Kimberly Giuliana Research Topic: Language Arts K-3 Prepared: July 19,

Slide Contents Introduction Summary Detailed Findings –Mrs. MaddenMrs. Madden –AbcteachAbcteach –KidwritingKidwriting –American ReadingAmerican Reading –StarfallStarfall Conclusion Appendix

Introduction The following information is geared towards teaching language arts in a Balanced Literacy, Primary School setting. Language Arts in a Balanced Literacy classroom includes teaching both reading and writing in five different settings: 1.Guided reading/writing 2.Modeled reading/writing 3.Shared reading/writing 4.Independent reading/writing 5.Interactive reading /writing –What is Balanced LiteracyWhat is Balanced Literacy Within a Balanced Literacy classroom you will see a variety of things going on during language arts within a 90 minute uninterrupted block of time (literacy block). The children are engaged in workstations while the teacher works with a small group (guided reading). The children are told from the start of the school year how the literacy block works and how important it is to follow the procedures during this time.

Many classrooms today are Balanced Literacy classrooms; it’s taking some of the old way of teaching and mixing it with a lot of the new ways of teaching, and has been proved to be very successful. Within this report I hope to show some of the amazing websites available out there to aide teachers in keeping up to date with current trends and giving them many links to some fabulous websites geared towards the Balanced Literacy Classroom. These websites can be used for teachers, students and parents and I hope that you too will find many of them as beneficial as I am finding them.

Summary Many new websites for teachers, parents and students. There are a variety of websites out there for teachers to use, some sell products or programs, some have ideas with lots of links that you could spend hours searching and others are for the students to reinforce or practice through a variety of learning games. Today we all use a variety of technology in our classrooms and many of us are always trying to make our lessons even better to help our students stay interested while learning. Any help we as teachers can get to better our planning or to aide us in the classroom is welcomed and appreciated. All of the websites I have researched are linked in the appendix of this report under the IAB (Internet Address Book)and a detail of each can be linked through the Research Excerpt, also linked in the appendix. There you will see many websites created by teachers, for teachers. In my opinion these are the best sites to view if you are looking for new ideas. These sites also give you many links to other teacher created websites, but be careful you could lose yourself for hours. In the following slides you will view my top 5 websites. I hope you too will find them beneficial

Detailed Findings In this section I have listed my top 5 sites for aiding the teacher in finding the most creative ways to help teach his/her students in a Balanced Literacy Classroom. 1. Madden’s Marvelous Movie Stars 2. abc teach 3. Kidwriting 4. American Reading Company 5. Starfall

Madden’s Marvelous Movie Stars Madden’s Marvelous Movie Stars was created by Amy Madden a 2nd Grade teacher who has been teaching for the past 9 years in South Carolina. Her site was created through Teacher Web, and there is a yearly fee to keep it going. This site has a lot of information for teachers, parents and teachers, from creating literacy bags and links to other teacher websites to academic links for her students and their parents. Here is one of the topics on her site I visit often for ideas: Literature Circles Literature Circle Project Showcase Page Click here to see pictures of students working in literature circles and examples of students' extension projects.Click here to see pictures of students working in literature circles and examples of students' extension projects.

abc teach Abc teach is a great website for teachers who are in need of a worksheet that has already been prepared. The site is broken down into many subsections, some by month, by subject/theme and also by grade levels. This site does have a membership fee, yearly; however it is a quick fix if you are in need of a worksheet and close to a computer, instead of having to buy or rummage through a lot of your own material, a quick time saver.

Kidwriting The Kidwriting website, was based on a writing program created by 2 Philadelphia teachers, Isabelle Cardonick and Eileen Feldgus. This website is for purchase of the book, however it gives you a great overview of what the program is about. It also gives you many links to look at along with examples of student work.

American Reading Company The American Reading Company is another reading program used in a Balanced Literacy Classroom for independent reading. It is a program created by Jane Hileman, an inner city and suburban school teacher, professor, staff developer, and literacy activist. This program links both home and school and focuses on children reading books that are at their “just right” level. “100 Book Challenge doesn't just teach children how to read...it teaches them to want to read.”

Starfall This website is geared towards your students, but not limited to them. There is also a section on the site for both teachers and parents explaining how starfall will work for our students/children. This site reinforces the subject of language arts, focusing on reading and phonics. Children can enjoy this site at home and at school. It is a free site and also has free downloads for extra practice. When starfall first came out a few years ago, teachers flooded the site because they were giving away a lot of free material for students, they have since put it on the site for you to download, but still free and what teacher does not enjoy receiving free material for his/her students.

Conclusion The websites researched in this report were chosen for their wealth of information. Some of the sites were programs. Others were sites with a great deal of ideas and information. There are some sites made by teachers for their classroom, so they can share what they are doing with their students, their parents and their fellow teachers, you can always find a lot of plans or ideas for teaching on these sites. With a little time you, the teacher, can find a great deal of information from new topics or programs to creative ideas for teaching. All of the sites I have mentioned or have linked to, can be used to create and run a truly magnificent, Balanced Literacy Classroom where children will enjoy learning and teachers will never get tired of doing the same thing year after year. AUDIO CONCLUSION

Appendix The following are links to the files that were used for this report Research Excerpts File IAB (internet address book) Sample Research Page Research Report