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Background Knowledge and Where to Get It

Stephen Krashen argues that those who read more know more Wexler (2023) has pointed out that a reader’s background knowledge is a significant predictor...
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Reading Programs

A selection of tools to help readers succeed

Although initial test data show that in fall of 2020, students in grades 3–8 performed similarly in reading to same-grade students in fall 2019, the public health, education, and economic damages inflicted by COVID-19 are likely to exacerbate long-standing inequities disproportionately affecting Black, Latinx, and Native American students, as well as English learners and students with disabilities, according to NWEA (www.nwea.org/content/uploads/2020/11/Collaborative-brief-Learning-during-COVID-19.NOV2020.pdf).

“Preliminary fall data suggests that, on average, students are faring better than we had feared,” says Beth Tarasawa, head of research at NWEA. “While there’s some good news here, we want to stress that not all students are represented in the data, especially from our most marginalized communities.”

World of Reading—Readers in 37 Different Languages
World of Reading offers exciting readers in 37 different languages—bilingual, multilingual, and monolingual. They have board books, paperback books, hardback books, and digital books. They have graded readers in levels for elementary school through college, picture books, novels, and nonfiction from publishers worldwide, all at competitive prices, with discounts for class sets.
There are big books for preschool and bestselling adult fiction. They have both translations of classic readers and authentic readers in their original languages. Looking for a specific title or author? World of Reading loves special requests.
Languages include Albanian, Amharic, Arabic, Bengali, Brazilian Portuguese, Catalan, Chinese, Czech, Dutch, English (ESOL), Farsi, French, German, Greek, Gujarati, Haitian Creole, Hebrew, Hungarian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Kurdish, Latin, Maltese, Norwegian, Polish, Portuguese, Russian, Slovak, Somali, Spanish, Swedish, Tagalog, Turkish, Ukrainian, Urdu, and Vietnamese. Monolingualism can be cured!
www.wor.com


Lectura Books
Lectura Books offers award-winning bilingual and bicultural books (print and digital) in Spanish and English. They specialize in publishing for parent engagement for cultural competency and language development with English and Spanish learners and provide training and curriculum for educators.     Lectura Books partners with the Latino Family Literacy Project, an award-winning, research-based parent and family engagement program for English learners. The age-specific programs help parents to learn strategies for reading aloud, reading comprehension, vocabulary development, and ESL skills using culturally relevant books and educational materials. Their new and improved curriculum now supports dual language development in Spanish and English.
For more information about their award-winning supplemental curriculum materials and staff development workshops, please visit www.LecturaBooks.com.


Okapi
Since 2010, Okapi Educational Publishing has met diverse student needs through flexible, best-practice instructional resources for grades K–5, currently in use nationwide in a range of programs and a variety of instructional settings. Okapi continues to support educators and students learning at distance with their stellar lineup of literacy programs now available digitally on Okapi Digital Literacy™ (ODL). ODL includes books and supportive instructional material from all levels of their four flagship programs: Flying Start to Literacy™, Despegando hacia la lectura™, WorldWise: Content-Based Learning™, and ExploraMundos™. Users can build foundations necessary to launch students successfully on their path to literacy with more than 1,100 titles for small-group instruction and content-based learning. ODL provides easy-to-access digital books, downloadable lesson plan cards, and vocabulary starters in English and Spanish, with each English-language title matched by its Spanish counterpart. Regardless of the instructional approach a teacher has adopted, their emerging bilinguals will be assured of exciting and equitable resources in both languages.
myokapi.com

GO! ELL Tween Literacy Library
Saddleback Publishing’s GO! ELL Tween Literacy Library is a unique collection of fiction and nonfiction books aimed at upper elementary and middle school English language learners, including newcomers. Many of these learners struggle with reading and a limited English vocabulary. This makes it difficult to do well in content-area classes, where textbooks are often written above grade level. For this reason, the GO! ELL Tween Literacy Library focuses on social studies, math, and science topics in books written at accessible levels. Each engaging fiction and nonfiction book features age-respectful storylines and full-color photographs on every page to support beginning readers at the secondary level.

Organized in five content-based genres, this collection includes 20 unique titles. Each genre includes three fiction books and one nonfiction book. Special emphasis is placed on vocabulary, with five key vocabulary words highlighted in each book.
There is extensive teaching support for every book, including progress monitoring in the form of summative assessments and program checklists.
www.sdlback.com/go-ell-tween-literacy-library

Crabtree Publishing
Crabtree is a trusted leader in pre-K–9+ curriculum nonfiction and fiction books. With the goal of inspiring children with a life-long interest in reading and learning, Crabtree and acclaimed author Bobbie Kalman have been bringing beautifully illustrated books to schools and libraries for over 40 years.
Introducing Two NEW Early Reading Imprints
Crabtree Roots Collection
Reading level: Pre-K–1
Series: Farm Animal Friends (six titles) | Seasons in a Year (four titles) | My Favorite Color (six titles)
Developed by early learning consultants, books in Crabtree Roots feature simple text with pictures to aid in comprehension and help children learn to read with confidence. Available in English, Spanish, French, and Haitian Creole.
Crabtree Seedlings Collection
Reading level: K–2
Series: My First Science Books (eleven titles), My First Science Words (five titles), In My Community (ten titles), I Read-n-Rhyme (eleven titles), Little Stars (18 titles), Early Learning Concepts (eight titles)
The next level up from Crabtree Roots, books in Crabtree Seedlings engage early readers with a “read-to-learn” approach and build reading and early vocabulary skills required for higher-grade success. Available in English, Spanish, and French.
Roots and Seedlings books are available in print and e-book formats—including read-alongs. Supplemental teaching guides are included.
www.crabtreebooks.com/products/imprints

Curriculum Associates
Magnetic Reading to Help Build Students’ Reading Confidence
Curriculum Associates’ new reading comprehension program, Magnetic Reading, is designed to help students master critical reading skills. This blended, research-based program for grades 3–5 helps teachers facilitate classroom discourse and engage all students with grade-level content.
Magnetic Reading works seamlessly with i-Ready® Assessment to help students become confident readers. Using the data from the assessment as well as Magnetic Reading’s grade-level scaffolding report, teachers are able to craft a success plan for each student, student group, or strategic pairing.
Curriculum Associates partnered with the Johns Hopkins Institute for Education to ensure that each unit of Magnetic Reading comprises texts that effectively build knowledge in critical areas. The Magnetic Reading content was created using “culturally responsive teaching protocols,” developed by Dr. Sharroky Hollie of the Center for Culturally Responsive Teaching and Learning.
Magnetic Reading features three types of scaffolds: resources for preteaching, embedded supports for students, and formative assessment opportunities. It also includes strategic supports for English learners.
www.curriculumassociates.com/magnetic-reading

Bellwether Media
Bellwether Media wants to create a lifelong love of reading in beginning readers and, for those who have lost confidence in their reading ability, provide opportunities for them to once again love the feeling of picking up a book. Their imprints feature high-interest subjects, accessible text, and special features to spark curiosity and help children learn about their world.

At-Level Imprints

Blastoff! Beginners uses simple language and high-frequency words paired with crisp, colorful photos to encourage young children to become independent readers.

Blastoff! Readers is a carefully leveled imprint designed to guide early readers through each stage of their journey toward fluency. Each of the increasingly challenging levels is uniquely designed to build new literacy skills and reading confidence for emergent readers.

Blastoff! Discovery takes the reading momentum and consistency of Blastoff! Readers and launches a new mission: reading to learn. Each book ignites curiosity and offers the fluent reader an exciting universe to explore, using the skills acquired from Blastoff! Readers.

Hi/Lo Imprints

Torque thrusts students into the action-packed world of sports, vehicles, mysteries, and adventure. Extreme high-interest subjects are paired with low reading levels to motivate and excite striving readers.

Epic pairs ultra-high-interest content with ultra-low reading levels to inspire students reading well behind their peers. The books grab the attention of struggling and reluctant readers, creating confidence and bringing them back to the world of reading.
Through all of these imprints—those for emergent, fluent, striving, and reluctant readers—Bellwether creates premium nonfiction that sparks curiosity, ignites imagination, and instills in all students the desire to learn about their world.
www.bellwethermedia.com and www.bellwetherlearning.com

Pearson English Graded Readers
Share the love of reading with adult and young adult learners. Pearson English Graded Readers e-book libraries offer collections of graded readers by level in digital format. What makes Pearson English Graded Readers e-books special: online and offline access, embedded audio, front-of-classroom presentation tools, annotation tools, comprehension activities, and a rich variety of genres, including classics, nonfiction, contemporary fiction, plays, and short stories, all graded across ability levels according to strict language guidelines. With seven levels of Pearson English Readers and five levels of Pearson English Active Readers, teachers can enrich their students’ knowledge, improve their reading skills, and spark their love of reading. The Pearson English Graded Readers are perfect for programs that want to supplement standard English course materials and build their students’ English competence.
pearsoneltusa.com/readers
www.longmanhomeusa.com/reader-libraries

Reading Horizons
The Easy and Engaging Way to Align Reading Instruction with Reading Science
Reading Horizons is a simple, systematic, and sequential approach to teaching reading using a blended model of direct instruction materials and online software to support the learning process. The Reading Horizons curriculum is aligned with the principles of reading science and structured around Orton-Gillingham multisensory phonetic cues. This method equips beginning readers, struggling readers, and English language learners with the skills they need to read, spell, and pronounce words with proficiency.

They Support Users, Every Step of the Way
Included with every implementation, Reading Horizons Accelerate® helps teachers fully implement the curriculum with on-demand resources for training, lesson planning, and technical support. They also offer customized implementation support, training, and continued professional development through their customer success, implementation, and certified coaching programs.
Visit ReadingHorizons.com for a personalized demo today.
“You have made the implementation process extremely smooth and customer-friendly. I have been working with SEVERAL curriculum companies implementing new curriculum for the coming year, and Reading Horizons has hands-down been the most user-friendly and supportive. You are laying out each step clearly and comprehensively. It makes my job so much easier and makes me see the success that we will have with this program because I know that with all of your support, time, effort, and training, there is no way we can fail!” Carrie Mugridge, reading director, West Franklin USD 287 KS
www.readinghorizons.com

Scholastic
Make Every Read-Aloud Experience Intentional and Instructional 
Award-winning children’s writer and acclaimed author Dr. Lester L. Laminack provides guidelines, lessons, and resources to engage students in deep thinking about fiction and nonfiction books. Central to Laminack’s message is his breakthrough thinking about the value and importance of “best friend books”—a small, carefully curated collection that teachers turn to repeatedly for specific teaching purposes. Laminack underscores the profound instructional value of literature in the classroom and helps students discover the magic of literacy and language. 
Each grade-level kit includes fiction and nonfiction best friend books, a teacher’s guide for each text, teaching cards, a copy of Laminack’s professional book The Ultimate Read-Aloud Resource (second edition), and online access to resources for teachers, students, and families.  
https://shop.scholastic.com/teachers-ecommerce/teacher/shops/lester-l-laminack.html

myON
Research shows two key factors can help boost student reading: motivation and access to books. With myON, students get both. Students can choose from personalized reading recommendations, dynamically matched based on their grade, interests, and reading level, or browse the vast library of thousands of engaging digital books and age-appropriate news articles in English, Spanish, and additional languages.
myON aims to engage students in frequent, high-quality reading practice with robust scaffolds, close-reading tools, professionally recorded audio, and a built-in dictionary that helps students build reading and writing skills.
myON’s comprehensive approach to personalized literacy includes all the tools educators need to guide and enrich their students’ reading, along with customizable assignments and reports to help nurture and monitor progress, then celebrate students’ achievements.
www.renaissance.com/products/myon

Learning Without Tears
The research is clear – handwriting can influence students reading, writing, language use, and critical thinking. Without explicit instruction, students are missing a vital literacy building block.
Build the foundation for literacy with NEW hands-on learning packs from the award-winning Handwriting Without Tears curriculum. We use fun, engaging, and developmentally appropriate instructional methods to enable children to master handwriting as an automatic and comfortable skill.
Get a bundle of our favorite writing materials for use in and out of the classroom. Each kit, available for students Kindergarten through 2nd grade, comes individually packaged with instructions and a wide range of multisensory materials needed to boost literacy skills, including our beloved Wood Pieces for Capital Letters and a slate chalkboard, little sponge cubes, and little chalk bits for Wet-Dry-Try! Our equitable handwriting program offers materials available in both English and Spanish, with support for English language learners.
A strong handwriting foundation creates literacy success!
https://go.lwtears.com/reading-showcase

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