ReadWriteThink.org
From LIS 460 Summer 2007
Contents |
What is ReadWriteThink.org?
ReadWriteThink.org is a website born from the collaboration of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE), the International Reading Association(IRA), and the Verizon Foundation. Its goal is "to provide educators and students with access to the highest quality practices and resources in reading and language arts instruction through free, Internet-based content" [1].
Parts of the site
Main sections:
- Lessons
- Lessons are research-based and correlated to standards. They integrate Internet content into meaningful learning experiences.
- They include estimated time, an instructional guide, a list of supplemental texts, a list of Web resources, and (when applicable) student worksheets, and interactive activities.
- Lessons cover a wide variety of subject areas.
- Standards
- The NCTE and the IRA offer 12 joint standards for English language arts. "The vision guiding these standards is that all students must have the opportunities and resources to develop the language skills they need to pursue life's goals and to participate fully as informed, productive members of society."
- Web resources
- Both the ReadWriteThink in-house team and an expert review panel evaluate the Web resources. You can see their criteria here. Web resources include
- Instructional resources for the teacher (including lesson plans, classroom activities, and teaching techniques)
- Professional development sites, including research findings and teaching trends,
- Reference sites providing specific information or offering general reference resources
- Interactive resources for students involved in a reading or writing exercise
- Both the ReadWriteThink in-house team and an expert review panel evaluate the Web resources. You can see their criteria here. Web resources include
- Student materials
- Online, interactive materials for students. The goal is to provide a chance for students to use technology to support their literacy skills.
Other features:
Why use the site?
The site is well-organized. Everything is clearly cross-referenced and very easily searchable. In most sections, you can search by grade level, literacy strand, or literacy engagement. The site also gives clear definitions and explanations of the standards, guidelines, and terms.
The lesson plans and resources cover many varied topics. You are allowed and encouraged to photocopy the materials for use in classrooms--there are no copyright issues. If you have a lesson you'd like to share, you can submit the lesson plan through the NCTE and the IRA. You can also give feedback on the lessons to help improve them for other people.
The recommended Web links are quite extensive. The NCTE and IRA work hard to keep the links up to date. When you look at the links, you know that they have already been reviewed by experts. This makes it easier to find applicable, safe sites online.
How can school librarians and other teachers use it?
This could be a great source of lesson plans for librarians and teachers. The lessons are already linked to reading and writing standards, and there should be overlap with curriculum frameworks as well. My personal favorite part was the calendar, which provides ideas for lessons on a particular date. The online and print resources that the lesson plans provide make great ideas for lessons or supplemental student materials.
Librarians and teachers can also use this site for professional development information or resources. For example, there are links to sites about children with learning disabilities if a teacher has a special needs child and wants more information on the condition. There are also links to professional development topics such as Whole Language Instruction and spelling development, which could be useful for teachers who want to know more about these topics.
The Web resources cover topics such as author Websites, poetry sites, history, space (NASA), and museum sites. These could be excellent, pre-reviewed sites for students doing research. In addition to the Web links, the site offers clear, useful criteria for evaluating Web sites. Librarians and teachers could adopt these criteria as they evaluate sites on their own. Librarians may be able to get some interesting information for book talks from some of the author or children's literature sites.
This site could be a good starting point for teacher-librarian collaboration. Librarians can e-mail suggested lesson plans or Web resources to teachers or print out pages for them. Teachers can e-mail links to students or post them on a class wiki.
This could also be a good source of educational games--if teachers are looking for games to supplement classroom learning or games for kids to play during free time, the site has many links.
