Summer Tools to Prepare for School in the Fall

 As the age for vaccine eligibility falls and COVID rates decline, schools throughout the U.S. are moving away from remote instruction to in-person learning this fall. Here in New York City, all public schools will be fully in-person in September and there will be no remote learning options.

A year and more of online instruction has made it difficult for many students to make the kind of progress they would have made if they were attending school in-person every day. Some students were able to thrive during online instruction, but for those who struggled, we have some suggestions for tools that can be used during the summer to build skills in math and writing and get ready for the fall.

Math 

We often recommend two software programs to help children build math skills. 

Dreambox, for grades K-8  adapts to your child's skill level. Using your child's answers to different kinds of problems, DreamBox detects which skills a student has mastered and which need more work, then provides instruction and practice in the form of games. Parents can use the Dashboard feature to monitor their child's progress. Note that the lessons in Dreambox may not align exactly with what your child is doing in school, but can help prepare your child for math lessons when school begins in the fall.

IXL, for students from pre-K through high school helps students master individual math concepts and lets parents track student progress. Students learn at their own pace and can prepare for the math skills they will need once back in school.

Writing

The best way for students to improve their writing is to write more. By using creative formats, supported by artwork, younger students will be motivated to express themselves in writing and be better prepared for the writing assignments they will face in the fall. We recommend:

Storybird - grade 1 and up
This beautifully crafted, aesthetically pleasing website-based app provides support for writing and an avenue for self-publishing.

Comic Creator - grades 3 - 8
Students can design and save or print comic strips with this user-friendly site. In addition to creating stories, it is an inviting tool for summarizing books to help improve reading comprehension. Comic Creator keeps it simple with very basic graphics and pared down options, making it great for students who may find flashy extras distracting.

 Story Jumper - grades 1 - 5

Younger students can choose between a seemingly limitless array of formats and pictures to supplement the stories they write. Books can be saved, shared, or purchased in hardcover form.

It hasn't escaped us that after more than a year, we are recommending more online instruction. But limited screen time and targeted lessons can be worth the "sitting still" time these programs require. We hope you and your student find them fun and helpful.

Supporting Your Remote Learner

Labor Day is behind us and schools are opening -- one way or another -- all around the country. Most students are engaged in some form of remote learning, at least part of the time, since being in school full time seems to be the exception in most places.

It was with the continuing challenges of remote learning especially in mind that Dr. Yellin and his colleagues from QED Foundation, Kim Carter and Betsey Bradley, presented a webinar last week focusing on Observations and Opportunities: Supporting Your Child in Remote Learning.

They used Betsey’s experiences with her own son to frame the challenges and possibilities that learning from home presents for students and parents alike. Betsey had noticed that her son was struggling with writing tasks. She knew that he had a good vocabulary and was a strong reader. But when it came time to create a report or write an essay, his work wasn't up to the level of his conversational skills. So she put on her parental detective hat and used the Neurodevelopmental Framework for Learning (NDFL) that underlies QED's approach, to examine where and why he was having difficulty.

 Betsey knew that writing involved a number of tasks that had to be performed simultaneously -- coming up with ideas, spelling, grammar, vocabulary, organization, punctuation, and actually forming the letters to write. But her son struggled with handwriting (graphomotor function) and attention difficulties made it hard for him to handle all the tasks of writing at the same time. Watching her son work at home gave her insight that she might not have gotten from just looking at a paper he had brought home from class. Once the bottlenecks in his writing became clear, it was possible to put together specific supports to help address the areas that made writing difficult. 

Some of the tools that can help students who struggle with writing can be found on the Resources page  of the Yellin Center website. Graphic organizers can be especially helpful for students who need to put their creative thoughts or academic knowledge into an organized story or essay. 

Parents whose children learn from home this fall -- even part-time -- have a unique opportunity to observe how they learn. Doing this while doing one's own job and managing other kids is not easy. But if circumstances allow, watching your child work through a lesson can provide useful insight into which areas might be challenges for him or her and how to help him or her improve.

 

The Challenge of the Blank Page

When professional writers sit in front of their computer or at their desk and are unable to write -- or to write the kind of content that they know they are capable of producing, they often talk about having writer's block. Some authors can go years without producing a new book or a magazine piece, even though they have had years of productivity in the past. 

This kind of difficulty is not just a problem of adult professionals. It can be hard for children to sit in front of a blank page -- on paper or screen -- and come up with a story or report on deadline. Certain kinds of writing may be easier for children. Book reports, for example, have a fairly standard format and the content can refer back to the book and its characters. Similarly, assignments with clear guidelines, such as a research report on an historical figure or event, can be relatively easy for a young writer to begin.

Open ended writing assignments can be more difficult for anyone and children can find it especially hard to get started. There are ways to help, however, and parents and teachers can use some of the following to provide the needed spark:

• Help them record the story. Many children find it easier to "tell" a story than to write it down. Once they finish, they can play the recording back and serve as their own scribe, or have a parent or teacher help them, writing down what they had said aloud. 
• Provide word banks. These can be found online or you can create them for a specific purpose. Having words in front of them that relate to the topic they are writing about may be all a child needs to begin to write. They can help create this word list, and then use all of the words in sentences. For example, a paragraph about spiders might include the key words “spider,” “legs,” “eyes,” “poison,” “bite,” “insects,” “web,” etc. 
• Have the child start with a free-write. This can mean jotting down ideas, making lists, or putting words to paper in any form that feels comfortable. No structure, no grammar issues, and no rules apply. Once this free write is completed, it can help the child to jump start a more organized written product. 
• Teachers can offer students alternative ways to tell stories. StoryboardThat enables students to create a storyboard, much like a screenwriter will use to create a film plot. Tools like Comic Creator can help children tell their story in a comic book format. Other "out of the box" ways to get children started with writing include having them write a skit or play, and perhaps acting it out, or to have them "report" a fictional event in a newspaper format. Storybird uses over 1,000 professionally created pictures to inspire writers of all ages - and children can read the stories of other children too (all carefully moderated).

Writing leads to more writing, so getting things started should be the goal. While proper spelling, grammar, and other aspects of good writing are important, they can be part of the editing process, once children come up with their ideas and the basic story. 

The Joys of Comic Books and Graphic Novels

Here at The Yellin Center, we have long recommended comic books and graphic novels as ways for children who struggle with reading and writing to experience success.

There are many reasons why a child might find reading, especially chapter books with complex plots, hard to follow. Reading disorders, such as dyslexia, can make it difficult for a child to decode the words on the page. Sequencing problems may cause a reader to confuse the order of events in a chapter or story. Memory difficulties may make it hard for a child to keep the beginning of a story in his or her head by the time they get to the end. Even attention difficulties may get in the way of concentrating on the material with sufficient depth to retain what was read.

Similarly, there are many reasons why children may struggle with writing. They may have limited expressive (oral) language, which makes it hard for them to find appropriate words to express what they are trying to say. They may have difficulties with organization, which make presenting a story step by step to be a struggle. They may have a reading disorder, such as dyslexia, which makes it hard for them to spell. They may even have an attention issue which makes it hard for them to concentrate on a complex task like writing for the time needed to produce written work.

For all of these children, graphic novels and comic books may provide access to written materials that can help build the skills children need to be successful readers and writers. These mediums are no longer just the sensationalist superhero stories (POW!, BAM!) many of us encountered in our own youth. Today's graphic novels are sophisticated and contain the same kinds of themes, characters, and language that can be found in books. Many comic books are very similar to graphic novels, with somewhat shorter stories. The key to both of these are that they are supported by high quality graphic images that allow students to more readily access the written words that accompany the illustrations.

These forms of storytelling are not just for reading. Creating comics (or even graphic novels, for older, more sophisticated writers) can allow children to tell their story through the medium of pictures, without needing to use the language skills that are so difficult for them. There are a number of good tools available. Take a look at the list from Common Sense Education or at some of the tools we often recommend to students: Storyboard Creator and Comic Creator. And we have written about some terrific graphic novels in prior blog posts:

• Graphic Novels - Don't Call Them Comic Books
• Great Graphic Novels for the Middle Grades
• Motivating Reluctant Boys to Read

Finally, there is a great story in today's New York Times about Loot, a comic book store in Brooklyn where children are encouraged to read, borrow, and create their own comic books. It sounds like fun for kids and the parents who accompany them.

Photo: Enokson

Tools to Inspire the Reluctant Writer

In an excellent recent article in Education Week, elementary school teacher Emily Galle-From discussed the enjoyment she got from teaching young children about writing. By encouraging her students to let their imaginations soar, to exercise their creativity, and to use a variety of ways to convey their stories - prose, poetry, correspondence, and artwork - her  students were able to express heartfelt thoughts and process complex feelings in ways that were meaningful to them.

Here at The Yellin Center, we know that many students find writing difficult. The reasons for this vary. Some students have trouble organizing their thoughts. Others find putting pen or pencil to paper - or keyboarding - problematic due to graphomotor or fine motor difficulties. Other students struggle with word finding or even reading their own work. Not surprisingly, when children find writing difficult, they are reluctant to write. However, the best way to become a better writer is to write.

We often recommend tools to help even the most reluctant writers to create and share their stories. These include:

• Comic Creator, a website that allows students to create their own comic strips using pre-made images and speech bubbles. This writing format will allow children to express themselves outside the confines of traditional academic writing tasks and greatly reduces the amount of writing required to get their ideas out. It includes a variety of lesson tools for teachers of different grades.
  

• Storybird, a free writing platform for creating and writing visual stories. This program is especially valuable for students with strong spatial skills as it includes high quality, artist-created images that young writers can use for inspiration.
  

• StoryBoardThat, a storyboard platform that helps students develop visual literacy and presentation skills.

• StoryJumper , a storybook creation platform where children can create, publish, narrate, and collaborate with friends to create a unique story.

We hope that one or more of these tools can be helpful to a reluctant writer you may know.

Tools for Empowering Dyslexic Students

Note: This post is the last in a three-part installment that describes a problem I faced in designing curriculum for dyslexic students and the solution I discovered. In the first post, I explained my role, introduced my students, and described the problem and my idea for combating it. The second post explained my rationale for that solution. Here, I’ll share my procedure and the resources I’ll use to implement this project in my classroom. The links for the tools and worksheets are embedded in this post and also appear at the end.

I always like to show models when teaching writing, and I wanted to do the same for this project. However, I had difficulty finding a self-advocacy letter I liked, so I wrote my own Sample Letter. The first step will be explaining the purpose of the letter and reading through it with my students. We’ll talk about what points the writer included, and I’ll guide them to determining the purpose of each.

Next, we’ll do some self-reflection. I want my students to think about themselves as people, not only as learners, so the Reflection sheet  I made will guide them through that line of thinking. Before and after they complete it, we’ll talk about how their thoughts will inform their letter.

Such a complex document has to be heavily scaffolded for any group of young students, and this is particularly true of my class. So I made a very thorough Organizer for them to use. It follows the order of the ideas in the Sample Letter so that students can hold one up to the other to orient themselves. Writing is a tremendously demanding process for dyslexic learners, and the Organizer will guide them to devote their attention to each task (crafting topic and concluding sentences, listing points, and justifying each point) separately. Once they have written down their ideas, I’ll help them check their spelling on so that when they draft their letters from their Organizers, they won’t have to think about that tricky aspect of writing. Writing, in this case, will be the easy part; their ideas will already be documented and partially edited and all they have to do is put the pieces together.

I’m excited to use this project in the spring as a way to review our year and preview next year. I’m certain that I’ll make some tweaks after seeing how this plays out in the messy, real world of my classroom, but I hope these materials and ideas help other educators create similar opportunities for their students to learn, reflect, and self-advocate.

Sample Letter
Reflection sheet
Organizer 

An Approach to Empowering Dyslexic Students

Note: This post is the second in a three-part installment that describes a problem I faced in designing curriculum for dyslexic students and the solution I discovered. In the last post, I explained my role, introduced my students, and described the problem and my idea for combating it. This post will explain my rationale for that solution. In the next post, I’ll share my procedure and the resources I’ll use to implement this project in my classroom.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized that the year-end project of a self-advocacy letter would tick an enormous number of boxes.

1.  Reflective learners are better learners. To write this letter, students would have to do lots of self-reflection as they figured out how to introduce themselves to their teacher. They’d need to think carefully about what approaches work for them as learners, which is an important revelation for anyone (and for kids with learning disabilities, in particular). I’d be sure to format the letter in such a way that students would have to list strengths along with their challenges, since kids with learning disabilities need frequent reminders that they have plenty of talents and skills.

2.  To write their letters, students would need to learn about the condition of dyslexia. Kids who are diagnosed at an early age often aren’t even sure exactly what dyslexia means. Knowing the nuts and bolts of their particular brain wiring can help their experiences make sense and give them confidence. All of my students struggle with attention, too, and one has severe anxiety that affects her classroom experience, so crafting this letter would give all of them the chance to research and put into words the effects of, and strategies for, all of these conditions. I hope it will give them a sense of agency and ownership.

3.  A letter is an easy format for transmitting information. I’ve seen approaches to self-advocacy in which a student gives a presentation to his/her teachers, and while I think it’s a nice idea, it’s not ideal for my population. My students all struggle with word retrieval. They’re also fifth graders. So setting them up to lead a session on their own learning in front of a crowd of middle school teachers they’ve never even met didn’t sound like a great idea. This, of course, was assuming the school could even manage to get all of their teachers and the relevant administrators in the same room at the same time at the frantically busy commencement of the school year. My experience working in large, public schools told me this was unlikely. Instead, I envision them walking up to their teachers at the beginning of next year, handing off their letter, and being done with it.

                                               

4.  A letter is adaptable. At the end of this year, each of my students will take home an electronic document that can grow and change as they do; I will encourage their parents to revisit the letter in the weeks before each new school year begins to provide their kids with an opportunity for reflection.

5.  A letter is, obviously, a real-world writing application. We’ve been working on crafting paragraphs that contain both solid points and justification for those points, but usually I’m their only audience. Their letters, on the other hand, will serve an actual purpose in their lives, and it will be easier for them to understand why they have to explain their points when writing.

6.  The letter will tie our curriculum together. Our class reads this year have included Al Capone Does My Shirts, The Cay, and Rules. I realized long after I had made these selections that each book features at least one character with some sort of physical handicap or learning difficulty, so I will use that common theme as a lens through which to analyze what we’ve read. After talking and writing about the strengths and challenges that each of these characters brings to the table, my students can put those analytical skills to work by turning the lens on themselves.

Look for the next post, where I’ll share the resources I’ll use to implement this project and explain the procedure I’ll follow.

NoRedInk for Improving Writing and Grammar

It is no secret that writing is a tricky subject for teachers to teach and grade. Much of writing can be subjective, but there are also some very concrete grammar skills that a student must master to be an effective writer. Finding an engaging, effective way to help support students in building these skills can also be a challenge. Grammar workbooks just don’t really cut it for most students.

NoRedInk is free website created by teachers to help students improve their writing skills using engaging, personalized content. The program strives to use high-interest content to teach children concepts by generating questions and activities related to their favorite celebrities, TV shows, or friends. The program is also adaptive, meaning it will adjust subsequent questions based on what a student gets right or wrong. NoRedInk also believes in “playing with language” and they designed the program to be interactive by allowing students to click on words to capitalize them or drag and drop to add or delete punctuation.

For teachers, NoRedInk is able to provide data on what areas they need to focus on in class and where their students’ skills are lagging. Teachers are also able to track student progress toward common core and state standards. Many teachers also seem to  be using NoRedInk for standardized test prep classes as well to build foundational grammar skills. NoRedInk has published two study guides to help map out the concepts NoRedInk can help build for the SAT and the ACT. exams. If you are curious how other schools have used the program, you can read the case studies they have published. NoRedInk also has several onboarding guides to help both teachers and students understand how to effectively use the program.

Gifted Kids

It’s not easy to be the parent of kid who struggles in school. But parents of gifted kids have difficult decisions to make, too. Some moms and dads with exceptionally talented children have limited financial means for lessons and activities. Others live in areas with scarce resources. Many worry about balance: how to nurture a child’s proclivities but maintain a “normal” childhood experience? Here are some ideas and resources that can help gifted children and teenagers pursue their passions and improve their knowledge and skill set:

General Enrichment

Look into community groups where there is no age limit, like an astronomy group or chess club. Gifted young people often enjoy discussing their interests with, and learning from, like-minded adults. There may be local lectures in your area, too, and authors often visit bookstores to discuss their work.

Talk to your child’s teacher about special projects in school that will allow your child to pursue her affinity. She might like to "check in" with her classmates once week by talking to the class for five minutes or so to share her progress and ask for their feedback. And she should be invited to set up a display or do a presentation for the class when she is finished. Teaching others is one of the best ways to learn.

Consider finding a tutor. Children who don't need remediation can still benefit from a knowledgeable instructor who can provide him with the extra challenge and stimulation he likely craves.

Podcasts like This American Life (a grab-bag of general culture, math, science, psychology, current events, and more), RadioLab (science), The Naked Scientists (science and medicine), The New Yorker Fiction podcast (the writing craft), Intelligence Squared (current events, policy, and ethics), Planet Money and Freakanomics (economics and statistics) are all (free) goldmines for curious young people. Since all of these podcasts were created with adult listeners in mind, parents may want to preview them first.

The Great Courses – Purchase high-quality lecture series by eminent experts in just about every field imaginable. Here is a sampling of titles: “The Inexplicable Universe,” “Understanding the Inventions that Changed the World,” “Latin 101,” “Lost Worlds of South America,” “Masters of War: Histories Greatest Strategic Thinkers,” “King Arthur: History and Legend,” “How to Look at and Understand Great Art,” and “Shakespeare: The Word and the Action.”

STEM - Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math

The Art of Problem Solving – This site contains numerous math resources for students in 6th-12th grades, including book recommendations, online courses, and even an online community so students can connect with other math-lovers around the world.

Math Forum – Users can access a new math problem each week, play KenKen, connect with other young mathematicians by joining the Virtual Math Team, and more.

Tech Literacy – Visit our dedicated resource page for information about opportunities to learn coding, tinker with robotics, and more.

Writing

Stone Soup – Contributions to this international English literary magazine come from young writers and artists between the ages of 8 to 13. The magazine features stories, poems, illustrations, art, and book reviews.

New Moon Girls - New Moon Girls is an online community and print magazine where girls create and share poetry, artwork, videos, and more; chat together; and learn.

Teen Ink – This organization offers a national teen magazine, book series, and website devoted entirely to teenage writing, art, photos and forums. Students must be between the ages of 13 and 19 to participate, register, and/or submit work.

The Young Idealist – Everyone who writes for and runs this quarterly journal is under the age of 21. Content in The Young Idealist aims to encourage the next generation of thinkers, policymakers, and leaders through the peer review and publication of political, social, and environmental ideas. Essays proposing positive change are critiqued and developed by an editorial board and an active readership.

The Concord Review – This periodical publishes the academic research papers of students in the secondary grades.

Performing and Visual Arts

Look for local performance opportunities. Community theater companies and musical performance groups are great places for kids to gain experience. Those not yet in high school might be able to volunteer to work behind the scenes in high school or college productions, giving them valuable experience about the world of theater. Try taking kids to open mic nights at venues that allow all ages; even those not yet ready to perform in public will learn from watching other performers.

Young Composers - Upload compositions of all genres for feedback from forum participants, or simply read and learn from reading discussion threads and listening to others’ work.

Composition Competitions – This compilation of competitions around the country may inspire young composers to develop and polish a piece they can enter.

Online Course: Photography for Kids - For serious young photographers, consider an online, project-based course from the online learning marketplace Udemy. The course, which consists of 20 video lectures, teaches kids the basics of photography and gets them thinking as they work through assignments. First-time Udemy users will pay only $24 for access to the series.

Photography Competitions – High school students may want to enter their own best shots in some of the competitions listed here, and they can learn a lot from looking at winning images, too.

Film Competitions – Those interested in film can submit their work to The All American High School Film Festival, and filmmakers seeking to spread a social message should investigate the Teen Truth competition. The National Film Festival for Talented Youth accepts both film and screenplay submissions.

One more quick, but important, note: Remember that even the brightest kids need time to be kids. Be sure that their after-school agenda is composed mostly of activities they've chosen, and give them plenty of free, unstructured time to spend letting their imaginations run wild.

Chrome Accessibility Extensions

Often, when searching for student-centered solutions for learning differences, we are quick to look at tools and programs specially designed for diverse learners. We forget that many of the everyday tools we use have been designed for accessibility in mind. This is true Universal Design, where one tool can be used by all, regardless of their limitations. Microsoft has a wealth of accessibility features across their products. Similarly, Google’s Chrome has several extensions to make web browsing accessible to those with reading and writing challenges. Most of the add-ons and extensions are free, making them a cost efficient alternative to some of the pricey third party resources. 

Reading and Writing Extensions

The Chrome extension Readability removes visual clutter from web pages, making them easier to read. Reducing visual noise will benefit students with attention, visual processing, and reading difficulties. If Chrome isn’t your browser of choice, readability has expanded its product line to include apps and add-ons for Firefox and Safari. The High Contrast extension allows you to alter the coloring of your webpage with several high contrast filters, making the text easier to read. 

The Zoom add-on will make reading easier by allowing you to magnify the webpage. Another great tool is the SpeakIt extension, which converts text into speech, reading the passage using a synthesized voice. ChromeVox is a screen reader designed for the visually impaired. For writing, Voice Search allows users to use voice commands to search Google and locate information online. Voicenote II is a simple and functional digital notepad that will allow you to take notes using your voice rather than typing. 

A Suite of Accessibility Features

Google has put together a suite of accessible features in their Read&Write for Google Chrome extension. This collection of tools was designed specifically to aid students with print disabilities and English language learners. Using this add-on, students can hear words, passages, or entire documents read aloud, and even hear the text translated into a different language. There is also speech-to-text capability with this extension. When typing online or in a Google Doc, integrated word suggestions will pop up, helping facilitate the writing process. Students are also able to highlight portions of the text or make voice notes. You are able to try Read&Write for free with a 30-day trial; after the trial period you can keep a free basic subscription or upgrade to the premium paid version. However, teachers are eligible for a free premium subscription. To register and activate your subscription, go to rw.texthelp.com/freeforteachers after installing the Read&Write for Google Chrome trial. 

Checking Accessibility

Online accessibility is important whether you are a consumer or creator of web content. If you are ever concerned about the accessibility of a web page, you can use the WAVE Chrome extension to evaluate web content for accessibility issues. WAVE can provide visual feedback about the accessibility of traditional websites, as well as personal sites, intranet pages and password protected sites. It is important to note that no data is sent back to the WAVE developers and all analysis is done within the web browser to ensure secure, private evaluations.

Not a Luddite

“Because I’m not a Luddite.” This was Les Perelman’s response when asked, in a Boston Globe interview, why he joined a web-based writing tutorial company after years of railing against computerized writing evaluations. Having recently retired from the directorship of MIT’s Writing Across the Curriculum program, Perelman is now the chief research scientist for WriteLab, a startup company that has partnered with dozens of college writing centers. WriteLab uses computerized algorithms to offer students feedback on their writing and guide them toward revisions.

Writelab Logo

As Perelman noted in the Globe interview, the software is not a replacement for a human teacher, but rather a supplement. By providing suggestions and questions, it not only facilitates improvement but helps students become more aware of their writing, whether they defend or reject their original choices. Perelman explained in the interview that automated writing instruction can be valuable despite computers’ shortcomings, and that he got involved because, “…if we don’t do it well, other people are going to do it badly.”

Doing it badly is what Perelman became concerned about a few years ago when the Educational Testing Service, which develops and administers the SAT, developed an e-Rater to automatically grade students’ essays. The New York Times noted that Perelman exposed significant flaws in the system by showing that he was able to earn high scores by submitting to the e-Rater prose that was essentially gibberish. Included in his findings was that the e-Rater values number and size of words over truth and logical coherence.

For example, the e-Rater generated positive feedback in response to this:
Competition which mesmerizes the reprover, especially of administrations, may be multitude. As a result of abandoning the utterance to the people involved, a plethora of cooperation can be more tensely enjoined. Additionally, a humane competition changes assemblage by cooperation. In my semiotics class, all of the agriculturalists for our personal interloper with the probe we decry contend.. . .

Clearly, Perelman had good reason to be cynical about algorithms’ evaluative and informative capabilities, although ETS disputed his findings and conclusions. However, he also has good reason to have some faith in them; and his move to WriteLab may signify that understanding. As anyone who uses a GPS knows, technology certainly can be harnessed for helpful guidance. What one recent study found, though, is that people actually tend to underestimate how much algorithms should be trusted. When researchers at the University of Pennsylvania had subjects observe and then choose between a human or statistical model to make predictions, the subjects were more likely to pick the human model. These results followed a number of other studies’ findings regarding the tendency to dismiss algorithms. In various domains such as stock forecasts or medical decisions, people tended to favor human judgement. However, research suggests that mechanical predictions often beat personal judgement, contrary to what we might be inclined to think is the case.

An openness to the power of technology along with a healthy skepticism and understanding of its limitations seems to be the best approach, in education and in general. Because, after all, we are not Luddites.

Baby Blogger

These days, more and more communications happen in cyberspace. To introduce your kids to online networking, why not create a family blog, or allow them to share posting responsibilities for an existing blog? Creating posts gives kids practice generating discourse, keyboarding, editing, and more, and it can be an excellent opportunity to discuss the crucial issues of online safety and privacy with youngsters in a relevant context. Here are a few ideas for launching the younger members of your household into the blog-sphere:

  

• Bestow the title of "family journalist" on your child. She could be responsible for a weekly post of family news bites or for writing up special family events and excursions. Remember that posts don't have to be more than a few sentences for beginning bloggers.
• Children just learning their way around a keyboard can have a voice too. Rather than writing whole posts, they can contribute their own typed sentences. For example, a post written by a parent could include a prompt such as, "Carrie had this to say about her first ski trip:" This is an excellent opportunity to introduce kids to features like spell check when they must type longer words. 
• Kids too young to type even a little can still dictate their own summaries of family events to be typed by an adult. Distant family members are bound to enjoy reading about the first day of kindergarten, as told by the kindergartner himself!
• Blogs are about more than just words. Kids interested in digital art can upload photos and experiment with editing tools to be sure the shots are just right. Creative kids might doctor photos to show what they wish had happened; just be sure to show them how to add photo captions, or confused family members may think Taylor Swift really did show up at your daughter's birthday party!
• Got a budding Top Chef on your hands? Help your child document the making of a recipe through notes and photos during cooking. Then your child can create a post to tell the story of the dish and share the recipe. Hundreds of food blogs around the web can serve as inspiration.

Finally, a note for well-meaning parents: While learning to edit is valuable, try not to be too heavy-handed with suggestions and corrections. Help your young writer to re-read what he has written and show him how to resolve the red squiggly lines that mean he's made a mistake of spelling or grammar, but otherwise let his words be his own. Blogs are wonderful records, and he will probably enjoy returning to old posts as he develops as a writer for concrete proof of how far he has come.

photo credit: Christian Schnettelker via flickr cc

Review: Essay Express Software

Essay Express: A Teacher-Focused Review

Ages: Grades 4 through 8

Content Areas: Language Arts

Cost: Varies depending on the license purchased. More information can be found on their website. Of note, a 30-day free demo is also available for you to explore before making a purchase. 

Last year, we reviewed the software program Animation-ish, created by one of my all-time favorite children’s authors Peter H. Reynolds and FableVision Learning. While researching the animation program I discovered Essay Express, which is described as “a powerful combination of interactive strategy-based exercises which use engaging stories, humor, and music to teach students how to structure a successful short essay”. FableVision Learning teamed up with Dr. Lynn Meltzer, Dr. Bethany Roditi, and a team from the Research Institute for Learning and Development (RILD) to create a researched based, creative learning tool to help develop students’ written competencies.

As a Learning Specialist, I often assess and work with students who struggle with the writing process. Writing is a complex task that requires multiple cognitive abilities to be deployed simultaneously. The breakdown in the writing process that causes students’ difficulties can manifest in a number of areas, including challenges generating ideas, effectively sequencing information, formulating a sentence or appropriately executing standard written conventions.For many classroom teachers, it can be challenging to pinpoint the specific area of weakness in a student, and subsequently devise evidence-based interventions to strength those deficiencies.

Essay Express is one very valuable tool educators can use to bolster their students' abilities, while feeling confident that the research that backs this program is instructionally sound. This writing program provides foundational skill development by employing nine cognitive strategies which break down, teach and strengthen each skill that is critical in crafting a well-structured essay. Essay Express is designed as a step-by-step process in which students can progress at their own rate, allowing the program to meet the needs of your student at the level of their writing ability. As such, it is a beneficial writing program for both special education and mainstream settings - all students, regardless of learning needs, can benefit from continually strengthening their writing ability. Furthermore, as teachers, the program provides you with a student performance tracking system, and ability to customize your essay questions to meet the specific needs of your curriculum.

If you are curious about what this software can do, or how an educator could utilize this program in their classroom, a detailed and robust Educator’s Guide is available. There you will find detailed instructions on how to use the progress tracking portion of the software, as well as lesson extensions and printable resources included in the software. In addition, for a great video summary of the merits of this program, FableVision Learning has created an excellent animated video to showcase Essay Express. Beyond this resource, Mr. Reynolds and Fable Vision Learning also offer a variety of tools for creating a creative classroom, which are worthwhile to explore. Most are literacy based and infuse elements of high quality art or animation to inspire learning among your students.

Fairytale Mail

Fairytale Mail is a resource I developed as part of my language arts curriculum. In the primary grades I did an entire comprehensive unit on fairytales that infused readers' theatre (for oral language development), fractured fairytales (to teach storytelling and sequencing), and imaginative writing.

Sometimes it can be a challenge to motivate students to write. I have found that this activity provides enough scaffolding and support to enable even my students who struggled with writing to produce a strong final product. Also, following a staged writing process has been shown to be a successful method for supporting students through the writing process (Spandel, 2009). As such, this activity is structured into stages to help organize the students as they progress through their writing.

Description of Activity


Fairytale mail provides a fun, engaging way for students to learn how to craft formal correspondence. I would normally begin this lesson by reading my students the story The Jolly Postman to help familiarize them with letter writing and a variety of fairytale characters. Then the students will pick a character that they would like to be and craft a letter to another fairytale character.



Materials Needed
Decorative stationery
Lined paper
Pencils
Envelopes

Instructions
Read The Jolly Postman to the class. As a class, discuss letter writing and the reasons why people would send a letter.

Teacher Modelling
Model how to write a letter and highlight the areas that each letter needs to have (e.g. to whom it is addressed, the content, a sign off and a signature). This would also be the time to teach your preferred writing and editing procedures if you haven’t done so already.

Prewriting
Have students brainstorm the two characters they will use for this activity. I often have my students use a chart to organize their thoughts, so they can write down their two characters and a list of ideas that these characters would discuss. They are then able to pick one idea before moving on to the draft.

Writing
Allow the students time to write their draft on lined paper.

Revising
I always did a two staged editing process where the student self-edits first, and then either has a peer or myself edit a second time. The student then makes the appropriate corrections to their work to make it ready to “publish”.

Publishing
Now the student can write their good copy on the Fairytale Mail handout. As part of the publishing processing, I also gave my students envelopes for them to address since learning how to address a letter so that a postman is able to deliver their correspondence is important. They would make up their own street names and addresses, and I always encouraged creativity.

For students who finish early I often would allow them to color their letter, create their own stamp for their mail or add embellishments to the envelopes that they feel would represent their character.


How this activity aligns with Common Core Standards:
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.1.2; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.2.2
Write informative/explanatory texts in which they name a topic, supply some facts about the topic, and provide some sense of closure.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.3.10; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.4.10
Write routinely over …. shorter time frames (a single sitting or a day or two) for a range of discipline-specific tasks, purposes, and audiences.

References
Spandel, V. (2009). Creating writers through 6-trait writing assessment and instruction (5th ed.). New Jersey: Pearson.

Current Events Demonstrate the Consequences of Plagiarism

Montana Senator John Walsh's recent embarrassment is what we in education call a "teachable moment." It was determined that Walsh, who was appointed to serve as senator this past February, plagiarized nearly a quarter of the master's thesis he submitted to the Army War College to complete his coursework in 2007. In response, the College has recently rescinded Walsh's master's degree, and Walsh has announced that he will be dropping out of the state's upcoming election.

  

When stressing the importance of proper citation to students, this is an excellent anecdote to relate. The internet makes it easier than ever for schools to catch students when they don't give credit where it's due, and the consequences, as Walsh's case shows us, can be severe.

Citation can be tricky, however, and some students don't fully understand the difference between research and plagiarism. The issue isn't as cut and dried as some might think. For example, plagiarism doesn't have to be intentional; even unintentionally failing to credit someone else for their words or ideas counts as cheating.

To help students understand plagiarism, look no farther than Purdue's Online Writing Lab, one of our favorite writing resources. For teachers, there are several excellent ready-made lesson plans that should help clear up misunderstandings about academic honesty. And students should bookmark the excellent page of resources on topics like the difference between paraphrasing and quoting, how to format in-text citations, etc. 

Review: Storybird Web Based Writing Platform

Storybird - Artful Storytelling

Recommended Ages: Grade 1 and up

Content Areas: Reading and Writing

Price: Free

Why We Like It : Storybird is a beautifully crafted, aesthetically pleasing website based application for reading and writing. Students sometimes struggle with the motivation to write, and it is important to provide them with engaging, meaningful ways to practice their written skills; Storybird does just that. Storybird is especially valuable for students with strong visual and spatial skills and has a wealth of high quality, artist created images that children can use as inspiration for their writing. In addition, Storybird allows students to infuse the same images into their story in order to help them tell their tale. The image support could be beneficial for helping students who struggle with sequencing a story, as the pictures will serve as reinforcements and cues as they craft their narrative.

Beyond writing, Storybird can be an excellent method to increase the time a child spends reading. Children can read other children’s stories, or those of their friends. There are multiple genres available for children to choose from, which increases the likelihood that each student will discover something that interests them. Furthermore, professional authors use Storybird to connect with their fans, which allows children access to their stories as well.

For Parents

There are other games infused into Storybird that your child can play to further interest them in the reading and writing process. For example, there are puzzles hidden throughout the artworks that your child can solve which, as a reward, will unlock new stories and puzzles for them to enjoy. Exposure to reading and writing at home is important. This is one avenue where your child can gain more experience reading and writing outside of their classroom hours. In addition, you are able to read your child’s creations and provide them with positive reinforcement through the program. Furthermore, your child’s work can be shared with other family members and close friends who can also encourage your child. This will help grow your child’s confidence in their writing abilities. 

For Teachers
Storybird enables teachers to create robust libraries of student work. These are able to be shared with parents and administrators as examples of student written output. In addition, lesson creation and assigning grades are features of the Storybird application that are integrated right into the site.

Publishing books is an important final aspect of the stages of writing. Storybird provides a high quality avenue for students to self-publish their work. This will increase their engagement and sense of ownership over the writing process. Also, collaboration is a huge part of the Storybird program. As your students read and explore their peers' work they are able to comment and send positive reinforcement to their fellow students.

Good to Know

• Users must be 13 years of age to become a member. If a child is younger than 13, he/she must provide a parent’s email address, and then the parent is immediately notified that their child has become a storybird.
• Student privacy is protected. Social interactions are classroom-contained.

How Storybird Aligns with Common Core Standards

• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.1.3 Write narratives in which they recount two or more appropriately sequenced events, include some details regarding what happened, use temporal words to signal event order, and provide some sense of closure.
• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.2.3 Write narratives in which they recount a well-elaborated event or short sequence of events, include details to describe actions, thoughts, and feelings, use temporal words to signal event order, and provide a sense of closure.
• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.3.3; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.4.3; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.5.3 Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, descriptive details, and clear event sequences.
• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.6.3; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.7.3; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.8.3 Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, relevant descriptive details, and well-structured event sequences.
• CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.9-10.3; CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.11-12.3 Write narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective technique, well-chosen details, and well-structured event sequences.

Literacy Lessons from Teachers College - Part IV - Writing

Today's blog is the final installment of a four-part series on a conference I attended on literacy in the elementary and middle grades, hosted by faculty from Columbia University’s Teachers College. Through lectures, readings, discussions, and collaborative group work, I learned a great deal about the implications of current research on literacy assessment and instruction. Check out my prior posts on phonics, vocabulary, and reading comprehension.

Dotmatchbox via flickr cc

Teaching writing can be one of the most challenging and rewarding aspects of literacy instruction. Writing is an enormously demanding activity. To do it well, students must be able to generate and organize ideas, form grammatical sentences using appropriate vocabulary, and combine motor skills with their memories about letter formation, word spellings, and written mechanics. 

The benefits of writing make it worth the trouble, however. Written work gives students the opportunity to solidify thoughts about material they’re learning. Writing can also make students better readers by acquainting them with different kinds of texts and structures. And research indicates that sharing personal experiences through venues like written narratives benefits students psychologically and physiologically.

Some of the most compelling writing insights presented at the Teachers College conference were:

Purposeful Writing

Students must have experience writing with different purposes. The ubiquitous five-paragraph essay is certainly a useful format through which to refine analytical thinking. But developing writers need to hone their ideation and language use through other formats, too. Students should experiment with the kind of language used to describe, narrate, inform, and persuade/analyze. Studies show that the most effective writing instruction gives students the chance to write across genres, as well. Younger students should begin to experiment with persuasive pieces, analytical essays, informative texts, and reflective journal entries. And older students need to continue expressing themselves through poems, stories, and other creative formats.

Writing instruction works best when it takes place beyond the language arts classroom. Content area teachers should give students the chance to write in forms fitting different subjects, whether this takes the form of lab reports in science, papers comparing and contrasting different systems of government in civics, or an explanatory paragraph justifying the answer to a math problem.

Effective Instruction

There are numerous ways to teach writing well and no single strategy works best for every developing writer. However, research indicates that the best instruction teaches flexible strategy use. Students need to understand which strategies to use for various types of writing, and they need to be able to choose independently which ones to use.

Optimal writing instruction also goes beyond the planning stage. Many students have the experience of planning a piece of writing by generating a diagram or an outline first. However, some kids aren’t ready to move directly from this plan to the first draft. Teachers often observe that students fail to refer back to their plan when writing; this may be because they’re not sure how to use it to assist them. Good instructors help students use the plan they generate to scaffold their first draft. But the completion of the first draft is not the end of the writing process.

Revising Versus Editing

Many students don’t know the difference between these two terms. The best way to polish papers may be to approach the proofreading process in two stages. First, students should revise by reviewing the content of their work. They should make sure what they’ve written accurately reflects their ideas and that their organization is effective. They should be certain that their writing isn’t repetitive and consider their word choices. Editing, the process used to find and fix mechanical errors, should take place only after students complete the revision process. When editing, students should look for mechanical errors (like spelling and punctuation mistakes) and make certain they haven’t written any fragments or run-on sentences.

At the Yellin Center, we have found that a two-part checklist works well to facilitate this review process. Students should read through their work once with a revision checklist, then read it again using the editing checklist. And students need to know that the best writers—even professionals!—often reread their work multiple times over many days to give themselves a more objective perspective.

Benefits of Learning to Write by Hand

We were fascinated by a recent piece in The New York Times about the controversy over handwriting instruction. The article thoughtfully summarizes work by neuroscientists demonstrating that learning to write by hand plays an important role in a number of developing neural pathways. Handwriting appears to have a positive impact on reading, idea generation when writing, and memory formation when taking notes in class. Keyboarding does not appear to have the same impact. Interestingly, manuscript and cursive writing each seem to provide different benefits, and research indicates that learning each style of writing leads to greater cognitive engagement than using only one approach. At a time when many schools are abandoning cursive instruction, this finding is particularly provocative.

As our world becomes ever-more reliant on technology, it is important to develop a true understanding of the impact that writing by hand has on the learning process. In our practice, we speak with many parents who are unsure whether to belabor handwriting development when their kids genuinely struggle. Wouldn’t it make more sense to simply transition to typing since that’s what they’ll use when they’re adults, they wonder? And, as the Times piece points out, the nearly ubiquitous Common Core standards suggest that children learn to hand write legible letters only in kindergarten and first grade; after that, the focus is shifted to keyboarding skills.

Here at the Yellin Center, we often find ourselves considering “the genius of and versus the tyranny of or.” Simply supplying children with a list of accommodations (e.g. either do it this way or learn it that way) is often limiting; a better strategy is establishing a system of accommodations that works in conjunction with a carefully crafted instructional plan (e.g. do this and that, too). Some students need help with a mechanical aspect of a task to complete classwork and should be given workarounds to get through particular tasks. But that doesn’t mean those mechanics shouldn’t be practiced at a separate time. For example, a child who struggles to sound out words certainly needs to develop those critical decoding skills. However, it’s also important that she listen to texts that match her intellectual level so she can practice her comprehension skills and build a love of literature. Learning to decode and listening to texts is a much better approach than only working on either decoding instruction or using audiobooks.

Children should learn how to write by hand, but if they are having difficulty with letter formation they should be given “bypass strategies” like having someone scribe for them, using speech-to-text software, or keyboarding, so their capacity for developing rich written output is not hijacked by their weak graphomotor function. It is essential, however, that kids continue developing handwriting “off-line”; as their mastery and automaticity grows, handwriting can be brought online and integrated into the writing process gradually.

Try OWL for Writing Help

By the time a blog has reached almost 700 posts -- as ours has -- it sometimes pays to look back and see what newer readers may have missed. We were reminded of this recently when we recommended that a student use the Purdue OWL to help with his writing and realized that it had been several years since we mentioned this terrific tool for writers of (almost) all ages.

Created and operated by Purdue University, the Online Writing Lab is a free resource (designed for those in seventh grade and up) with answers to questions about grammar and usage, information about teaching writing, English as a second language, and dozens of links to resources parents can use to help their children.

With a selection of podcasts, vidcasts, and downloadable guides, OWL has something for everyone who writes - student, educator, and -- of course -- blogger. Try it the next time you have a question. If they don't have the answer listed you can always email them for guidance. 

Photo Credit: John Haslam via flickr cc

What Should I Write About? Write About This!

To some kids, a blank page is an exciting opportunity. They love the freedom of a wide-open writing assignment. They’re eager to let their imaginations run wild and seem to overflow with ideas before the tip of their pencil even hits the paper.

For other kids, nothing could be more intimidating than facing a blank page. For them, a writing assignment without parameters is a nightmare. Their minds seem to freeze. They wrinkle their foreheads and look desperately around the room for inspiration. If only someone would give them just the smallest shred of an idea…

A fourth grade teacher named Brad has a great solution. Brad noticed that his students loved to make up stories and poems based on photographs, and so he developed an app called Write About This to make inspiration easy for any elementary school child with access to an iDevice. Write About This is home to hundreds of interesting, idea-sparking photographs arranged by curriculum, season, and theme. Adults can choose whether kids see just the picture for an open-ended response, or whether a prompt is displayed (the level of complexity is customizable) along with the picture. For example, an image of a bike entirely covered with mud has prompts like “What is the messiest you've ever been? Tell about where you were and how you felt” and “How would you explain this to your parents without getting in trouble?”

The app is a handy source of inspiration, and a single image can be shown to a small group or a whole classroom full of students with paper and pencils. But it becomes even more valuable if individual kids can get their hands on the iPad with the app. This way, they can type their writing directly into the app, record their voices as they read it aloud, and publish it with a single click. And students and teachers can import their own pictures and prompts – as written phrases or recorded audio messages – into the app, making it almost endlessly adaptable.

Write About This is a simple idea with powerful possibilities. It is available through the iTunes store.

Watch a video about Write About This below: