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To celebrate Language Magazine's partnership with the TCEA (Texas Computer Education Association) at its annual convention in Austin this month, here is a selection from the wide range of products on offer

Cantata Learning Offers Multi-Sensory Stories

To achieve a complete multi-sensory learning experience that engages every type of learner, educational publisher Cantata Learning has created books enhanced with music. These pre-K–3 products combine engaging stories, delightful illustrations, and fun songs for a unique learning experience.

All Cantata Learning products have accompanying melodies to support student engagement and learning. Music is a fun, proven method of introducing new language and concepts to a broad range of students, including ELL/ESL and SPED. Songs can be used in a variety of ways throughout the school, including the library or classroom, to strengthen language skills such as pronunciation, grammatical structure, and vocabulary. All books come with a CD that contains three different tracks: the book, the song only, and an instrumental version of the song. Free access to all of the songs can also be found on Cantata Learning’s website, where the music is available to stream or download.

Librarians and other educators can choose from hundreds of books on the site, where they can search for lessons by subject, grade, reading level, and music genre. Topics span the entire curriculum, from language arts and social studies to STEAM, as well as additional subjects, such as social emotional learning and simple sing-along stories. Examples of titles include “Animal Feet: A Song about Animal Adaptations,” “Little Red Riding Hood,” and “Make Every Day Earth Day: Caring for Our Planet.”

Additional resources on the Cantata Learning website include specially built lesson plans centered around Cantata Learning stories and songs, research articles about literacy and the use of music and movement to teach children, and presentations on best practices for implementing this teaching method.

myON 3.7 Gives Teachers a Clear View of What Students Are Reading

myON, a business unit of Capstone and leading provider of personalized literacy solutions in the K-12 marketplace, has released myON 3.7, an updated version of the myON Digital Library and Faculty Report. The newest version of myON provides a variety of updated features aimed to give educators a clearer view of what their students are reading and how their skills are developing as they read.

Major new features include trackable Lexile Scores, standard correlations by book title, K-2 benchmarks for younger readers, and title usage reports that give teachers insight into which titles are being read and what students think of them. 

Teachers can now filter student assignments by roster, and by group. Educators can assign start and end dates for reports, and may also search by name, filter by grade, and display the top 10 or 20 students in a large roster. To help educators share reports, myON 3.7 offers new, easier print commands and the option to download reports as CSV files.

Redcat Access Fills the Classroom with the Teacher’s Natural Voice

The Redcat Access by Lightspeed Technologies is a receiver, amplifier, and speaker all in one. Frequently paired with the Lightspeed Flexmike Microphone, the Redcat provides clear, complete audio coverage to fill any space and help distribute a teacher’s voice evenly throughout the classroom. Incorporating Redcat Access into daily lessons saves teachers’ voices by making them more audible and more intelligible—without raising their voices. Teachers wear the Flexmike Microphone around their neck, so it captures every word and leaves teachers’ hands free. Sound is delivered wirelessly from the Redcat, filling the room with the teacher’s natural voice and enabling students to hear the entire lesson no matter where they sit in the classroom. Redcat delivers whole-room audio with exceptional clarity, maximizing students’ time on-task and allowing everyone, including ELLs and those with hearing impairments, to hear better and learn better.

ThinkCERCA Launches Blended Learning Planning Tool

ThinkCERCA has launched a new Classroom Planning Tool to its personalized literacy platform. The tool enables teachers to customize classrooms into blended learning environments that create personalized learning experiences for students.

Teachers begin by searching for a model based on their school’s level of technology access and time constraints. The platform then generates a selection of robust classroom models, which include station-based rotations, leveled groups, responses to intervention, and many more. Once educators select a lesson model, they are provided with a suggested schedule for completing a differentiated lesson set, step-by-step instructions for incorporating ThinkCERCA into the classroom, classroom setup suggestions, and even advice for customizing each model.

Teachers can set up blended implementations that are aligned to their school’s level of technology access, schedule, and instructional plan, offering a variety of learning models to fit the needs of every classroom.

ThinkCERCA’s Applied Reading & Writing lessons were designed around research-based best practices such as differentiation and peer-to-peer discussion. The Planning Tool allows educators to seamlessly incorporate ThinkCERCA usage into their classrooms while staying focused on the classroom activities and practices that lead to student growth.

The ThinkCERCA Lesson Library features a curated array of minilessons, passages, and automated and constructed response assessments. These standards-aligned lessons can be delivered directly to students at their individual levels of readiness. Lessons are leveled for grades 3-12 and are developed by master teachers and nationally recognized literacy experts, such as Gerald Graff, Doug Buehl, Katherine McKnight, and Doug O’Roark.