"If we teach today as we taught yesterday, we rob our students of tomorrow." - John Dewey. Providing digital content to any students is important; providing it to our special ed students is critical. In addition to differentiated content, use of technology will become a meaningful, daily activity.
Our special education population includes delightful students with a wide range of abilities and various "labels," including attention deficit disorder, hyperactivity, autism, visual impairment, hearing impairment, and physical disabilities.
They come to school everyday, eager to learn. They CAN learn, but sometimes it takes additional time and a variety of approaches. Teachers in self-contained and resource classrooms work to preview lessons before they are encountered in the traditional classroom, review what has already been introduced, and re-approach concepts that are not grasped in the traditional modes of presentation. Our school serves children with a high level of poverty, but our statistics are not high enough to entitle us to Title I funds. Consequently, our teachers are often challenged to provide dynamic education with limited funds for supplementary curriculum materials. All our teachers work as a team to provide stimulating, appropriate education, sharing resources.
My Project
Providing individual educational programs is a regular service provided for our special students by their dedicated teachers. After a student has used the traditional textbook and the resources available in the regular classroom, the student support team seeks to provide additional learning materials for reinforcement. It is easy to exhaust the media center offerings. Big Universe is "an award-winning balanced literacy platform, providing K-8 students and teachers, curriculum resources across subject areas." The website provides thousands of informational and literary digital texts from a variety of publishers, online self-publishing, a global bookshelf sharing community, and robust management tools for educators. Such a vast amount of digital content will enable our teachers to design customized lessons for students, providing differentiated instruction. Offering engaging independent activities such as these will increase time for direct individual and small-group instruction.
Access to the Big Universe program will give our students access to thousands of ebooks, providing a fresh approach when revisiting challenging concepts.
With materials leveled from Pre-K through 8th grade level in four core subject areas, students will be inspired to read and write anytime, anywhere. The book creation tool will provide a means to create and share personal compositions, resulting in a balanced literacy experience. Digital differentiation will make a dramatic difference!
More than three‑quarters of students from low‑income households
Data about students' economic need comes from the National Center for Education Statistics, via our partners at MDR Education. Learn more
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mrs. Montarella and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.