News and reflections from experts and practitioners on the latest literacy research, events and daily practice
Welcome to Learning Ally's blog. You've come to the right place if you are an innovative teacher who wants to transform more struggling readers into grade-level achievers.
October 4, 2022 by User
In April, Learning Ally team celebrated National Volunteer Appreciation Week by recognizing the amazing community that makes up our #VolunteerNation. Now, as we jump back into the school year, we would like to personally acknowledge two volunteers who go above and beyond—even as they pursue their own education.
Arwa Ouali is a high school senior and an integral member of our volunteer community. Since joining our team in 2020, she has donated as many as 262 hours, researching school districts to support outreach, and performing quality checks on our audiobooks. “She is someone who you can always depend on,” says Maria Lelie, Learning Ally’s Program Manager of Volunteer Services. “She has a strong ability to assess community needs, learn tasks quickly, and jump right into a project.”
Newer to Learning Ally’s Volunteer Nation, Adoesha Taylor has quickly become an integral member of the community. As a college senior, Adoesha is on track to receive a Bachelors of Science in Business Administration this spring. Despite the rigorous demands of college life, she has already donated 22 hours since she joined our team last year. “Only recently joining our volunteer community, Adoesha has already made an enormous impact, serving on three high-priority projects in less than one month,” explains Lelie.
Recently, Ouali and Taylor worked together to research school districts and school principal contacts in Massachusetts. The aim of their work was to identify districts that may be eligible to receive a state grant. Grants of this kind allow U.S. schools to provide their students with additional support without ever spending a dime. Many of the students who depend on Learning Ally are able to do so as a result of government grants. However, a surprising amount of districts are unaware that these programs even exist.
Luckily, this outstanding volunteer duo were able to curate a list of 137 eligible schools, and they did so in less than a week. Thanks to their diligent work, principals at these schools will now be made aware of this awesome opportunity.
In another recent project, Ouali and Taylor helped to expand Learning Ally’s volunteer network. This time, they focused on the civic engagement departments at colleges and universities, nationwide. In less than one day, the two volunteer superstars scouted 170 new contacts at 86 different schools. These efforts will help connect Learning Ally with many more young volunteers, like Ouali and Taylor, who are committed to making a positive impact on struggling readers.
“Find an organization that is aligned with your beliefs and take the initiative to start,” says Ouali encouragingly. “Volunteering has proven to be rewarding for me and gives me a feeling of fulfillment”.
Taylor shares the sentiments, “[Volunteering] can help connect you to others, advance your career, teach you new skills, and impact the lives of others”.
If these two superstars sound like you, you may be a great addition to our #VolunteerNation.
Learning Ally is always excited to work with motivated community members who are passionate about supporting students, educators, and schools.
To join our network and make an impact, simply fill out the Volunteer Interest Form.
Categories: General, Volunteerism
September 26, 2022 by User
The month of September has a special place in my heart. September always symbolizes “Back to School” for me and the excitement of learning and reconnecting with friends and teachers. It is also International Literacy Month. Founded by UNESCO, this month we are meant to reflect on the importance of literacy for individuals, communities and societies, and the need for intensified efforts towards more literate societies.
As literacy champions, this is not something that we do just once a year. You are focused on literacy all year long, as are we, in our collaboration to solve the literacy crisis and to help students to read and learn for success in their school years and beyond. So I wanted to take a moment during International Literacy Month to celebrate you, our community of educators for all that you do to support America’s students. Thanks to you, in the last school year we really made a difference together. You have persevered through a global pandemic, through the challenges of remote and hybrid learning formats, through the ongoing harsh realities and the imposition of disrupted learning, and the heart breaking social-emotional issues that have emerged and impacted our students, our classrooms and ourselves.
Our partnership has grown in strength and in numbers. Our impact with Learning Ally Solutions now extends to over 2 million students, and supports nearly a half million educators in schools across the country. Our work together continues to accelerate, with pages read by students through the Learning Ally Audiobook Solution reaching over 161 million, a gain of 20% from FY19 and quadrupled since FY16. Our work together continues as many of you have brought and implemented our newest solution for emergent readers, Excite Reading™ into your PreK-2nd grade classrooms, supporting the building of foundational reading skills in the earliest school years. Our work together continues as we join together in our Professional Learning Solutions, events and communities, immersing ourselves in the training, conversation and inspiration that promotes the literacy leadership required to drive transformational change at scale.
The struggle is real. The early summaries on the soon to be released NAEP scores highlight that even while our work and impact grows, we are still seeing the majority of students falling behind, especially those with learning differences and those from poor and underserved communities. Lifting up these communities through literacy is key to educational equity and solving the literacy crisis. Students can’t learn if they can’t read. And they can’t learn to read if there are barriers present impacting their ability to learn. That is why our solutions are informed by our unique approach, Whole Child Literacy™. This approach is designed to understand how each child learns. It focuses on three major components to learning to read, including the core foundational skills, based in the Science of Reading, that contribute to reading comprehension and skilled reading, and as importantly it addresses the cognitive and environmental factors that impact how a student learns. Through this approach, we’ve piloted solutions that have doubled the rate of reading growth for students and measured a host of benefits for teachers and students that include reduced prep time and alleviated stress for teachers, increased student achievement and independent reading, and growth in self confidence and class participation. We are thrilled to be able to partner with even more districts and schools this year, to support educators in delivering personalized instruction at scale and positive student outcomes.
Your role as teachers is the key to unlocking the potential for your students. As you return to school, energized to tackle the challenges and guide your students in their academic goals, we are here to support you. Thank you for all that you do as literacy champions and for your partnership. Our students are fortunate to have your continued dedication and expertise. Here’s to making literacy leaps in the coming school year!
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Andrew Friedman was appointed to Learning Ally as President and CEO in January, 2011. As CEO, Andrew has led the transition from a government funded library of audiobooks for students with disabilities to a leading nonprofit, education solutions organization aimed to solve the literacy crisis in America by 2040. As an innovator, dedicated to educational equity, Friedman has championed the development of Whole Child Literacy Solutions and an “ecosystem” approach to breaking down the barriers of inequity in education. Friedman serves as a connector for partnerships between Districts, Policymakers, Researchers and Families/Communities, to bring a coordinated and orchestrated effort to benefit students across the country and drive transformational change in literacy and learning achievement.
Categories: Audiobook Library, Education & Teaching, General, The Digital Age
BeLinda Martin, an English Language Arts and History teacher, faces a challenge familiar to many educators across America. Students come to her class not liking to read. Some have never passed a reading test, and others even fake reading because they don’t want to look dumb.
By fifth grade, struggling readers are disheartened. They label themselves as poor readers. They have reading angst, which makes reading comprehension that much harder. For these students to become successful readers, applying a whole child literacy strategy could be the key to unlocking their potential. "If you don’t like to read because you cannot understand the story, you are not going to feel good about yourself as a learner," says Mrs. Martin. Her whole child literacy strategy includes dynamic teaching which entails making reading fun and enjoyable. This approach helps to change the way her students perceive themselves as learners.
Dynamic Teaching…Let the Play Begin!
"Unless children intrinsically enjoy the act of reading and get value from it (pleasure, knowledge, confidence, respect from peers), they will not produce the desired achievement levels,” says Mrs. Martin. “Audiobooks are a beneficial resource to remove reading stigmas, especially with students who have difficulty decoding words. Watch their eyes move across the screen. You can almost see their minds processing information. Decoding becomes less intense. Students read with more comprehension, fluency and frequency.”
In Mrs. Martin's classes, you won’t find neat rows of chairs. What you will find are students busily rotating through reading stations. For thirty minutes, they focus on skill building exercises. Her reading instruction revolves around education “game-like” activities that fifth graders can relate to: roll the dice, theater role-play, artistic expression, and human-read audiobooks. Story selections feature protagonists who display perseverance. Learning Ally's skillful narrators make characters and plots come alive for readers.
Students can curl up in cozy chairs with a print or digital book and enjoy the extra time and support they need to have a really awesome reading experience. They read aloud and work on individual reading skills. They learn new vocabulary words using artistic expressions. They carry on conversations with peers and their teacher to demonstrate knowledge. They build skills to reinforce reading engagement, comprehension, social and communication skills. Reading at home independently is encouraged.
In her Texas Region 14, many of Mrs. Martin's students have achieved top reading scores. They all passed to the following grade -- an exceptional accomplishment for struggling readers. “My students were over the moon with pride, and so were their parents!”
Thanks to Mrs. Martin and her dynamic teaching instruction, more struggling learners and non-readers now enjoy reading. They are working successfully, and their learning confidence is on par with grade-level requirements. With the right resources and creative expression, reading can be fun!
Categories: Assistive Technology, Curriculum & Access, Education & Teaching, Educators, Learning Ally “How-To Use”, Reading Strategies for K-12, Student Centric Learning, Teacher Best Practices
September 19, 2022 by User
Casas Christian School is a 2022 recipient of Learning Ally’s Winslow Coyne Reitnouer Excellence in Education Award, an award recognizing exemplary educators and schools. Principal Joshua Kempf says, “Our mission is to meet each student where they are in their learning process. The “readiness-level” approach is a core value to identify literacy needs in small group instruction.”
Voted Best Private Christian School in Tucson, Arizona for four years, this school is unique because of its “readiness-level” education philosophy valuing the whole child.
Whole Child Learning - A Top Priority
Mr. Kempf’s teaching team conducts its mission with consistent needs assessment, continuity of instruction, an instructional SIS support team, and close relationships with families. SIS stands for Student Instructional Support, a team assisting teachers in meeting individual needs. After evaluating scientific research studies on evidence-based reading instruction grounded in the science of reading, Casas took a 180-degree turn in the reading curriculum -- from a balanced literacy approach to a structured literacy program. School leaders participate in professional development workshops like the Learning and Brain conference to broaden their knowledge of the science of reading and then share it with other school staff.
Student Instructional Support
Classrooms conduct learning in small group rotations where the SIS teacher and classroom teacher work with subsets of students on decoding multi-syllabic words, another subset on specific comprehension strategies, and another on depth and complexity with higher-level texts. The beauty of this model is there is no stigma or labels attached to students because SIS teachers work equally to approach, meet, and exceed standards. The team also models for students how to advocate for themselves and to set growth and achievement goals.
Schoolwide Screening to Advance Literacy
The SIS support staff provide critical, systematic, and explicit instruction. Within their processes are school-wide screenings to identify learning gaps as early as possible. Teachers are trained in dyslexia to help identify and provide reading support. Students with cognitive challenges such as executive functioning receive an accommodation plan and SIS assists teachers in breaking large assignments up into smaller chunks, providing note-taking support, and the use of appropriate assistive technology. “We’ve heard incredibly positive feedback from parents, teachers and students about Learning Ally’s resource,” says Mr. Kempf.
Home-School Communication
In their school-to-home relationships with families, Casas has grown dramatically in their efforts to connect with families who are expecting the school to help their children love learning, and to feel valued and connected, especially during the global pandemic.
In this effort, teachers send visual representations home so parents can see what is going on in the classroom, along with having an open line of communication regarding readiness-level groupings and progress. “Students with all types of learning needs flourish regardless of their ability or circumstance,” says Mr. Kempf. “It is our job to let them know that they are ‘okay’, just as they are.”
Mr. Kempf recalls a conversation with an Instruction Support Director presenting Learning Ally data about a sixth grader with learning barriers. “The data showed a positive trajectory toward literacy growth in fluency and fundamental skills,” he said. “Learning Ally is a massive resource for teachers to monitor reading progress and learn about students’ reading behaviors. We believe our model is beneficial for any school who wants to provide more individualized instruction by adapting and meeting each student’s abilities at their ‘readiness level,’ and to use resources and support to advance them forward academically, spiritually and emotionally.”
On behalf of the Learning Ally organization, we congratulate Casas Christian School and Principal Joshua Kempf for exemplary service to improve literacy for all learners.
Categories: Awards, Early Literacy, Education & Teaching, Educators, Reading Strategies for K-12, Student Centric Learning, Teacher Best Practices
September 8, 2022 by User
September 8, 2022 Princeton, NJ– Learning Ally, a leading nonprofit education solutions provider working to improve reading outcomes in U.S. schools, has won a 2022 Tech & Learning “Back to School” Award of Excellence in Primary Education for its new Excite Reading.™
Excite Reading™ is a Prek-2nd Grade supplemental reading program that takes a holistic approach to early childhood literacy. It is grounded in research-based learning principles integrated with Learning Ally’s Whole Child Literacy™ practices. A library of engaging ebooks are curated into coherent, thematic text sets and paired with standards-based lesson plans to help teachers bridge the gap between a child’s emerging decoding and comprehension skills. The program will build a deeper context of subject matter through rich vocabulary, language, and comprehension practice, while encouraging curiosity and wonder in young learners.
Heather Wiederstein, Vice President of Solutions Design for Learning Ally, said, “Early childhood is an essential time to build foundational reading skills– both word attack and comprehension of texts– for all students. It is imperative to provide extra support for students who need more preparation, who may be entering the early grades with limited word or background knowledge exposure or have an undiagnosed learning disability. Excite Reading™ does both well and supports a joyful culture and community of reading in the classroom.”
Excite Reading™ stories come from Learning Ally’s rich e-library of vibrant, culturally responsive titles to engage emergent readers through human narration. Using authentic contemporary literature, children can explore exciting themes such as gardens, insects, communities, and the arts, crossing important domains to learn about science, art, and history. Learning activities extend reading at home with families, and make important social and emotional connections with prompts for valuable discussion. Corresponding teacher guides drive instruction to a higher level of discourse using relevant vocabulary to express questions, answers, and ideas to stimulate critical thinking.
“Thank you Tech & Learning for acknowledging Excite Reading™ as a beneficial instructional resource in primary education,” adds Ms. Wiederstein. “The nation’s drumbeat is loud for using evidenced-based principles in the science of reading to improve reading outcomes. Ending the literacy divide and improving reading outcomes is what our organization is best known for.”
Excite Reading™ also won a 2022 Readers’ Choice Award by SmartBrief on EdTech. This award celebrates early educational products making a lasting impact on the education industry through innovative solutions, the latest technology, and pioneering problem-solving.
About Learning Ally
Learning Ally is a leading education nonprofit dedicated to empowering educators with proven solutions that help new and struggling learners reach their potential. Our range of literacy-focused offerings for students in Pre-K to 12th grade and catalog of professional learning allows us to support more than 2 million students and 445,000 educators across the United States.
Read more information about Excite Reading™
Visit Learning Ally School Solutions or call 800-221-1098.
Categories: Awards, Early Literacy, Education & Teaching, Educators, General, In the news, Press Releases, Reading Strategies for K-12
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