Issue link: http://educator.cta.org/i/477973
C A T L I N T U C K E R doesn't think students are taught how to read digital material properly to maximize comprehension. "With Common Core assessments on the horizon, my concern is that most students do not have the digital reading skills or technology literacy needed to be relaxed or confident in this digital testing environment," says Tucker, an English teacher at Windsor High School. To be suc- cessful on computerized exams, says Tucker, students need to develop reading stamina, transfer active reading skills from paper to the computer screen, answer text-de- pendent questions, identify textual evidence to support answers, and practice navigating the tools embedded in the computerized exam. "These are no small tasks," says Tucker, Windsor Dis- trict Educators Association. She published her first book, Blended Learning for Grades 4-12, in 2012 and co-authored Creating a Google Apps Classroom, which was published in 2014. Her blog, "Blended Learning and Technology in the Classroom," can be viewed at catlintucker.com. Tucker includes more digital texts in her curriculum, such as articles at Newsela.com, a news website where educators can search by subject to find articles on a variety of topics available at a range of Lexile levels. (A Lexile measure indicates the level of an individual's read- ing ability and the difficulty of a text.) A teacher simply clicks at the Lexile level appropriate for a student, and the article's vocabulary and sentences change without altering the topic or information being presented. This makes it possible for teachers to differentiate instruction while exposing students at differing reading levels to the same information. To help students retain information they have read digitally, she encour- ages them to annotate online and provides strategies to identify and define unfamiliar words, underline words or phrases, predict what will happen next, etc. It's similar to highlighting and writing notes when reading regular books. By Sherry Posnick-Goodwin "With Common Core assessments on the horizon, most students don't have the digital reading skills or technology literacy needed to be relaxed or confident in this digital testing environment," says Catlin Tucker,with Casandra Vargas. Helping students go deep with online reading Teaching ideas Learning 45 V O L U M E 1 9 I S S U E 7