Education is often misunderstood or over simplified. This is because formal education encompasses so many different types of knowledge and skills. One type that gets some discussion is fluency. I’m thinking of two distinct areas which seem to me to have much in common. For instance, they are both vital, they are both achieved in elementary school, and they both require lots of practice. I’m talking about phonics skills and math facts.  In both areas, automaticity is necessary.  If s student takes more than a second to read a word when they have to sound it out, then the student will not have g ..read more

WritingCity is an elementary writing program which has been popular due to its ease of use. Teachers like the day by day lesson plans and the support by the technology program.  A WritingCity efficacy study done with fourth graders in school in  NJ showed an 11.2% improvement over the control group.  More specifically, the WritingCity students’ scores increased by 6.6%, the control group’s scores declined by 4.6% for an overall improvement over the control group of 11.2% The Challenge of Effective Writing Instruction in Elementary Schools Providing an explicit writing curriculum that embeds me ..read more

Even as we rolled out SpellingCity, teachers and literacy coaches asked us to provide the same flexible practice tools to focus not just on spelling but on recognizing and working with sounds.  They asked for help not just with the spelling of words but with learning phonics and building phonological skills. So we decided to help students construct and decode words by working with the sounds and the letter blocks that represent them.  The idea was simple: We wanted to treat words like “tooth” as three blocks of letters which correspond with the three sounds: T, OO, and TH. But, as we search ..read more

The English language is hard partially because of some ambiguities in key terms that are used daily. There are words that are just confusing. Worst of all in my opinion is the word “sorry”. The phrase “I’m sorry” can mean dramatically different things that are easily confused.  At a funeral, I might say “I’m sorry” to express sympathy or empathy for the person’s lost. But it’s not an apology or admission of guilt. I’m not suggesting that I caused the death. If I bump into someone on a crowded bus and say “I’m sorry”, it is a sort of apology or at least a recognition that I take some r ..read more

Learning language skills can be challenging for students of all ages and skill levels. That’s why VocabularySpellingCity is offering some valuable teaching resources for parents of students with learning disabilities. Our unique applications help students improve their spelling and vocabulary skills. Students with special needs, specifically ADD/ADHD, Autism, Dyslexia, and Language-Based Learning Disabilities thrive with our engaging platform. Colorful graphics and amusing sounds in our games and activities make learning fun for the student. As we all know, when something is fun, kids not only ..read more

Tim Rasinski is a renowned professor of literacy education whose research on reading fluency and word study has made him a literacy hero to many. Below, he shares his thoughts on teaching idioms. Some of the most challenging words (and phrases) for students to learn are those that are metaphorical in nature – words not meant to be taken literally.  Idiomatic expressions, a type of figurative language, are among the most challenging words for students to learn. Expressions like going bananas, it’s raining cats and dogs, a chip on your shoulder, and it’s all Greek to me, are not to be take ..read more