FREE Literacy Tools - Immersive Environments

Free Literacy Tools - Immersive Environments

This is the third in a series of posts on Free Literacy Tools.  To see another literacy post click here.

Immersive Environments

These literacy programs try to capture student interest and engagement by creating worlds students are immersed into as characters in a story.  Although the concept of the learning is made more interesting, I have found the activities to be rigorous and lead to new learning.

classroominc.org

Classroominc offers 2 immersive work environments for students to practice reading and writing skills. One is a magazine office reporting on the aftermath of a recent storm. The other is a community center reaching out to help after the storm. Students navigate through a series of challenges making decisions to best serve the public. There are reading skill activities and writing assignments embedded in the program.

Grade Levels:

Middle School (5th to 8th grade)

Type of Texts:

Fiction and Nonfiction passages within the immersive environment.

Differentiation:

From the Website: "Our learning games include differentiated activities for a range of learners. Students who perform below a certain threshold on a primary assessed task are invisibly routed to one or more levels of scaffolded reading activities. Students who perform above that threshold pass on to more complex and challenging reading activities." 

Teacher Use:

After familiarizing students with the format, the game allows students to be independently productive.  Teachers can turn on and off specific assignment types to meet learner needs. Teachers can check many pieces of data on progress reports and decide which students may need some small group instruction on a skill. There are even pre-designed small/whole group skill lessons with step by step instructions for implementing.

closereading.amplify.com

Amplify Reading is a close reading graphic novel experience. Students start by creating an avatar and following it on its journey to save the world.

Grade Levels:

 Grades 5-8

Type of Texts:

From the website: Targeted concepts are organized into two distinct threads: informational and literary. Lessons on informational texts focus on the structure and types of argumentation. Lessons on literary texts focus on word choice and narrative structure, along with other advanced topics that emerge in later lessons.

Differentiation:

The texts can be read aloud by the computer. From the Website: Teachers will soon be able to assign students to one of four unique tracks of instruction: language learner, Spanish, grade-level, and advanced.

Teacher Use:  

Teacherscan monitor progress through progress reports showing how students are doing on the skills within the program.

FREE Literacy Tools - Reading Comprehension and Critical Thinking

This is the second in a series of posts about my favorite FREE online literacy tools.  You can see the first post here.

FREE Reading Comprehension and Critical Thinking Sites

commonlit.org

From site: "Commonlit.org is a website that desires to have great texts and great questions for students aligned to common core standards."  All texts are premade with 3 types of questions:  Guided Reading (not graded and have to be answered for the remainder of text to be revealed), Assessment (graded), and Discussion.  The data generated for students is amazing for a free site.

Grade Levels:

Grades 5 through 12

Type of Texts:

Mostly literary texts, but there are many nonfiction pieces that would be applicable to social studies curriculum (and a few science).  The search feature is amazing, allowing you to search several criteria at once: genre, grade level, theme, literary device, common core standard.  There is also a search feature for entering a novel you are studying and getting recommended texts related to that novel. Teachers can choose and assign texts to classes.

Annotation Features: 

Students can highlight while reading, but can not make notes.  Teachers could assign students to highlight text evidence as part of the assignment.

Differentiation:

Putting students in different classes allows differentiation of text assignments.  Students can adjust the font size to their preference, texts can be translated to Spanish, there is dictionary access embedded on the site, and CommonLit has an embedded text to speech feature.

Teacher Use:

Great for a blended learning environment, or to have something students can do fairly independently while you meet with students in a larger group.  It is also perfect for sub plans that are as rigorous as possible when teachers have to be absent.  Teachers do not have the option to add their own questions and notes.  Students get join code in order to enter your class.

readtheory.org

Read Theory is by far the most effective program I have found in over 25 years of teaching for increasing critical thinking skills, giving students confidence and ownership, and helping students prepare for standardized reading tests. From the website:  "Read Theory's adaptive approach fosters improvement by automatically meeting learners at their own, individual ability levels." Read theory is programmed to give students more difficult texts when they score 90-100 on quizzes, keep the text level the same when they score 70-89, and lower the text level when they score below 70.  Students and teachers can see data immediately. AND IT IS FREE

Grade Levels: 

Grades 3 through adult

Type of Texts:

Fiction and nonfiction texts. From the website, "The passages you'll see on ReadTheory are all hand crafted originals that have been written, refined, and tested by the members of our team. The ReadTheory team consists of a handful of professional writers and educators, many of whom have received advanced degrees, are published authors and award winning teachers." Texts are assigned by Readtheory based on pre-test and practice data from students; teachers can not assign texts.

Annotation Features:

There are no annotation features.

Differentiation:

Students can adjust font size and use an extension, SpeakIt for example, to have the text read aloud to them. Read Theory automatically differentiates and adjusts text levels for students based on individual performance.

Teacher Use:

Teachers can allow time for stories to be worked on in class or as homework. I require my students to pass 5 stories a week (70 or higher) for a grade.  They get 5 points (out of a possible 25) for each passing score each week.  We meet to discuss data weekly so that students are realizing what they need to work on and keep themselves motivated.  They love watching their scores rise.

readworks.org

Grade Levels:

From the website: "The largest, highest-quality library of award-winning nonfiction and literary articles, carefully curated to support reading comprehension." This site is amazing in what it provides for FREE.

Type of Texts:

Printable and digital fiction and nonfiction passages for grades K-12 with literary, science, and history categories.  There are questions for each text, and the program auto grades the multiple choice.  There are easy tools for teachers to use to grade short answer questions and leave feedback for the student.

Annotation Features:

Highlighting and digital note taking are available for students, as well as audio for each text.

Differentiation:

Articles can be assigned to whole classes or specific students.  Features for articles may also be assigned to whole class or specific students (audio, extra questions, vocabulary help, etc.) 

Teacher Use:

The wealth of texts makes it easy to find something related to topics of study for students to read.  Being able to assign different texts to students certainly makes it easy for teachers to differentiate to students needs.  Content area teachers can assign texts easily as well. Another great tool for the blended learning environment

Explore one or more of these amazing tools, and see how they can help you meet your students' literacy instruction needs.

Subscribe to this blog to be informed of two other upcoming posts:  FREE Literacy Tools - Reading Comprehension and Critical Thinking     and      FREE Literacy Tools - Immersive Environments!

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FREE Literacy Tools - Online Annotated Texts

I love finding online quality programs that can make things better for my students and myself. Below are two free tools I use for teaching students how to annotate texts effectively and get the deep meaning out of texts.

FREE Online Annotated Text Sites

owleyes.org

 According to their website, " Owl Eyes is an improved reading and annotating experience for classrooms, book clubs, and literature lovers.  Find full texts with expert analysis in our extensive library."

Grade Levels:  

Middle School and up

Type of Texts: 

 Mostly literary classical texts in the following categories:  fiction, nonfiction, drama, poetry, Shakespeare, Short Fiction, Young Adult

Annotation Features: 

Already included annotations on many texts as well as add your own annotations.  Highlights, Notes, Questions (only multiple choice).

Differentiation: 

Students can adjust settings for font style, font size, background/text color, and spacing of lines and columns to their comfort levels.  By creating different classes, you could assign different questions/annotations for different groups of students. Speak It Chrome extension will read difficult words or entire passages aloud for students.

Teacher Use:  

You can add classes and assign texts, but it doesn't appear there is a grading or data feature.  OwlEyes does have some good training documents via some pre-made texts you can read and the FAQ section of their website.  I find this site good for teaching students how to annotate effectively.

Image of text with highlights where annotations have been added.

Image of text with highlight (green) clicked on to show annotation

activelylearn.com

Actively Learn is my favorite online annotated text platform! The front page of their website says, "The human brain is wired to avoid thinking deeply. Our online literacy platform helps teachers activate, support, and reveal thinking for every student."  One of the things I love most about Actively Learn is that students can not continue on in a text until they respond to questions that are embedded along the way.  They can even see other student responses and have a chance to change their thinking if you code an annotation that way.  It is truly a collaborative thinking platform.

Grade Levels:

Upper Elementary through adult - even some professional development

Type of Texts:

ELA/Humanities (novels, short stories, drama, poetry, nonfiction) Current Events, Social Studies, Science, Knowledge Sets (sets of related texts).  The majority of texts are free to use, some can be rented ($.50-1.99 per student for 3-month time frame).  Teachers can also import texts not already in Actively Learn (3 per month limit with free version) 

Annotation Features:

Use already made annotations, or create your own and have students create their own.  Insert questions (multiple choice, poll, short answer), notes, links, and white out text portions.

Differentiation:

Teachers can add students to different classes to give differentiated text assignments.  There is a differentiation embedded feature on premium team and school plans. Speak It Chrome extension will read difficult words or entire passages aloud for students. Students can highlight difficult words and get definitions for them. Font type, size, line spacing, background color, can all be selected by the student.  There is also an option to turn on paragraph numbering as well as a dyslexic setting (proven font that is easier for individuals with dyslexia to read).

Teacher Use:

Teachers can add questions and annotations of their choice, or use pre-inserted questions if they choose. With the free version, teachers can see all student work and scores (must score short answer on own), but the data you have access to with a paid subscription is obviously more in depth.  Another tool that is helpful from Actively Learn is that teachers can toggle between teacher and student view so they know exactly how their students are viewing assignments.  There are some wonderful training resources for Actively Learn that walk you through how to create annotations and allow you to experience Actively Learn as a student. The trainings help improve a teacher's ability to ask quality questions, insert the right type of annotations, and understand the importance of content knowledge. Integrated with Google Classroom for ease of uploading rosters and assigning lessons.

I have been using the free version for about a year, and I find it to be adequate for one classroom.  If you teach several sections, it would be worth investigating the personal subscription ($18 per month). 

This is teacher view so we can see text below the question. In student view, the text below the question would not appear until after the question is answered.

Image shows expanded view to see the entire annotation when clicked on.

Subscribe to this blog to be informed of two other upcoming posts:  FREE Literacy Tools - Reading Comprehension and Critical Thinking     and      FREE Literacy Tools - Immersive Environments!

Follow me on Twitter @KaraGuiff    Join my Facebook Group:  Secondary Resource Teachers

Google Labs - Hidden Treasures for Calendar and Gmail

While completing my Google Certified Educator Level 2 Certification (You can read about my experience here), I discovered Labs for Google Calendars and Gmail.  Amazing little things.

Basically, Labs are extra features for Calendars and Gmail that are in trial mode - they could disappear at any time, but many of them become permanent features after some trial use.

My Favorite Labs for Google Calendar:

(Find labs by clicking the settings wheel at the top right of a Calendar and then clicking labs. Then enable the labs you find useful.)

World Clock - 

This lab adds a view to the right of your calendar which shows the current time in several time zones.  By clicking settings on this view, you can add/delete time zones you prefer to see.  I absolutely LOVE this - saves me so much time when signing up for and participating in webinars, meetings, Google Hangouts, Twitter Chats, etc. from different time zones.

                                                                                           

Jump To -

This lab adds a view with a button so you can jump to whatever date you desire.  Simply filling the date needed on the chart and click the "Jump to date" button.  Magic!

                 

My favorite Lab for Gmail:

(Find labs for Gmail by going into the settings and then choosing the Labs tab.  Then enable whichever labs you find useful.)

Canned Response -

This lab allows you to create a "canned" response for email so that you don't have to repeatedly type the same response over and over.  For instance, say you are asking for people interested in serving on a committee for a Listserv Check.  You can create something like, "Thank you for volunteering to serve, we will be notifying people the end of July if they have been chosen for the committee."  That way, whenever someone emails to volunteer, you can put the "canned response".  You can even adjust the settings in canned response to look for email with the words "Listserve check" in the subject and it can automatically send that reply.  After enabling the canned response lab, you can click on the bottom right arrow of an email to either create a new canned response or use an already created response to fill the text of the email with.  Amazing!

There are many more labs available, so check them out and see how you can use them to improve your experiences with Google Calendar and Gmail.