Inference Ace

Week of March 14^th - March 18th

The name of this week’s app was called the “Inference Ace.” This app was designed to help students build strong inferencing skills. When students develop strong inferencing skills, this will help students’ level of reading comprehension increase. After reviewing my students’ data, I realized that this was an area that needed to be readdressed. Inference Ace will help students to learn the different types of inferencing and even keep track of which types of inferencing the student is better/worse at completing. Lastly, the app has a couple of different levels that will actually time the students to check their fluency. This was important to me because I wanted to see how the students’ fluency, or rate they are reading, changes as they transition from reading with me to themselves or a partner.

I used this app as an engagement technique in guided reading. For every two weeks, each of my guided reading group has a topic that we focus in on. We have covered topics like main idea and details, summarizing, finding themes, comparing and contrasting, cause and effect, and a few more. But there was one large third grade topic that I realized that we had not covered as much as I would like: making inferences. Finding inferences throughout a passage are a hard concept to complete and to do it well. As I began to talk about inferences with the students, I realized that they had no clue what it was. What they had previously learned about inferences had not stuck. So I decided that for the next two weeks, that would be the area of focus during guided reading groups. After lesson planning, I realized that I wanted to make inferencing fun for the students. I researched and found the app called “Inference Ace.” It had received wonderful reviews, so I decided to see if this app would help to motivate my students more to read and better understand the concept of making inferences about pieces of text. As a way to get the students ready for the guided reading lesson, they were allowed ten minutes on the app, reading passages and making inferences.

This app received mixed results from my students. I think a majority of them liked it but it did not help them to see themselves as a better reader or did not help them to become more motivated to read. For question one that asked them to rank the overall score of the app, students ranked Inference Ace with a 3.67. That was honestly a little higher than I expected, which means that most students actually do like being challenged to find the inferences in a passage. For the second question, which asked them if the app made them feel like a better reader, eleven said yes and eleven said no. My class is pretty much split based on academic ability, so this result from the survey did not surprise me. The third question asked the student if the app motivated them to want to read more. The average score was a 3.68, which means that for most students Inference Ace made them want to read more. For the fourth question, the average score was a 3.59. This question focused on whether or not the app had an impact on their thoughts about themselves as readers. Lastly, the fifth question asked the students if they would use Inference Ace again. According to my results, seventeen students would use this app over again and five students would not.

There were many positives and benefits that I saw from this app. The first benefit that I saw with this app is that it really helped my students to understand making inferences. All of my students started out struggling with this app and the questions it asked. But after a couple of days, where we practiced with this concept over and over again, the students got better and better. Inferencing is a hard concept to learn, so this app was extremely helpful to explain what inferencing was and how to do it. The other positives of this app were that it is written in a way that helps students with their testing skills. It presents the questions in multiple choice and gives the students four choices to choose from. The app is written in a way that is suitable for all of my third graders, which includes all of my really high students and my really low students. I feel that it asks questions that hit both of extremes in my class. Lastly, the app rewards the students once he/she gets a certain number of questions correct. This incentive and reward is a positive reinforcement for the students.

The biggest negative that I saw with this app was that, for as many levels as my students completed, the passage that the students had to read never was longer than three sentences. I was disappointed in this because I feel that students have to first find the clues to make the inference and then figure out the inference. A lot of the questions were basic and I thought they could have made the questions a little harder. For this app to work the best, I think that it would be helpful to have different levels that the different academic levels of students could compete during class. Another negative that I saw with this app was that it did not have a read aloud feature. A few of my students really still need this and when an app does not have this feature, some of my lower students struggle and dislike the app.

The biggest change that I would make with this app would be to find a way to extend the passages for the students to read. It is not only important for the students to be able to make the inference but they also need to look for the key words and details that support the inference. Also, I would have added this app into the Free Centers rotation so the students could have the extra time to work on this area of focus. Lastly, I would find a way to better explain to the students how to connect making inferences and increasing motivation to read go hand in hand with one another.

3rd Grade Friendzy

Week of March 7^th- March 11^th

This week’s app is called 3rd Grade Friendzy. According to their website, this app is a, “trivia based application aligned to the Common Core standards for third grade”. This app has an unique feature about it, which is why I personally liked it so much. 3^rd Grade Friendzy has a social component. Students can play this app and challenge themselves, their friends, or other students from around the world. This attribute of the app appealed to me since I have a very competitive class.

I used this 3^rd Grade Friendzy App as a part of our Free Centers rotation. Students were allowed to use this app during their own free time when they finished their work and during their Tuesday’s and Friday’s Free Centers periods. The students were allowed to choose one of the following English Language Arts area: reading, vocabulary, or language. Each of these topics relate back to becoming a better reader, which is why I provided my students with choice. This game became a competition for a few of my students which helped them to focus in on practicing their reading by using this app.

Overall, this app received mixed reviews from my students. After talking to a few, I feel that the students really enjoyed the competition portion of the app. On the other hand, I think they felt that the questions and the reading portion of the app was too easy for most of them. For question one, when the students ranked the app with an overall score of 2.32. I thought this was a pretty accurate representation after discussing with the students their thoughts on the app. When the students were asked if they thought the 3^rd Grade Friendzy made them feel like better readers, six said yes and sixteen said no. I contribute those results to the level and degree of the questions. The biggest complaint I heard from my students was that this app was too easy for them. For question three, my students averaged a score of 2.64 in helping to increase motivation to read. I was hoping that for this app, this question’s score would be higher because of the competitive component in the app. I was a little disappointed to see this score not average higher. For question four, the students’ average score was 2.55. Lastly, the students responded with eleven yes and eleven no’s for question number five. This showed me that the students were pretty much split down the middle on their thoughts about using this app again.

The biggest positives that I saw from this app were two important things. The first positive about the app was that it helped students with their testing skills. The multiple choice questions are written in ways that are similar to what they need to be use for their progress monitoring. By practicing these types of questions, becoming test takers will follow. The next positive of this app was the competition portion of the app. I loved how it challenged the students to be better than yesterday, but also gave them the opportunity to compete with their classmates and other third graders around the world. Overall, this app was a fun and engaging way to review ELA topics like reading, language, and vocabulary.

There were a few negatives or parts of the app that I know my students and myself did not like. First, I did not like how the app only asked multiple choice questions. I felt that after a while the questions became repetitive and were too easy for the majority of my students. Next, I felt that this app did not help the students to become more motivated to read. I think this was because of the setup of the questions. It never gave the students a passage to read or sentences to try to figure out. The questions asked were basic and not entirely related to just reading or reading comprehension. Lastly, I did not like the set-up of the app. My students struggled to understand how to work the app and that wasted some of their time on the app.

The biggest change that I would enforce in my classroom when the students use this app is having the students pair themselves up with students who may not be on their same reading level. There were a few issues that students who struggle with reading went up against students who are great with reading. This was not good for the student who struggles with reading and their confidence level/ self-esteem in themselves as a reader. I would make sure that students challenged another student who was in their reading group or assign them a student from another reading group that they will be compatible to when competing. 

Vocabulary SpellingCity

Week of February 29^th- March 4^th

Since a lot of schools and districts push on the importance of phonological awareness, phonics, spelling, and vocabulary as a major component of reading, I wanted to incorporate an app that focused on them. I found the award-winning app called Vocabulary SpellingCity. When looking at the app, I liked what I saw. Vocabulary SpellingCity provides spelling, vocabulary, writing, and language arts activities for K-12 cross-curricular word study. According to their website, “Our primary focus is now on vocabulary, especially the meaning of words used in specific contexts. We offer seven vocabulary games and activities, plus two writing activities, in which students can demonstrate their mastery of the meaning of words by using them in context, writing their own sentences and paragraphs. Our activities to build phonological awareness and phonics skills use a patent-pending technology developed by Vocabulary SpellingCity. These games let students see and hear words sounded out, spelled, and used in a sentence.” Looking through the app, I liked the games and activities that were offered for the students for their spelling and vocabulary words.

Overall, I thought this app was going to be a great addition to our classroom. I used this app during I & E time (interventions and enrichment). I decided to have students get on this app every morning for about ten to fifteen minutes to participate in an activity that quizzed them on their vocabulary/spelling words for the week. Students who struggle with their spelling and vocabulary test had to go on the app every morning throughout the week. My other students, who do well with vocabulary or spelling tests had to go on the app only three times that week. I set a routine for each of them and by Tuesday they knew how to get on the app and which activities they could pick to complete. Every morning the students seemed excited to get on the app and work for a little bit of time, so my data collection came to a surprise to me.

The students did not like this app at all. In my honest opinion, I think most of my students are too high to see the benefits of the app. I talked to my students to better understand why they did not like this app. The higher students told me that it was way too easy and they wanted to be able to read more instead of practice their spelling and vocabulary. (To me that was great news! It has been my goal to help shape them into lifelong readers!) But my students who are lower and struggle with vocabulary and spelling seemed to think that this app was okay. They thought it would be fun to do on their iPad or computer at home. One of my students told me that his mom lets him do the spelling quiz every night during the week before Friday and he received an 80 on his spelling test compared to his normal grade of a 30 or 40. My students gave this app an overall score of 1.77. Obviously, my students were not really a fan of the app. When the students were asked if this app made them feel like better readers, two said yes and twenty said no. The average score for question three: 1.68, which asked them if the app made them more motivated to read, gave me the overwhelming sense that it did not. The students also did not give this app a high average rating for question four (1.59) that asked them if it helped them to see themselves as better readers. Lastly, when asked if they would use the app again, one student said yes and the rest said no. I was actually really disappointed with these results considering that it is an award winning app.

The biggest positive that I saw from that app was talking to my one student who really seemed to benefit from using the app. I think the app gave him the confidence booster he needed to do better on his spelling test. I even wrote an email to his mother so she can see what made the difference in his spelling scores, because we have been struggling to find something to help him all year long. The app and website has a lot of cool features and activities that you can choose from to help you expand your vocabulary and practice your spelling skills. I love how the app uses words from different subjects. For example, on the app you can choose to practice words about geometry, space, U.S states, etc. I think this would be a great app to use with English Language Learners- especially if you are going to be talking about any of the topics on the app and using those academic words that they might not be familiar with. Also, the activities on the app are helpful. They all can help with increasing vocabulary and spelling skills.

There were a few negatives that I saw with this app, besides that it did not go over so well with my students. First on the app, you can only choose from a list of words which in my eyes was the biggest negative. But on the website, you can type in the words you want to use! So when I implemented this app in my classroom, some days the students would use the app on the iPad and other times they would go on the website through the iPad. I wanted them to be able to practice their words for their spelling test on Friday which is why I made them do that. Another negative that I saw the more that I used this app was that in a way I can see how my students thought it was “babyish.” For my higher students who do not struggle with spelling or vocabulary, they did not like how the app read the sentences and found the activities to be boring. The app is supposed to be used for students K-12 and I think it is more age appropriate for students under fourth grade.

The best part of implementing this app is that I found something to help one of my students who has been struggling with his spelling and vocabulary all year long. This app has given him a new boost of confidence that will hopefully help him to continue to be successful with his spelling and vocabulary tests. I’ve decided that he will be on this app during I & E time for the next couple of weeks and I want to continue to monitor his spelling and vocabulary scores to see if this app continues to make a difference. If this app can help this student, then by all means, implementing this app in my classroom was one of the best things that could have happened!