The web is full of teaching materials of all kinds that you can leverage to enhance how you teach reading and writing. Many interactive stories, games, audio, video, and other online activities, make an exciting and worthwhile addition to your good teaching sense and your conventional literacy materials.
Going online with kids, you’ll make use of different types of web sites and use them in many different ways, adding to your repetoire of teaching talents! To get your webbed feet wet, we are going to explore three or four different types of literacy-oriented web sites you can use as the basis for or supplement to a literacy activity of your design.
Strategies for Developing Activities
Dig Deep! Explore the activity or site, including teacher (or parent) information. Try out activities; take note of what happens if you make mistakes or use the activity "the wrong way."
Brainstorm! Consider possible ways to use the site. What would you do if you only had five minutes of prep time? Could you use the site to build an ongoing activity or integrated thematic unit? Can it serve as a launching point for other classroom activities? Provide an opportunity for independent learning or differentiated instruction?
Have it Your Way! Connect to your curriculum, making the web tools and activities work for YOU. Look for sites, activities and materials that support and enhance the teaching you already do; see if the site offers useful printables to extend the learning opportunities.
Mix it Up! Choose and use conventional materials and web sites together. Whoever said you can't turn to the web to get help on a hand written activity, have paper and pencils at hand for web notes, or compare an online version of Cinderella to a classic printed version?
Take Note! Use the Activity Planner to keep track of your good ideas!
time to get started! Most of the web sites below have an elementary focus, but many of these sites span a much wider age range and may also have materials or features to support students who are learning English.
Web Sites to Explore and Use in Kindergarten through 2nd Grade
Explore It #1 Some sites offer a simple activity that can be a launching point for or companion to other classroom activities. Sites such as Big Brown Bear's Magnetic Letters offer interactivity in a simplified format, ready for you to use in any way you choose.
Use It! Follow our steps to build a literacy activity using Big Brown Bear's Magnetic Letters. If you like the Magnetic Letters, you might also like The Literacy Center (which includes French, Spanish and German versions), Bembo's Zoo, or even the online version of Lite Brite, all of which could work well with a SmartBoard and a creative idea to promote literacy...
Explore It #2 Sites such as www.starfall.com offer so much content, you can build entire lessons (or weeks worth of lessons) using just the materials on the site (and accompanying printables to order or download). Students could spend most of a lesson online with the materials and activities, and progress through the site's offerings on repeated visits. Alternatively, select a small part of a site – a story or activity, for example – and build your activity around that.
Use It! After you explore Starfall.com, take some time to plan an activity using a portion of the site that intrigues you, meets an instructional goal or works well for you. (Try Literactive or Between the Lions if you already know Starfall and want to explore something new).
Explore It #3 The International Children's Digital Library offers hundreds of stories from countrires all around the world. Search by country or by other criteria and read the stories online. Online book collections like ICDL may not offer the additional activities and resources that some sites have, but they do provide access to a wealth of stories to add to your classroom (or home) reading experience.
Explore It #1 Sites such as Reading Planet offer so much content, you can build entire lessons (or weeks worth of lessons) using just the materials on the site. Students will spend most of the lesson using the online materials and activities, and progress through the site's offerings on repeated visits. Alternatively, select a small part of a site – a story or activity, for example – and build your activity around that.
Use It! After you explore Reading Planet (If you already know Reading Planet and want to explore something new, try smaller but well crafted sites like BookHive or FableVision. Then take time to plan an activity using a portion of the site that intrigues you, meets an instructional goal or works well for you.
Explore It #2 Read • Write • Think offers several self-contained online activities, each teaching or reinforcing a specific concept or skill. Similar sites include Brainpop.
Use It! After exploring, take time to plan an activity using one of the self-contained activities that matches a current or upcoming learning objective in your classroom.
Explore It #3 More and more sites offer creative ways to encourage writing, from collaborative writing projects like Writers Blocks, to publishing platforms, to interactive story and poem creators, like Wacky Web Tales or Giggle Poetry.
Use It! After exploring, take time to plan an activity using a portion of the site that intrigues you, meets an instructional goal or works well for you.
ExplorE It #4 OSLIS, the RhymeZone and other sites offer reference tools and guides that students can use for projects they do online or using conventional materials
Use It! After exploring, take time to plan an activity using a portion of the site that intrigues you, meets an instructional goal or works well for you.
More Sites:
Handouts:
Download the following handouts in pdf format or for Apple's Pages software:
Approach the web and other technology with a practical mindset:
Treat it the way you treat other tools and materials – pick, choose and customize as needed
Treat challenges and tech failures as opportunities to model flexibility and problem-solving for your students. (In fact, if accidents and mistakes don't happen to you, consider "planting" some into your lesson to highlight difficult steps or enhance critical thinking!)
Connect to other sources for quality links, such as readwritethink.org or ipl.org, that continually add new links
If all else fails, have your students create web site "reviews" – note the name and URL, briefly describe the materials or activities, decide who would like it or learn from it, the site's best features and what would make it better.
Good Luck with our Literacy Adventures on the Web! Thanks for Visiting!
Best Web Sites for Reading and Writing with Kids
Dig Deep!
