ACTIVE LEARNING STRATEGIES
TO HELP YOUR STRUGGLING STUDENTS BE SUCCESSFUL IN CLASSROOMS
Presenter(s)
David Bradburn
Kurzweil Educational Systems Street Address:
Day Phone: 781-276-0600
Fax: 781-276-0650
Email: davidb@kurzweiledu.com SEP28 2U05
Students
with reading and learning disabilities struggle to understand and learn from
text, as a result of problems with decoding, reading fluency, vocabulary and/or
comprehension. Oftentimes, spelling, composing, handwriting, organizational
skills, and study skills are impacted as well. These same students are
typically frustrated in the traditional content area classroom, as demonstrated
by their failure or under—achievement. But, they can learn and experience success
when provided with appropriate learning supports.
Kurzweil 3000 is the premier reading, writing and learning software for
struggling students. Because it is also content—independent, teachers in
elementary schools, middle schools, high schools and colleges alike use it to
help students succeed in the classroom regardless of their curriculum or lesson
plan.
Kurzweil 3000 features have been developed specifically to support
student in their interactions with text. The tools can be used by teachers to
scaffold supports for diverse needs, and then by students to help them make
sense of what they have read. Students learn to look for main ideas and
supporting details, to create study guides, to increase their vocabulary — to
integrate what they have read with what they already know.
In
this workshop, participants will approach Kurzweil
3000 from the educator and the student perspectives. Kurzweil
3000 takes text from virtually any source — a textbook, the web, a PDF file, a
Word document — and simultaneously reads it back to the student using a
patented dual highlighting system. Students are always looking at an exact page
image, so what they see on the computer screen looks exactly like what their
peers are seeing on paper. Word study supports are available on the toolbar so
they can check for definitions and synonyms, have individual words decoded and
syllabicated or spelled out loud.
Teachers
can provide prompts and notes to students using a variety of annotation tools.
A sticky note can be placed at the top of the page with the assignment; a
footnote can be left with a study question at the start of a paragraph where
the answer can be found; a voice note can be left reminding students that the
test is on Tuesday and what it will cover.
Using
the highlight and extract features, teachers can teach their entire classroom
to search for headings, main ideas, and supporting details to formulate study
guides and outlines. As students become more independent learners, they can use
these same annotation tools to track their assignments, to answer chapter
questions and complete assignments, and to formulate meaning from text to
support their learning.
Worksheets, tests, and job applications can easily be completed using the writing and annotation features of Kurzweil 3000. Students can hear the questions and their answers cad back to them in context, providing an auditory check of their work. A spell checker and vocabulary lists with homophones and confusable words help to support writing, and content specific vocabulary lists can easily be added.
Kurzweil 3000 provides universal access to text for the range of diverse learners in today’s classrooms; with Kurzweil 3000, struggling students can read, write, and learn independently and do so at grade level!
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