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Many members of our community of educators have told us that digital learning is crucial in their programs and classrooms. That’s why we’re thrilled to partner with companies and organizations focused on creating and curating quality digital content to bring interactive reading, math games, critical thinking, writing practice and more to under-served children.

Here are a few of our favorite digital education tools:

1. Reading Rainbow Skybrary
Do you remember reading books with LeVar Burton while watching Reading Rainbow® on TV? The Skybrary® platform picks up where the beloved children’s television series left off, bringing its mission of comprehension and intellectual engagement into the Digital Age. By infusing digital books with purposeful interactivity, engaging narration by master storytellers, and paired with delightful videos hosted by LeVar Burton, Skybrary® captures the magic of the original show while helping children find relevance and understand context in their reading.

Skybrary® is a carefully curated, ever expanding interactive library of digital books and video explorations designed to engage young readers and foster a lifelong love of learning.

Members of the First Book community of educators can purchase two classroom subscriptions to Skybrary School for the price of one. Click here to find out more.

2. Words with Friends EDU

Our partners, Zynga, developed Words With Friends EDU to bring the fun of Words With Friends into the classroom. The Words With Friends EDU platform provides a safe environment for students learn new words as they play with their classmates.  As they play, teachers and parents can track students’ progress using custom teacher dashboards.

Discover this free learning tool here.

3. Homer
With hundreds of hours of reading lessons, a vast library of stories and songs, and endless virtual field trips, Homer gives your program a boost of confidence and creativity! The Homer Learn-to-Read program was developed by teachers and literacy experts, built on Harvard and Stanford studies, and backed by Gold Standard research. Use of the platform has shown to increase reading scores by 74%!

Click here to learn more about Homer Learn-to-Read Program.

4. Open Ebooks

Developed through the White House ConnectED initiative to reach children from from low-income families, Open Ebooks is a free app that grants access to a digital library of thousands of popular and award-winning children’s and YA eBooks.

Allowing kids of all ages and their caregivers to instantly download up to 10 eBooks at a time to their mobile digital devices, Open eBooks makes it possible for educators and librarians to actively teach digital literacy, encourage family engagement, and share the love of reading through millions of mobile devices already in the hands of young people and their families.

You must be registered with First Book to use this app. If you are not yet registered with First Book, click here.

To learn more and request access codes to download Open Ebooks, click here.

5. Speakaboos

Speakaboos is a digital storybook platform that motivates children to read, explore, and discover stories they love based on their interests. With a catalog of over 200 interactive stories that feature a mix of read-along word highlighting, narration, and animation to enhance vocabulary, reading comprehension, and fluency, Speakaboos cultivates literacy and language learning skills for children from preschool to third grade.

Thanks to our partnership with the creators of this innovative digital tool, a one-year subscription of Speakaboos is available members of the First Book community of educators for free.

To learn more about Speakaboos and start your free subscription, click here.

For further information about these digital learning tools and to explore more digital learning resources, visit the First Book Marketplace.

The post 5 Digital Education Tools for Educators Serving Kids in Need appeared first on First Book Blog.

My name is Jan Mader and I'm an addict.  What am I addicted to you ask?  Words!  Big words.  Little words. Squeezed in words and specifically...
                 Words With Friends!
I'd like to say I'm ready to stop playing but that's just not the case.  I could play Words With Friends till the cows come home. I play in between reading my emails. I play Words with Friends while I'm in a doctor's office.  It's better than reading magazines I tell myself.  Who knows what kind of germs are on the pages of those  mindless reads!  I keep my germs to myself.

I play Words With Friends while I talk on the phone.  I play while my husband watches TV.  After all, I tell him, my mind is working while I'm playing my game.  Your mind is just being entertained.

I play Words With Friends while while I drink my morning coffee and until well after bedtime.  Time zones have become my friend.

And speaking of friends....some of my best play Words With Friends with me now. I'm hopeless.  Not only am I an addict I'm creating addicts.

I'm sure at some point my new favorite thing to do will get old, but for now I don't care.  Isn't that what all addicts say?  I don't care. If 'it's not a problem for me so why is it a problem for you?

Gotta run now.  I'm sure there's a word that needs to be defensively squeezed somewhere!

Get ready for a very different kids’ media landscape (as Disney and Nickelodeon go head to head for ratings. Disney is trying to bolster itself for the fallout after losing shows like “Hannah Montana” and “The Wizards Of... Read the rest of this post

In a total game changer for the worlds of toys and technology (Hasbro and Zynga have teamed up to make toys and board games based on Zynga’s popular online video games. Starting with Words With Friends, the partnership will also see FarmVille,... Read the rest of this post

Pride & Prejudice author Jane Austen stars in a new video game called “Word Fighter.” The video embedded above shows two characters from the game, J.D. “The Hero” (an orphan scholar) and Neil “The Rival” (an ivy league graduate student).

According to Pixels, Panels & Playthings, the game’s developers were influenced by Princess Peach Toadstool (from the Super Mario Bros. franchise). Jane “appears to be a very prim and proper lady … but when it’s time to throw down, she’s ready to destroy you.” The game will be available for iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch and Android devices.

Here’s more from the article: “Inspired by Boggle, Scrabble, Words With Friends and Super Puzzle Fighter, the object of the game is for players, as famous authors personified by their literary works, to spell words quickly on separate tile grids. The better the word — based on length and letter value — the more damage you do to your opponent. Special power-ups like attack multipliers and tile shufflers are added to the mix, so it can be anybody’s game.”

New Career Opportunities Daily: The best jobs in media.