starfall: K-2. Interactive phonics-based stories.
Online Interactive stories- clever traditional and new stories
Story Time for Me - Excellent site for grade K-2 where interactive stories are read to kids by professional actors.
Silly Books Books, songs, comics and games animated and read aloud with accompanying text highlighted. Students can also publish their own stories.
The Big Myth Experience myths from cultures throughout the world with this impressive site that provides multimedia renditions of world creation stories. Each of the nine myths includes an overview of the culture that produced it, suggested class activities, and discussion questions. You'll need headphones for this one. Great site to add to a comparative study of world cultures.
Speakaboos A chock full of classic video storybooks read by actors, along with games,
e-cards, sing-along karaoke tunes, and printable coloring pages. The stories
are divided into Favorites (such as Arthur and Holidays), Fables, Nursery
Rhymes, Fairy Tales, Folk Tales and Songs. A useful feature is "More on
This Album: Play All" which will queue up all the songs (or stories) in a
particular album. Some of the songs are available for free download while
others are for sale in the iTunes Store.
Andersen Fairy Tales Animated The animated Andersen Fairy Tales site is my storytelling pick of the day. It features three narrated fairy tales ("Real Princess," "Leaping Match" and "The Emperor's New Suit"), games, and a biography of Hans Christian Andersen. For more fairy tale fun, visit sister site Grimm Fairy Tales ( http://www.grimmfairytales.com/ ) which showcases "The Brementown Musicians" and "Faithful John."
Explore Stories Online Fun childrens stories for kids of all ages.
iStoryBooks offers two dozen free digital storybooks for kids ages two through eight. Most of the stories in the app are adaptations of classic children's tales like The Ugly Duckling
Grimm Fairytales It defaults to read aloud, but you can turn the audio off
Ceebies K-3 Stories are read aloud and can be printed.Read Alouds 4 - 6
Free Audio Books Download and listen
Assistive Media has recorded hundreds of articles from 50 different magazines and newspapers, including the New York Times, Discover, and MAD Magazine. A click will start them playing. A right button click will save the MP3 file to your computer.
Signed Stories- free audio books designed for elementary readers that are also signed
Online Audio Stories
- a collection of elementary audio books
The Mother Goose Club
has a number of rhymes and songs that provide audio support for the text.Learn Out Loud
- over 2000 free audio and video titles including books, lectures, speeches and interviews.
Read Print
- free online book library with over 8,000 titles that can be read using any free text reader (tested with Natural Reader).
Smories
is a video site featuring kids reading kids' stories. Many of the videos include captions.
The Big Myth
Experience myths from cultures throughout the world with
this impressive site that provides multimedia renditions of world
creation stories. Each of the nine myths includes an overview of the
culture that produced it, suggested class activities, and discussion
questions.Great site to add to a
comparative study of world cultures.
Read Alouds 6 -12
Free Audio Books Download and listen
CAST Editions (GR. 4 to 12) UDL Editions by CAST are classic texts from world literature presented
in a flexible online interface that provides just-in-time,
individualized supports for struggling readers, and added-value features
that engage novice and expert readers alike.
Learn Out Loud - over 2000 free audio and video titles including books, lectures, speeches and interviews.
Read Print - free online book library with over 8,000 titles that can be read using any free text reader (tested with Natural Reader).
Writing
Read Write Think: K-12. Comprehensive literature and writing site http://www.readwritethink.org
The Material Index
of R.W.T.is a great
collection of Flash-based, interactive activities target literacy skills
for all grades. Some of the dozensof tools include: Bio-Cube for
writing interesting biographies, Circle Plot Diagram, a story planner,
Comic Creator for creating comic strips, Literary Elements Map, students
can map out the key literary elements of character, setting, conflict,
and resolution, Literary Graffiti, aims to teach students to visualize
what they are reading to help them develop as readers. Fractured Fairy
Tale Creator, Eye on Idioms, Essay Map, and much more!!! http://readwritethink.org/student_mat/index.asp
English Composition: Writing for an Audience
This video series introduces basic principles and strategies for
communicating in writing to a variety of audiences and improving general
composition skills. Throughout the series, students will meet a wide
array of professionals whose work involves writing - not only authors,
journalists, and teachers, but also musicians, judges, nurses,
engineers, scientists, and athletes - who will discuss how they write
with their specific audiences in mind. http://www.learner.org/resources/series128.html
Character Development: Guidance for developing characters in student writing http://teacher.scholastic.com/writeit/fiction/draft/characterdevelopment.htm
Character Scrapbook: Reader response activity to analyze the characters in any book http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/scrapbook/
Historic Tale Construction Kit
Using this digital storytelling tool, students can select
among menus of folk (brave and ordinary), buildings, and beasts; add
their own text in the colors of their choice; adjust the scale of the
items they select; and create an authentic looking Medieval comic strip
http://www.adgame-wonderland.de/type/bayeux.php
Checklist of Focus Correction Areas
Create your own checklist. Choose from a menu or correction areas or create your own. http://pblchecklist.4teachers.org/
Story Jumper
An online tool that makes creative writing fun for kids. Using our
interactive workbook and lesson plans, teachers spark students'
interest in developing and writing complete stories. Kids can then put
their creativity and project skills to work in crafting their very own
professionally published hard-back books! http://www.storyjumper.com/main/teacher
Writing Fix
Interactive writing prompts. http://www.writingfix.com/
Writing Fun
http://www.writingfun.com/
video intro http://www.teachertrainingvideos.com/3gems/index.html
Cube Creators
provide templates designed to break the writing process into six
distinct parts. There are templates for writing biographies, mysteries,
short stories, and a blank template that you can customize. Students
enter the required information into the online template. When the
template is completed, it can be printed with lines for cutting and
folding to create an actual cube.
Word Clouds
Tagxedo
Nice variety of shapes. http://www.tagxedo.com/
Wordle
Create word clouds to analyze text. How to use video http://www.wordle.net/
starter sheet | 46 ways to use Wordle
WordSift
Creates word clouds like Wordle. Many uses for examining student writing and professional writers and speech makers. http://www.wordsift.com/
ABCYA
Good for little ones. Note the download button in lower left corner
http://www.abcya.com/word_clouds.htm
VocabGrabber
Similar to Wordle with good integration samples. Not flashy but good for
understanding passages. It analyzes text and generates lists of the
most useful vocabulary. Also click on any word in the cloud and
asnapshot of ta visual thesaurus appears. http://www.visualthesaurus.com/vocabgrabber/
Our Story Designed for families to record a time line of events in their lives, this online tool serves the classroom teacher as an electronic time line for a collection of "stories." Each event on the "playable" timeline is a "story." http://www.OurStory.com
Fanfiction http://newlits.wikispaces.com/Fanfiction+Unit+for+Grade+4+Classroom+by+Donna+%26+Nicole
TagCrowd is a web application for visualizing word frequencies in any user-supplied text by creating what is popularly known as a tag cloud or text cloud. http://tagcrowd.com/
PictLits
PicLits.com is a creative writing site that matches
beautiful images with carefully selected keywords in order to inspire
you. The object is to put the right words in the right place and the
right order to capture the essence, story, and meaning of the picture.http://piclits.com/compose_dragdrop.aspx
Novlet http://www.novlet.com/ Collaborative, nonlinear story writing
Fotobabble http://www.fotobabble.com/ Create talking photos in three steps
Witoku An interviewing tool to record interviews. Includes embedded code for uploading to Web page http://wetoku.com/
Can I Have a Word?
http://www.barbican.org.uk/canihaveaword/
This site won the education Webby award, contains projects
that include readings by British poets, visual components, and lesson
plans for expanding the creative writing of students
Kid Publications: K-5. Children can publish their own stories, read other children's stories, and collaboratively write stories. http://kidpub.com/kidpub/
Kid Authors: K -8. Children can publish their own stories and read other young authors. http://kidauthors.com/default.asp
Kids Love to Learn Interactive writing for grades 3-6 http://www.2learn.ca/kids/LangArts/listLAWriting.asp?ID2=2
Zhura
Screen writing software. Simplifies the process with templates. Good for newscasts, podcasts and plays. http://www.zhura.com/
Create Your Scenario
A tool that lets elementary students select characters, type lines for each one, save their work, and generate a playscript. http://www.kids-space.org/HPT/1a/11a.html
StoryMash A creative writing community for authors, amateur writers, readers and anyone interested in collaborative fiction and collaborative creative writing. http://storymash.com/
Storybird http://storybird.com/ Free online publishing and stories by others you can read. Also has the capabilities to write cooperative stories.
Story Creator
A unique story making tool, a sound and picture gallery, and a timeline to place the stories in their historic context. http://myths.e2bn.net/create/tool527-new--story-creator-2--beta.html
Generator Blog
A fantastic blog that contains links to all sorts of
free, interesting generators (such as cereal boxes, insurance cards,
money, etc.) that would be great tools for students to use in creating
creative advertising campaigns http://generatorblog.blogspot.com/
iAdventures
http://warrensburg.k12.mo.us/iadventure/index.html
An iAdventure is a problem solving activity in which students
determine the direction and outcome of a content-rich storyline, using
resources available on the Internet, particularly resources providing
real-world data and primary documents.
Comics and Cartoons
Kerpoof
Create Interactive stories and movies. Simple to learn. http://www.kerpoof.com
Toon Doo
Creaqte comic strips with clip art and speech bubbles http://www.toondoo.com/
MakeBeliefsComix
Allows students to create comic strips up to four panels and print them.
Supports English, Spanish, French, Italian German, Latin and more
languages. http://www.makebeliefscomix.com/Comix/
Pikistrips
Free, well-designed software that lets you create comic strips and save them for others to view. http://www.comeeko.com/
BitStrips An easy to use comic building site. Students can use this webtool to create a comic cell, strip, or story and then share it with their peers or the world. Use with illustrating a scene from a novel, or even to help a student understand a complex theory such as gravity in science. http://www.bitstrips.com/
Little Bird Tales allows your students to create a story, animate it, narrate it, and publish it! It's strong point is simplicity! You do have to register for an account, http://www.littlebirdtales.com/
Comic Brush
A tool that lets you create and share a comic using any
combination of your own drawings, photos and ready-to-use artwork.You
can choose from the site's library of backgrounds, characters and speech
balloons, add your own text or captions, and even your own photos. http://www.comicbrush.com/
ZimmerTwins Gr. 1-3 - Create cartoon movies http://www.zimmertwins.com/
Talking Cats Generator Create a slideshow dialogue with speech bubbles. There are also links to a squirrel, an owl, a tomato, and a flower generator on this page that can be used as well. This gives students another choice! http://www.fodey.com/generators/animated/talking_cat.asp
Memoov Created animated videos http://memoov.com/index.aspx
Newspapers and Magazines
Newscred
Create a free online newspaper http://www.newscred.com/
Crayon - Create a professional-looking newspaper with this nice online creator. There are several options to choose from, so it has a bit of a higher learning curve.http://crayon.net/
Fodey
Students enter text for a fictitious news article. Then
download a picture to create a headline and story that looks like a real
newspaper
http://www.fodey.com/generators/newspaper/snippet.asp
Young Writers
Magazine with writing support and accepts students submissions (7-12) http://www.young-writer.co.uk/
The Newspaper Clipping Generator
http://www.fodey.com/generators/newspaper/snippet.asp
Helps students summarize articles. Students take an article
or a blog post and make decisions as to what to include, what to
delete, and what to substitue in order to summarize.
Issuu - One of the most popular and successful online digital magazine creators/publishers around, with a very nice user interface.
Yudu
- Upload a document or PDF to create an online magazine that can be emailed our or embedded into a site.
Openzine - Very user friendly site with an abundance of templates and layouts to create a professional-looking magazine and share online.
Scribd - A very popular Web 2.0 site for creating online content and publishing.
Zinepal - A great way to bring the news to students by "clipping" online articles. This is a wonderful site for those making the move to ebook readers.
Paper.li - A fantastic site to turn Twitter into an online readable magazine. 9. Guzzle.it - Is a news aggregator that puts online news in one customizable place. 10. Crayon - Create a professional-looking newspaper with this nice online creator. There are several options to choose from, so it has a bit of a higher learning curve.
Guzzle.it - Is a news aggregator that puts online news in one customizable place.
Newsvine News source for students. It’s a clean and friendly social news site containing articles from the Associated Press, ESPN, and New Scientist as well as user contributions. Students can browse the site comfortably, rate news articles, participate in article discussion, and even start their own news column where they can write and publish articles.
My Brochure Maker Design brochures and flyers by selecting themes and templates, editing the text, adding your own images, and printing.
Books
Create Book Trailers Samples | How to
Top 10 Tools to Create digital books http://www.techlearning.com/article/28822
Shmoop High school guides to literature. A plethora of guides to books. Each guide also includes a "Why should I care?" section http://www.shmoop.com
Embedit - The document sharing and embedding application, Embedit.in, makes uploading a document and embedding it on a classroom blog or web site exceedingly easy. Can create thumbnails to click on to access documents. http://embedit.in/
Wittie collaborative wiki books free tool http://www.wittieproject.org/wiki/Main_Page
StoryJumper http://www.storyjumper.com/ Simple online book publishing or read other's stories.
ZooBurst Create 3D pop-up books free http://www.zooburst.com
Create a Book
Create an electronic book that can also be printed. http://bookbuilder.cast.org/
My Storymaker
http://www.carnegielibrary.org/kids/mystorymaker
Create storybooks with animated characters
Blurb A service that helps you to create, publish, and purchase your own custom book. You can create a cookbook, a photobook, or even turn your blog into a book. You have to download “booksmart”, which is the software that helps you to make a book. http://www.blurb.com/
Big Universe
Students can create their own picture books with just a few
clicks. Or if you want, you can read countless other books written by
students. The professional illustrations and layout options offer the
ultimate in publishing of students' writing. Watch the Tips and Tricks
tutorial to see how the features work. Due to the minor advertising,
blogs, and internet retailing, teachers should monitor students closely
or use this website as a whole-class activity. http://www.biguniverse.com/
Essay and Thesis
Thesis Builder
An online tool for developing persuasive essays. http://tommarch.com/electraguide/
Essay Prompts Numerous essay prompts for high school classes and college admission practice http://www.eduers.com/University/College_Admission_Essay_Topics.html
Essay Map
Online graphic organizer for 3 paragraph essay http://www.readwritethink.org/materials/essaymap/
Quotes.Net Source for quotes http://www.quotes.net
PowerPoint Presentations on Student Research
Topics include: Building Better Research, Collaboration, Plagerism and Putting the Pieces Together. http://ed.sc.gov/agency/offices/tech/ms/lms/page1360.html
Research Paper Organizer
Interactive guide to planning, researching, and writing a research paper. http://library.sasaustin.org/sasaustin/library/paperOrganizerUS.php
NoteStar
NoteStar is an Internet utility to assist in the
preparation of research papers. Teachers and students can set up
research projects with topics and sub-topics. Students may then take
advantage of NoteStar's many features to collect and organize their
notes and prepare their bibliography page. http://notestar.4teachers.org/
Think Tank Think Tank is designed to help students develop a Research Organizer (a list of topics and subtopics) for reports and projects. Based on the subject assigned, the students can refine it by choosing from a variety of suggestions and by using a random subtopic generator. This helps students learn how to refine a subject so that it is more manageable for Internet research.
PersuadeStar
This free online application is designed to help students in grades 5-12 write an online persuasive essay. http://persuadestar.4teachers.org
- Analysis of example essays
- An essay planning tool
- An essay writing space
- Student spelling feedback
- Source and bibliography information
- Records of how many times a student used the available options
Think Tank
Think Tank is designed to help students develop a Research Organizer
(a list of topics and subtopics) for reports and projects. Based on the
subject assigned, the students can refine it by choosing from a variety
of suggestions and by using a random subtopic generator. This helps
students learn how to refine a subject so that it is more manageable for Internet research. http://thinktank.4teachers.org/
Checklist of Focus Correction Areas
Create your own checklist. Choose from a menu or correction areas or create your own. http://pblchecklist.4teachers.org/
Thesis Generator http://mciu.org/%7Espjvweb/thesisgenerator.html
A+ Research and Writing A step-by-step guide for research and writing "help site" for high school students. http://www.ipl.org/div/aplus/
Editing
Guide to Grammar and Writing Suggestions, examples, quizzes, and links to help the writing process . http://grammar.ccc.commnet.edu/grammar/
Every-Day Edit
Use Every-Day Edits to build language skills, test scores, and cultural literacy with students in grades 4 and above.
http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/archives/edit.shtml
Teaching Effective Peer-Editing Strategies
In this lesson, students use a three-step peer-editing process that consists of compliments, suggestions, and corrections.
http://www.readwritethink.org/lessons/lesson_view.asp?id=786
Write On: Editing Activities
Develop the structural and creative skills necessary to produce
written language that can be read and interpreted by various audiences. http://208.183.128.3/write/editing.html
The Goofs
Features an extensive collectrion of online and downloadable editing activities.
http://jc-schools.net/write/goofs/
Glencoe Online: Proofreading Practice
Practice correcting passages online for spelling, punctuation, capitalization, and usage.
Grades 6-8:
http://www.glencoe.com/sec/writerschoice/pp/mslessons/grade6/index.shtml
Grades 9-12:
http://www.glencoe.com/sec/writerschoice/pp/hslessons/grade9/index.shtml
Proofreading & Editing Tips
A compilation of advice from experienced proofreaders and editors.
http://www.lrcom.com/tips/proofreading_editing.htm
Math Tools
Talking calculator tool for
students with learning disabilities! Students with learning disabilities
often need more modes addressed - seeing and hearing is a great start
and that's just what the talking calculator does. Best of all it's
free! Download it to your computer Video