Reading Bear

Jerica Dungca

ED638-01

January 13, 2018

Fall Intercession 2017

Dr. M. Rivera

IRA Newsletter Weekly Project: Effective Literacy Website #7

            Reading Bear (http://www.readingbear.org) is a free online program that teaches beginning readers how to read. The program is aimed to teach reading for children ages 4-7. It can also be used as a supplement resource to help children who struggle with reading to master the basic phonics of letters and words. Therefore, Reading Bear is an effective literacy tool that could benefit young children and beginning readers.

            This online reading program is a project of WatchKnowLearn.org, which is a non-profit organization of St. Charles Place Education Foundation. Reading Bear introduces all the main phonetic patterns of written English and vocabulary concepts through innovative media presentations. The program offers 50 carefully designed presentations that cover the phonetic principles and includes over 1,200 vocabulary items with illustrations.

            Since Reading Bear is a free program, parents and teachers can use it as a resource to teach their students how to read. The presentations can be viewed as a video or an interactive slideshow. In each presentation, the phonetic rules are introduced and illustrated with picture examples. For the full version, the presentation will start with sounding out a word slowly and quickly. Then students will be prompted to blend the word slowly and finally blend the word quickly. As students blend and pronounce the sounds, the corresponding letters are highlighted. After practice with pronouncing the word, the presentation will then show a picture of the word, use the word in a sentence, and show a video illustrating the sentence.

            Young children and beginning readers can benefit from Reading Bear’s program because the presentations are progressive. The presentations make learning to read, fun and easy! Children can go through the presentation and learn at their own pace. The presentations are made into short and simple sessions, rather than long, difficult ones. Students will not feel as pressured and can learn in a stress-free online environment. Reading Bear breaks down the reading process so that students can learn and master the fundamental phonics and vocabulary skills. With the Reading Bear program, the process is easy so that students can make gradual progress.   

            Overall, Reading Bear benefits teachers, parents, and students! It is a free program that parents can use at home and teachers can use in their classrooms. Teachers could use Reading Bear to teach and reinforce phonics and vocabulary skills with students. Teachers can incorporate Reading Bear in their lessons with the whole class, small groups, or individual students. It could also be a great resource to teach and support ESL students with learning to read. In all, Reading Bear offers an innovative program to teach children the basic reading skills needed to build their reading comprehension.