Accelerated Reader

While reading the article, Stories about Struggling Readers and Technology by Rebecca Anderson and Ernest Balajthy, I found one of the stories particularly interesting. The story discussed how many teachers tend to treat technology as almost having, “magical effects on children,” (Anderson & Balajthy, 2007, pg. 541). The article specifically discussed how a community literacy program was using Accelerated Reader as their main literacy activity. Although some students may enjoy Accelerated Reader initially, this program should not be used in isolation. The article discussed how a literacy coach worked with the volunteers at the center to show how the AR books could be used to guide other literacy activities such as discussion groups.
I think this article proves that it is important for teachers to really research the technology programs they use with their students and examine their overall objectives for using the programs. It is also important that teachers do not simply use programs like Accelerated Reader alone to gain information about a students reading progress or reading level. I personally believe that Accelerated Reader can be a great program if it is used together with other literacy activities. While student teaching, the first graders in my class really enjoyed selecting their own “AR” books and getting a chance to go on the computers and demonstrate what they remembered from reading. There were incentives such as points and prizes that did motivate some students in the class to read a new book each and every night. I have also seen where the program was negative. It is easy for the teacher to use Accelerated Reader as the only basis for having a student pick a new book to read. In this case, students will begin to rely on “prizes or incentives” for reading. If teachers really want their students to enjoy reading, they must also show how reading can be enjoyable without winning a prize or getting Accelerated Reading points. Some students may also relate reading to answering multiple choice questions, if this is the main activity being used in a language arts classroom.

Anderson, R. & Balajthy, E. (2009). Stories about struggling readers and technology. The Reading Teacher, 62(6), pp. 540-542.

Authoring with Video

After reading the article, Authoring with Video found in The Reading Teacher, I loved the idea of using AWV (Authoring with Video) in order to help motivate students in writing. I have used the technique of having students write a story using a wordless picture, but found that this technique to be much more motivating for students who enjoy using technology or creating a video. Students enjoy writing when they know that their audience will include more than just their teacher. Using this technique, students will be able to share their stories in a digital format with classmates, family, and friends. In today’s technology advanced society students of all ages are already regularly viewing short videos on websites such as YouTube or creating and sharing their own digital videos on cameras and cell phones. This format allows students to watch a short digital video with no audio and create a text narrative in response to a writing prompt or task. The students use software that enters their text as a closed caption beneath the video. Additionally this technique is great for getting students to see why detail is important in their writing. When students watch a video and read the caption at the same time they see how their writing may or may not contain enough information about what is happening in the pictures. Teachers can also use their writing process to go along with other content areas or to go along with themes that are doing in the classroom. For example, in social studies class the video could relate to current events or in science could include a video clip about an endangered species or science experiment being performed. Students could even create their own videos and create narrative to go along with a silent video.
Overall I think it activity would be very motivating for students. They definitely would enjoy watching the video clips and creating words to go along with the videos. It also would reinforce reading because students could read their stories to classmates, family, and friends while sharing the completed videos. The class could even complete a story together after shooting a short video of a field trip they went on together. I think this activity would be make writing fun for students of all ages and ability levels. I also think this activity can be incorporated in any given content area; not just language arts/reading.

Strassman, B.K. & O’Connell, T. (2007). Authoring with video. The Reading Teacher. 61(4), pp. 330-333.

Technology Programs/Software for Assessments

An article I recently read in The Reading Teacher provided information about how several different types of computer software can be used in the classroom to help provide assessment information for teachers, parents, and administrators. The article discusses how Pearson Learning provides an online management system for teachers and schools using the DRA. The software allows teachers to input their students’ names and keep an ongoing track of their students’ running record scores (fluency, miscues, and comprehension scores) throughout the course of that students’ elementary school years. The information on each student can easily be generated into individual student reports or a class or school report.
The article also discusses a similar program available called Renaissance Place by Renaissance Learning that can be used to track students’ development throughout their school years. Different from the Pearson Learning product, this management system keeps track of three different levels of assessment information. The first level includes ongoing monitoring of results from Accelerated Reader, the second level has placement testing information from STAR Reading test, and the third level provides input of additional formal assessment information the school has available.
There are also computer scanning software that allows schools to process answer sheets that normally must be sent a central location to be scored. Degrees of Reading Power (DRP) tests, makes it available for teachers and school buildings to generate computer scoring reports. In addition, tests can sometimes be administered on computers. For example, STAR Reading offers CAT (computer adaptive testing). CAT shortens the time needed to take the test and the computer individually administers questions to students. The computer also determines the student’s ability level and if initial questions are answered quickly will move on the more challenging questions. If initial questions are answered incorrectly, the computer moves on to easier questions. This type of administration can save time because it avoids a teacher administering unnecessary questions.
The article also explains that there are many assessments that can be administered through the Internet. Harcourt Assessment publishes the Stanford Diagnostic Reading Test (SDRT) offers a fourth edition that provides the option of administering the test online.
Overall, I think this article provides some suggestions for districts who are deciding upon what types of assessments they would like to use with their students. Unless a school district has enough computers for each student to sit down and take an assessment online, it would be very time consuming to administer an assessment in this manner compared to the traditional paper and pencil method. I do however, feel it is important for schools to have an electronic management program that keeps track of students’ progress and make it easy for administrators to easily produce reports on individual students, grades, classes, or the overall progress of the school building.

Balajthy, E. ( 2007). Technology and current reading/literacy assessment strategies. The Reading Teacher. 61(3), pp. 240-247.

Digital Story Telling!

Digital story telling can be a great addition to the language arts classroom. Students of all ages would most likely enjoy sharing their own stories in a digital format. For students that find traditional story writing boring, the digital format would be much more motivating. Instead of simply writing a short story on a piece of paper, students can see their stories come to life by recording the stories, adding graphics, and music/sound effects. This would definitely make story writing more exciting for students. Digital story telling could be used in the language arts classroom as a way to retell students’ favorite stories in a digital format, or create stories about class field trips or projects. By having students read their own stories during the digital story telling process, students could increase their reading fluency through re-reading a familiar piece of text. Students could also work on comprehension by retelling a favorite children’s book or a book that has been read and discussed several times in class. Digital story telling could also be used as a reader response a activity in which students share their favorite parts of a story, create an alternative ending, write a letter to a character in a story, etc. There are countless possibilities. Digital story telling could even be a great way to begin a school year; having each students share information about themselves, their families, or their favorite part of summer vacation. Overall, I would love to incorporate digital story telling into my own classroom. I think it would be a great way to motivate the reluctant readers and writers in my class.

Incoporating Children's Books & Technology into Writing Workshop Mini Lessons

I found a great article for teachers looking for ways to motivate students in writing. After reading an article I found in The Reading Teacher, I was very happy to learn new resources I could use to help incorporate technology into the language arts curriculum. I have been constantly adding to my list of beneficial websites that I can use in my future educational career and found that this article gave me several new websites that I will surely use with my future students. The article listed several children’s books (for both early and more advanced readers) and then gave technology resources that could be used to teach specific writing skills and strategies during a writing workshop mini lesson for each book. Although I am familiar with writing workshop mini lessons I have never actually performed a writing workshop mini lesson myself. I felt that this article gave me several ideas of how I can incorporate writing and technology with reading and children’s literature. Some technology resources suggested by the article included using Inspiration to allow students to generate and organize their writing ideas before beginning a piece of writing and using the website www.rhymer.com to help students with writing poetry. The website includes a rhyming dictionary which helps students find a word that rhymes with another word. This makes it easy for students to look up words that often are difficult to rhyme with and still choose words that evoke clear images and meaning in their poetry. Another website the article suggests is http://gigglepoetry.com/. This website can be used during a poetry writing mini lesson to help motivate students to read and write poetry. The website allows students to read and perform silly poems and also complete their own silly poems by using fill-in-the-blank poetry forms. The article also suggested resources for teachers, such as browsing through lesson plans on http://www.readwritethink.org/, http://www2.scholastic.com/browse/home.jspnd, and http://www.emints.org/. The article also suggests visiting author’s websites to help students learn more about the authors of the books they are reading. I think this article does a very good job of laying out how technology can be easily integrated with language arts activities. It definitely allows reading to be more interactive, hands-on, and exciting for all different types of learners. By incorporating technology into language arts lessons, it will benefit students no whether they learn best through visual, audio, or kinesthetic materials and activities.

Check out the article for yourself!
Kara-Soteriou, J., Zawilinski, L., & Henry, L.A. (2007). Children’s books and technology in the classroom: A dynamic combo for supporting the writing workshop. The Reading Teacher. 60(7), pp.698-707.

Making Electronic Books to Aid in Comprehension & Fluency

After reading an article found in the Reading Teacher, I learned how e-books or interactive/ electronic story books can be a great way to help increase the comprehension of students of varying reading ability levels in an interactive and motivating manner. Although I recently created an interactive story book in my graduate level technology course, I had not realized at the time how these types of stories can be used to increase reading development in ways other than by simply using the books in a similar format to audio books or books on CD. The article shared how a second grade teacher has her students create e-books or interactive story books to aid in comprehension and fluency. After the students listen to a piece of literature and discuss the book, each student fills out a graphic organizer in which they retell the events that took place in the book. The teacher then types the students’ retellings of the story as accurately as possible without changing the students’ natural language into a slide show program on her computer and also adds digital photographs and clip art. Later, the students are given the chance to record their voices reading their retellings. The slides are then placed together into a class e-book and loaded on to the classroom computers so that students can frequently re-read and/or listen to the class book. Overall, the activity helps aid in students’ comprehension since the activity involves retelling main ideas from a piece of text and also help increase students’ overall reading fluency by having students re-read a familiar text multiple times. In my opinion this is a fantastic way to help motivate the reluctant readers in a classroom because it will be engaging for students who enjoy creating something and also allows students to use the computer. If I was to make e-books in my own future classroom, I would even allow the students to type their own retellings. I am positive that students would enjoy using computers to complete a project like this and it would be a fun way to get students to read and comprehend a piece of literature. I will definitely keep this in mind for my future classroom. I already have a great example to show my future students since I created my own e-book this year. I would love to help my future students create their own e-books based on retellings of books we read and discuss in class. It also will be a great addition to any classroom library!

Read this article too!
Rhodes, J.A., & Milby, T.M. (2007). Teacher-created electronic books: Intergreating technology to support readers with disabilities. The Reading Teacher. 61(3), pp. 255-259.

Blogging in the Classroom???

An article I found in the Reading Teacher entitled, Collaborative Literacy: Blogs and Internet Projects written by Erica Boling, Jill Castek, Lisa Zawilinkski, Karen Barton, and Theresa Nierlich (2008), had some great ideas for how to implement blogging into the elementary classroom. The article discusses how one third grade teacher has her students blog to their classroom friend, Jefferson Bear. Jefferson Bear is a brown teddy bear that the students regularly correspond with on various classroom topics. For example, when Jefferson Bear writes, “What’s being done to help my endangered animal friends? You’ve got to do something. Please! They need your help.” (Boling et. al, 2008). The students will respond to Jefferson Bear using online research that the teacher has provided through specific websites.
In the same way, the article discusses a second teacher who uses blogging with her fourth graders. The fourth grade teacher created a classroom blog for her fourth grade students to have online literature discussions on pieces of text they have read in small groups. She formats the blogging similar to a literature circle in which each student selects and writes about something that stands out in the text and also a question they have after reading the text. More advanced readers from schools more than 100 miles away then respond to the students’ blogs. This particular teacher found that students who typically were reluctant to discuss books they read, were much more willing to participate in literature discussions online.
I thought these were great ways for educators to implement blogging in their own classrooms. These few examples prove how blogs can have several benefits in the classroom. For example, the teachers in the article demonstrate how blogging allows students to use technology in the classroom as a way to communicate with other students, enhance writing skills and critical thinking skills, and even create deeper understanding of pieces of literature. Given that students are already spending lots of time online, I am positive that students would enjoy these types of activities. I also feel these activities would help the students who typically do not look forward to the traditional reading and writing activities. I will definitely keep these ideas in mind for my future teaching!

Integrating the iPod Touch in K-12 Education

I felt the article by Banister, Miller, and Herman (2009) gave many interesting benefits of integrating the use of the iPod touch in kindergarten through twelfth grade classrooms. Before reading this article I would have been very hesitant to consider using iPods in my future classroom. After reading the article however, I was more open to the idea of using this new technology with students in school. Although I’m more open to the idea, I still feel there are both benefits and drawbacks to using this type of technology in a classroom. One of my main reasons for being more open to using iPods is my belief that children would find the idea of using iPods in school extremely engaging. In this way, I feel students would become more motivated in their learning if they were able to do educational activities that involved using an iPod. For example, for a student who extremely dislikes geography, being able to use an iPod to view maps of the earth and zoom into area views of places around the globe (through programs such as “Google maps”), this student would become much more engaged in a learning about maps and directions than through the typical textbook version. In the same way, allowing elementary students to listen to digital audio books on an iPod may help motivate the struggling readers in a classroom to become more interested in books and reading. I also believe that having iPods available to all students would make it much easier for multiple students to have access to the Internet at one time. I know from previous experience working in a classroom that it is very difficult to give every child time at a computer when there are typically four to six computers in a class of twenty-five to thirty students. Overall, I can see where the iPod touch would be a great addition to a classroom learning environment since it takes up little space, but still allows many students access to very engaging education programs found on the Internet.

On the other hand, I can imagine that integrating this type of technology into the classroom can cause problems. As a teacher you would definitely need to enforce rules in regards to using the iPods and stick to those rules. It may be harder to control what students are viewing on the internet or catch students who are viewing sites that you did not intent for them to use; given that the screens are much smaller than a typical computer monitor. As the article pointed out, it also may be hard to find an energy source or time to charge thirty-some iPods. Additionally, supplying this type of technology to all students may not be worth the cost given that many of the activities and programs that can be used on the iPod can already be used through a typical computer program and also can be shown to all students using smart boards or other classroom projectors.

A Great Resource on E-Literature...

Unsworth, L. (2008). Multiliteracies, E-Literature and English Teaching. Language and Education, 22(1), 62-75.

The article Multiliteracies, e-literature and English teaching by Len Unsworth (2008) provides many valuable websites for teachers wanting to integrate technology into their language arts classrooms. The website explains that while print literature has not yet become outdated, the internet has had a great impact on contemporary texts. For example, the article describes how Harry Potter enthusiasts often discuss and respond to the books on fan websites, online chat rooms, and blogs. Although children and adolescents are still reading the book in print, they are constantly learning more about the author and novel itself through the internet.
Unsworth (2008) describes three frameworks to developing classroom work with e-literature and online literary resources. The first frame work is an organizational framework and involves using computer based literary narratives as an extension to contemporary texts. Unsworth provides many websites that educators and students can use as extensions to print versions of text or that provide text in an audio or digital format. The websites I found the most interesting were the “hypermedia narratives" websites in which stories include hyperlinks of both text and images. I think students would find these versions of stories entertaining to both read and follow along.
The second framework that Unsworth (2008) discusses is the interpretive framework. The interpretive framework involves the use of images and new illustrations to go along with popular literature. I agree that educators should educate students to consider how the images in a text create new emotions, attitudes, and feelings for a reader. I also feel that students would enjoy viewing images created specifically for their favorite novels. It is always interesting to see how the images of a text you have read are contrasting to how you would picture a scene or character by reading the text alone.
The third and last framework that Unsworth (2008) explains is the pedagogic framework for e-literature. The pedagogic framework involves using online resources to extend children’s literary experiences by allowing them to discover information about the author, earlier drafts of a favorite novel, characters that have been changed, or even other readers’ reviews or thoughts about a novel. Again, Unsworth provides many helpful websites for educators and students to use.
Overall, I feel that educators need to be aware of what resources are available to them. It is obvious that the students in our classes are already spending countless hours on the internet and would not be upset if some of their homework or course work involved using their favorite websites. It would definitely be motivating and engaging if students were able to use some of the websites or resources they enjoy outside of school for educational purposes. By simply having students visit websites to find information about an author or post their own reviews of a novel they finished reading, it is giving them opportunities to extend upon what they have learned and also providing them with literary activities that are highly engaging.
I will definitely keep this article for future reference because it has some wonderful resources that I can use with my future students!

My Thoughts on No Child Left Behind

Although I do believe that the goal set from No Child Left Behind was made with good intentions, I do not believe that it is a realistic goal. Any educator could argue that it is simply not possible for 100 percent of students to be performing at grade level and attaining state-mandated proficiency standards by 2014. Even with the best teaching materials and scientifically proven instructional methods, not all students will achieve at the same level. Walking into a typical first grade classroom as a student teacher, I found that within this one classroom, the students’ ability levels and background experiences were immensely different. Teaching the same lesson to every student in the class did not result in the same learning for each student. For example, even within the realm of language arts learning, there were students who came from homes in which their parents read with them from the time they were toddlers, where as other students whose parents rarely read with their children at home, even when I assigned this task as a nightly homework assignment. Obviously, there were vast differences in these students reading abilities from the time they entered my first grade classroom. It is easy to “assume” that the classroom teacher can help every student (regardless of their background experiences or home life) successfully master the state standards, but this simply does not happen. Every teacher has had the experience in which they have worked with a student one-on-one (sometimes before or after school) and tried several different teaching approaches, but still could not get the material or skills to “click” for that student. Without support from parents or guardians at home, it also makes it very difficult for teachers to make sure that all students have a home life that supports student learning and helps reinforce classroom learning when the student is at home. In my opinion, the entire goal of NCLB should be revised. I do not feel that teachers can continue to be held accountable for all students’ learning or mastery of state standards. It is especially difficult for schools to continue to be held accountable for at risk students, such as low-income students and English language learners. It simply is not fair that students attending an inner-city school must meet the same standards as students attending a high income community school. Anyone who would walk into these two types of schools would find that the materials and resources that are available are much different. I think that in order for NCLB to even begin to work, it would be necessary to prove that every school had the same resources, materials, and highly-qualified teachers. In my opinion, NCLB’s goal needs to be completely revised. If not revised, in order to increase its effectiveness, each school should be able to make their own yearly goals based on their current level of performance, and NCLB should also take into account the resources that are available at each school.