Though there are hundreds of helpful resources online that encourage greater literacy in pre-school and elementary students, only ten were chosen for this ranking. These tools were selected based on a combination of factors. First and foremost, the tools chosen had to be developed either by a coalition of parents and teachers or by a group of teachers who work with real students on reading and literacy in their professional careers. Online reading programs were also chosen, and ranked, based on their affordability, their appeal to parents of homeschooled children, and their use of fully immersive web technologies that appeal directly to young learners. More immersive and interactive programs, like those with slide shows, videos, and interactive games, rank as some of the best and most productive resources today. This reality is reflected in their placement within the ranking.
Kiz Phonics draws a great deal of its instructional inspiration from programs like Hooked on Phonics, which was one of the first programs to emphasize phonics and phonetics in literacy education. With that being said, the program is also differentiated in several key ways. First and foremost, Kiz Phonics is developed by a 27-member panel of teachers who work daily in reading and language arts education. The program also has the support of several tenured professors of language from around the country.
There is one problem that has almost always stopped homeschoolers and budget-weary parents in their tracks: licensing fees for literacy programs. Many of the most popular literacy programs, even those offered primarily for home use, require steep subscription and licensing fees that can eat into family budgets. This makes it hard to review, or to teach, the most basic literacy and reading comprehension concepts with early learners. Reading Bear was founded to put a stop to this problem. All of its literacy and reading comprehension lessons are completely free for home use, making this tool the best option for parents on a tight budget.
To help you find the perfect program for your child, we have compiled our list of the 14 best reading programs for kids, ranking them based on a variety of factors like affordability, ease of use, and effectiveness.
To ensure that they have a fighting chance when it comes to reading competency, make sure you invest in reputable and high-quality programs like the ones mentioned above. Not only do these help your child develop their reading skills but also show them how enjoyable learning can be!
All of our reading programs can be accessed through Beanstack, which is our free online service that offers book and activity logging. Continue to grow your love of reading by participating in one of our programs!
Now, some data are available. In a nationally representative survey, the Education Week Research Center asked K-2 and special education teachers what curricula, programs, and textbooks they had used for early reading instruction in their classrooms.
To support district implementation of HQIM with focus and coherence there is a shift in the literacy curriculum review process. The review process will primarily highlight comprehensive core programs that provide sufficient support across the five components of reading. Arkansas has partnered with EdReports for this review process. Please see link below for the Arkansas EdReports catalog.
An effective core reading curriculum, as well as differentiated support for struggling readers, is essential for any MTSS practice. But with the hundreds of reading programs available for districts and schools, it can be difficult to determine which one is the most effective.
Below we outline the five most frequently used reading programs and platforms by Branching Minds school districts throughout 2020. We provide a critical overview of the research and evidence base for these programs and outline what educators should be aware of when implementing these approaches. We also include some general recommendations for teachers, principals, and administrators to ensure that their reading curriculum is effectively meeting the needs of all students.
While independent practice through computer-based programs can be beneficial for students, there needs to also be interactions between students and teachers, so that teachers can adequately monitor how students are reading and provide real-time feedback and dialogues about the text. This is especially critical during the early elementary years, when these instructional interactions can provide students with foundational reading skills.
Wilson Fundations is a Tier 1 and 2 reading program for early elementary (K-3) students. The program is grounded in reading research, highlighting the importance of phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. It also uses a multi-sensory teaching approach that is structured, systematic, and cumulative. Unlike some of the programs outlined above, Fundations is primarily implemented directly through the classroom teacher and not online, although they currently have an online resource hub that can be used for virtual instruction. In addition to being used as a whole-class supplementary program, Fundations can be used as an early intervention for students who are struggling with reading and require Tier 2 support.
While many programs try to address this through the use of online diagnostics and adaptive content, these programs may still miss the individual needs of certain students, social-emotional competencies, and other factors that influence their ability to develop their reading skills. This type of problem-solving requires ongoing interactions between students and teachers as well as collaboration among educators to determine the best course of action.
A study published in the journal Pediatrics shows the combination of two early reading programs had positive effects on preschool students entering kindergarten in Cincinnati Public Schools over a three-year period.
In some schools, kindergarten interventions consist of extra time practicing letters and words on flashcards, lessons with a paraprofessional or time spent with a computer program. Richard Allington (2013) speaks to the effectiveness of these intervention approaches in his article, What Really Matters When Working With Struggling Readers (2013).
Lastly, it is not necessary to waste precious funding on computer-based reading programs. Unfortunately, despite the lack of independent research that supports their effectiveness a plethora of literacy-based computer programs have invaded schools across America.
The perceptions of administrators and teachers of a computer-assisted instructional program in literacy skills were collected by a survey. The survey participants were kindergarten teachers and administrators from four elementary schools in the same, fast-growing, suburban school district in Texas. Literacy assessments were given to all kindergarten students in the district in the fall, winter, and spring of the 2005-2006 school year. This study included a quasi-experimental research design to determine if students using the computer-assisted instructional program improved more on the district literacy assessments than students who did not use the program. The treatment group members were the 449 kindergarten students of the survey participants. The treatment group worked in The Imagination Station program for a nine-week trial period. The control group members were 1385 kindergarten students from thirteen other schools in the same school district. The study found that teachers and administrators perceived that their students' improvement in literacy skills after using the program was good. The quasi-experimental portion of the study found that there was a statistical difference between the treatment and control groups on the composite literacy assessment score. The group membership variable could explain 1.4% of the variance in the students' literacy assessment scores. Based on the small effect size, there was no practical difference between the groups.
OLPL has different reading programs for patrons to participate in throughout the year. All reading programs are tracked through a website called Beanstack. Check out our programs below or stop by one service desks for more information. Thank you for participating in the Fall Reading program. Winners and prizes will be announced soon.
Many teachers will be using supplemental phonics and word-recognition materials to enhance reading instruction for their students. In this article, the authors provide guidelines for determining the accessibility of these phonics and word recognition programs.
This article examines the content and instructional plans of phonics and word recognition to be used with children with reading disabilities. Information is provided about the content of effective word-recognition instruction. Guidelines are included based on this information as well as on 4 other aspects of reading instruction (i.e., oral language development, print awareness, reading aloud, and independent wide reading) that are central to any accessible and effective classroom program. These guidelines will assist educators in selecting programs that enable all children to be successful in learning to read.
These commercially published basal reading programs are particularly important because they are typically adopted by a school or district and become the cornerstone of instruction for most classrooms. Recent reviews of the major commercial programs (Smith et al., in press; Stein, Johnson, & Gutlohn, 1998) have revealed that word- recognition instruction and instruction in oral language skills related to word recognition were inadequately represented. Stein et al. found that few programs included an explicit phonics approach, and student reading selections often did not correspond to the words children were learning during word-recognition instruction making most of the selections inaccessible to the readers.
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