"The Solution to Reading Comprehension"

There is a buzz going around about this fantastic website..........readworks.org 

LESSONS & UNITS

About the Lessons & Units

What if I already use a core reading program?

• ReadWorks complements core reading programs. In fact, we’re aligning many of the programs for you.
  
• Most reading programs Do NOT address the specific needs of teachers and students in reading comprehension.

Is ReadWorks all I need?

• Reading comprehension requires decoding and phonics mastery, fluency, independent reading, and the building of vocabulary and background knowledge across all subjects, so ReadWorks is one essential component of your complete literacy program.
   
• ReadWorks lessons support vocabulary and background knowledge development.

This is phenomenal, clean, simple, user-friendly, SLP-friendly (whooohooo!) resource gold mine. This website provides FREE READING PASSAGES that are organized by Grade Level, Skill/Strategy, Lexile Level and then you can search by keyword. 

The website also allows you to ALIGN YOUR LESSON PLANS WITH COMMON CORE STANDARDS!  This can be done once you've created an account and designated which grade levels you work with.  You can put it into an Excel doc, a Word doc, or print it. 

I downloaded 15 lessons already and at least 10 different passages. The passages can be filtered alphabetically, by grade level, lexile level, or by skill/strategy level. 

IT'S FREE and very very good for those of us who need new passages or like to mix things up. 

On the left hand side there are links for LESSON PLANS 

Each lesson plan has extensive resources, worksheet, passages, and step-by-step instructions. Who said we ever needed to create everything from scratch? With a resource like www.readworks.org, we don't have to!

What will you do with this resource?

The Boy and the Ghost

I typically don't like to scare children or teach them to talk about scary stories...however, I found this great southern folklore tale about a brave little boy named Thomas who wanted to help feed his poor family and conquered his fears by meeting a ghost who shared all of his wealth to him and his family thanks to Thomas's bravery and courage.

The story has beautiful imagery

"He set out the next morning. His mother hugged him and gave him a pot and a hambone to make soup and said, "Now, you always be polite to anyone you meet, and generous as well." Then his father embraced the boy, gave him a box of matches and a croaker-sack to carry things in, and told Thomas, "Be brave, no matter what happens, and always be honest."

and a great lesson about bravery, putting others first, and keeping your mind and heart set on what will benefit your family

You can find the questions that I used for this story on the download page or you can click here.

I hope your library carries this book so that you can do this lesson before the month ends. It's a wonderful book that addresses socioeconomic struggle, providing for the family, being brave at a young age, giving to the poor, and the universal theme of money and comfort.

What else will you do with this story?



App Review: "STORY BUILDER" by Mobile Education Store

Kyle over at Mobile Education Store was so gracious to let us review his Story Builder app and give one away!!!  I'm sure you'll join me in saying Thank You for your generosity!!

So, without further delay, this is what WE love about Story Builder

• Students can generate their own stories and are not bound to a set of predetermined answers

• Therapists/parents can choose to skip pictures that may be too abstract for the student/child
• Student record their own voice and can replay the entire story to hear for themselves; which means you can work on things like intonation, voice and fluency while hitting those CCSS!

• Stories can be saved!!
• 3 Levels of play allow you, the therapist/parent, to determine how easy/hard you want the task to be
• Level 1: questions will be asked regarding each picture
• Level 2: questions are asked and the student will need to make inferences about the events in each picture
• Level 3: the student can make up any story he/she wishes

• This app can be used to address articulation, vocabulary, increasing mean length of utterance, syntax, morphology, voice and fluency!

So who would like to have a FREE Story Builder App???  Here's your chance . . . sign up below and good luck!!

Check out Kyle's site at Mobile Education Store today!


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