Reading Passages Resource: FREE

Quick post to share an excellent resource I used almost daily this last year.  Read Works (http://www.readworks.org).  Have you heard of it?  If not and you work with elementary, middle school, and high school students, you are in for a treat.

Let me start by saying that I am in no way affiliated with Read Works and I have not been asked to review the website nor am I receiving any reimbursement for my review.  This is simply a genuine and excited share of a fabulous resource.  

Read Works is a non-profit organization aimed to support reading comprehension.  By signing up for FREE you have access to research-based units/lessons and reading passages sorted by genre, grade level, and reading level.  I have been working to make my speech and language sessions align with common core standards and work addressed in the classroom while keeping the students' attention and motivation.  Knowing the topics covered in class or even in current new events, I go onto Read Works at the beginning of the week and find articles that aligned with those topics.  I print out a choice of articles...usually two.  During the speech and language sessions, I give a quick intro for each article and let the students decide which article we should work through.

We use the article to address all the speech and language goals.  For example, with articulation, I give each student a copy of the article and have them highlight their speech sounds.  Then we popcorn read through the article while practicing our sounds.  For example, with language, we stop at the end of each paragraph to summarize or discuss literary concepts in correct and complete sentences.  Clearly, the options are endless...those are just two examples of way I have used the articles to target speech and language goals. 

What are your favorite resources?