Starfall

Catherine Gonzalez

ED638-41

January 2, 2019

Effective Literacy Exploration #4

Starfall is a website for children who teach them the basic reading and writing skills. This website is catered to preschoolers, kindergarteners, and 1^st graders. Browsing through the website I found a parent-teacher center with supplemental resources and games for students to use as a reinforcement.

The student’s website allows students to learn in an environment of imagination and play. Students have a variety of games to choose from while on the main page. It is very interactive and animated. Students will be able to learn about their alphabets, learn how to read, phonics, and have fun while reading. Not only does this website touch on the reading skills but also the basic writing skills. Students will be able to form sentences and be able to write different types of writing such as writing letters to people. The parent-teacher center website is available for everyone. It provides worksheets, curriculum downloads, informative guides, and the latest Starfall news. The website meets and exceeds state and Common Core standards ensuring students will be ready for the next grade level.

Website: http://more.starfall.com/?

Whooo's Reading

Catherine Gonzalez

ED638-41

12/27/2018

Whooo's Reading

            Whooo’s Reading is reading accountability without multiple choice. It is a higher-level thinking alternative to multiple choice. This website can get your students writing about stories that they’ve read. 

            For teachers, there are 3 main benefits. Main benefit for this website is that you do not need to rely on the multiple choice to know whether the students are reading. Second benefit is accountability. Hold you students accountable with higher-level thinking quizzes. Third benefit is that you can receive automatic scores on written responses. 

            For students, there are also benefits for them. The first benefit is that it gives students 100% positive reinforcement for reading and writing. Second benefit is that it helps students think critically instead of asking multiple choice questions. Third benefit for students is that students will be able to converse with their peers about the books they’ve read on this website. Students have over 450,000 different texts to choose from. They are able to choose anything that interests them to read. When students read and write about their reading, they earn “Wisdom Coins” to create their Owlvatars.

            The activities are easy to differentiate to the needs of each student and are very engaging for students to use. The writing portion which tests the students provides students with a graphic organizer to structure their thoughts and will lead them to explanatory or persuasive writing. Teachers can use this also to gauge their students writing ability.

ABCYa

Catherine Gonzalez 

ED638-41

December 24, 2018

ABCYa

            ABCYa is a free educational game for students that is organized by grade level and subject area. Students are able to play games and use their motor skills without being aware that they are reviewing their skills that they have learned into a game. All games are spread out evenly throughout the grade levels. The games that are in each grade level are appropriately grouped according to subject. 

            As I was browsing through some of the games, they are very engaging activities for all learners. Not only are these students reviewing skills on Reading and Math, but they are also learning how to be a good digital citizen and learning the basic functions on how to operate a computer or laptop. Also, another great thing that is useful for teachers is that the games are aligned with a wide variety of Common Core State Standards. 

             The website is very catchy and very colorful for school aged children. To access the games, you do not need to have a log in information.  It is easy to navigate through all the different grade levels. There is a section on videos and these videos are “How To…” for students to do either at home or at school. 

            As teachers we are constantly collecting data on our students, with this website it does not collect information. A recommendation is to use this website as a reinforcement or an incentive for students when finished with their work.

Learning A-Z

Catherine Gonzalez

ED638-41

Learning A-Z delivers resources designed to meet the unique needs of every PreK-6 student. This website helps you differentiate instruction to have each student succeed in the classroom. Learning A-Z is focused on 3 content areas – Reading, Writing, and Science. 

As a teacher, we want to find websites that we can easily align lessons or resources to standards. Teachers are able to use this website to find the right resources for their students to align with their instruction or assessments. This website offers many benefits to offer for all kinds of students. Learning A-Z has sub-websites that focus on certain areas. They have Raz-Plus, Reading A-Z, Raz-Kids, Headsprout, Science A-Z, Writing A-Z, Vocabulary A-Z, and Ready Test A-Z. One of the sub-websites that caught my attention was Reading A-Z. 

Reading A-Z offers over 5,000 leveled books for all students. It touches on Foundation Skills, Key Reading Skills, and Benchmark Assessments. Teachers are able to control the settings for their students and be able to assign books to certain students at a certain reading level. 

Website Link: https://www.readinga-z.com

TeacherTube

TeacherTube

         TeacherTube is similar to YouTube the only difference is that this website is designed for professionals in the 
education field.  It allows educators to share resources such as videos, audios, documents, photos, and blogs for other educators to browse through.
         On the main page, it has sub tabs that educators can click on such videos, audios, documents, groups, playlists, channels, collections, on-demannd, and a tab that shows educators who are new to the site a virtual tour - "Get Started!"
          As you further scroll down on the main page, viewers are able to see that videos are broken off into categories by the topic. The categories consist of math, science, history, teachers, parents, and students.
As a viewer, when you click on the tab that is labeled Videos it will direct you to the site. Viewers can customize the videos that they want to view by the subject. I am a Special Education teacher so the subject that I wanted to view videos that are in my field of teaching. Many videos popped up on how to teach students on sequencing. With the Audio tab I customized to the field of Special Education. The audios have a range of topics within the field of Special Education. The videos that are posted are engaging and teachers can get updated and new videos every week in their email.

This site offers educators in the field a range of information, videos, and audios for them to use throughout their career and can use this as a reference or a guide. 

Main Page of TeacherTube

Glogster

              GLOGSTER

Glogster is a multimedia interactive poster. It is almost like Google and you can find everything all on one page. It is a website that allows users such as educators and students to create an interactive, Web-based poster called blogs on a virtual canvas. 
                This allows students or teachers to express their ideas with ease by combining images, text, graphics, audios, and videos all on one canvas. You can customize information to the topic. Glogster library is constantly growing from classrooms around the world. Not only can you obtain information on topic you can make notes in your lectures, present a project in meetings, and share your experience while on a field trip. 

Example of an interactive poster

Students are able to access this website through a mobile application. With the introduction of this application on any Apple device, it is simpler and useful for students to work on their posters at home or in the classroom. Glogster brings teachers and students ideas to life with touch of their fingertips.
Glogster has some packages that teachers or parents can purchase for their students and themselves. With these packages, you will have access to Glogpedia, iPad App, 3D & Premium Content, and the Helpdesk.