RE 5533 discussion

Do you use online texts much for self-selected reading or read-alouds in your class? Recommend them to parents? How do your students like them? What do you (dis)like about such sites?

I do use online texts very frequently for SRR. I have found that it motivates students as well because they love to use technology. My school purchased the program Raz-kids. Raz-Kids allows students to read text that is at their level. They also earn points for reading books, listening to books and taking comprehension quizzes. In using those points they can create a raz rocket. Over time the students add details to their rocket using the points they have earned. I also allow my students to read on the iPad and Kindle. I have downloaded children's books to the two devices. The students are constantly asking if they can read on the tablets. I do recommend online reading at home because I think it motivates the students to read. Also, a lot of my students do not have good literature at home. I think if they visit websites that are recommended by teachers then they can engage in good literature at home for their nightly reading. There are only a few dislikes I have because I am unable to hear students errors and such when they are reading independently. The quizzes on Raz-Kids also gives you correct answers to the quiz and lets you take it again. I found that many of my students would just click through the book, take the quiz to get the correct answers then retake it again. Therefore, they could earn points faster. I informed them that I monitored their progress online and could keep track of how often they read a book before taking a quiz. I don't use online text for read aloud during my read aloud time. During SSR, my students do visit Storyline Online that is read alouds done by Screen Actors.

I do not use online texts as much as I could. I usually use my computers to record students reading for them to listen to it so it doesn't leave them open for online texts. I do recommend them to parents! I often tell them that it can help with their fluency and it's great to read along with. I like that a lot of them you can follow along with the words on the screen (Like captions on a TV). When the words flash on the screen it almost forces them to read with the reader. Students also love reading with them, this motivates them to read more also.

I do not use online texts to read to my students (mainly because I dont have any). However I would use them in the classroom if the material was available. I use online texts to read personally but only if they are free. Currently I am reading The Swiss Family Robinson on my android. I would recommend using such programs to parents who have the material available. I not only believe this would inspire students to read digitially but would also help the parents understand the technological advances students are enjoying. I would have to warn them about the costs of books, programs and activities while also helping them understand that links can still "pop-up" while texts are loading.

I do not use online texts in a whole group as much as I could. Usually when they are used it's during SSR time or station time since I only have 2 computers in my room. I do encourage students to read online text at home with their parents. Many of my students have a Kindle or an iPad and they are allowed to use those during reading time which I feel really motivates a lot of them.

Okay. I just had a revelation. You could actually do a read aloud with a Kindle. Why had a I never considered that?

Anyway, as you all know, I don't have a classroom yet, so I haven't gotten to try things with students much. The students I have worked with did not usually use online texts. We did use Kindles in the Reading Clinic with the students in the Kindle club group, and that's a brilliant program. I love the feature of Kindles that lets you share messages about the text.

In public schools, however, we usually use paper texts. I am not sure if this is a funding issue, or if the K-5 resource room I interned in simply didn't have these types of technologies.

I could see parents liking the technology. I would recommend online texts to them--especially those on websites (that don't require an e-reader).

There's very little I dislike about online texts except they aren't always practical. However, they are becoming more and more common in the classroom.

I don't use online texts all that frequently in my classroom. I do use poets.org during my poetry unit for students to look up poems and poets they might be interested in. When we explore the poets on the website, I let students self select poets and poems they are interested in.
Part of the reason, I haven't used online frequently in my classroom is because my students aren't crazy about them. There aren't a lot of good websites for high school level texts. While we have used Project Gutenberg to read some parts of works or short stories, my students have expressed that they enjoy reading hardcopies of the stories much better. I would like to explore more and see what other potential online texts I could use with my students outside of looking up articles and poems.
I have had students use youtube as a version of read aloud. Several classic books have been recorded and are on youtube for my students to listen to. For example, there is a reading of Night by Elie Wiesel.
While I do read aloud to my students, so they can hear how the text sounds, I don't think read alouds are as much of the high school classroom climate as in elementary grades. I do know that my students always enjoy it though when I read aloud to them. I don't think that ever leaves people. I still like being read aloud to myself.

I use them quite a bit. In the classroom I use many Internet Resources for Science and Social Studies. I pull text up from National Geographic kids all the time. I usually read and have students help me with the words I "don't" know. It keeps the students on task. I do put things on my website for the parents. I had one parents come up to me last year and tell me her daughter wanted to get on my Internet Workshop pages everyday, as soon as school was over. I use more Internet resources, than online books though. We do have an account for A-Z and occasionally I will pull up those texts. It is nice because they project on the screen and there are tools to highlight certain words and examples I want to point out. The only thing I am not a huge fan of, is how boring a lot of the illustrations are. Students like colorful things, and many of these texts have black and white illustrations.

Morgan wrote: "I use them quite a bit. In the classroom I use many Internet Resources for Science and Social Studies. I pull text up from National Geographic kids all the time. I usually read and have students..."

Morgan, There are a lot of boring illustrations for read aloud books. There are also a lot of read alouds that do not have fantastic voices. There are times when I have to turn it off because it sounds boring to me.

I use online text all the time to supplement the text. The reason I use so much online text is because I like to connect what I am teaching to something that is going on in the world currently. I want my students to see relevance: connections, connections, connections.

Paige wrote: "Okay. I just had a revelation. You could actually do a read aloud with a Kindle. Why had a I never considered that?

Anyway, as you all know, I don't have a classroom yet, so I haven't gotten to tr..."

I never thought about that either. Thank you for the revelation. I read fifty shade of gray on my moms kindle while on vacation. She said it was affordable. may that is something a grant could be written for.

I use online texts to read to my students whole group. I have several books, such as The Great Kapok Tree and The Polar Express, that have found on YouTube. I have also used Storyline Online. Both of these sites have celebrities read to the students as well. This is a wonderful tool and the students listen attentively. I would like to broaden my knowledge of these types of sites. Parents enjoy knowing about these sites, if they have a computer or iPad at home. I always suggest them and will post them on my webpage.
The only dislike I have found is that there is not a wide variety of "free" read alouds and sometimes it is hard to see the illustrations when someone is holding the book.

Morgan wrote: "I use them quite a bit. In the classroom I use many Internet Resources for Science and Social Studies. I pull text up from National Geographic kids all the time. I usually read and have students..."

I didn't realize National Geographic had a selection of read aloud books. I will look into that. Thank you!

I have not done as many read aloud books online as I should. I think that this year, after reading all of these articles and seeing these great websites! I really like wegivebooks.com this really gives the students a chance to read along and see the pictures at the same time. We also have a subscription to tumblebooks.com, I do use that whole group but not as much with small groups. I think that next year I am going to also send home these websites for the parents to use so the kids can get on and read books online :) What I like about them is it is clear voice that reads the words correctly to the students so they can hear fluent reading!

Marcia wrote: "I do not use online texts to read to my students (mainly because I dont have any). However I would use them in the classroom if the material was available. I use online texts to read personally but..."

Marcia, you know that you can use websites like wegivebooks.com this was a website Dr. K recommended!

Breanna wrote: "Morgan wrote: "I use them quite a bit. In the classroom I use many Internet Resources for Science and Social Studies. I pull text up from National Geographic kids all the time. I usually read an..."

If you have tumblebooks find any book by Robert Munsch. You will NOT be bored!!!!

I use online books for workshop time for my students that need help with fluency, however; most of my kids probably need this. They really enjoy watching them online and they LOVE the Robert Munsch books, like Natalie, said. I love all of the websites that Dr. Koppenhaver gave us and will certainly put them in my list of websites for my students to listen to. I like the books better when they have the words with them where the students can follow along. We have class sets of laptops so those are beneficial to use when reading stories online so every students gets a chance.

Robyn wrote: "I don't use online texts all that frequently in my classroom. I do use poets.org during my poetry unit for students to look up poems and poets they might be interested in. When we explore the poe..."
I love that you still read to your students. That is so important and I do think that all of us still enjoy being read to! It is still important for them to hear that story structure, fluency and new vocabulary.

I recommend audio books all the time to parents and I welcome eBooks and eReaders in my room. I knew of a few sites that had free eBooks (like We Give Books which I actually use with my son too!) and then A to Z Reading which has on-line readers. Our Basal (which I admittedly don't use) has all of its leveled readers online but I haven't used them widely in the classroom. On our school iPads we have the Storia App from Scholastic where I can make a book shelf for each of my students and put digital books on it (which Storia will read aloud) it is just that the ebooks are expensive so I do not have a large enough number of books for the students in my classroom. Most of the sites linked I had never heard of before. I definitely think this is an area that I will need to improve upon next year!

Rebecca wrote: "Morgan wrote: "I use them quite a bit. In the classroom I use many Internet Resources for Science and Social Studies. I pull text up from National Geographic kids all the time. I usually read an..."

Hey girl, It's not actually books its magazine I tweeted the link but here it is again...It is actually really awesome and usually goes right along with Science and Social Studies curriculum...I can't find a place for older students, but here is the link to what I have. http://ngexplorer.cengage.com/ngyoung...