Teach your Monster to Read
Created by: Teach Monster Games
Teach your Monster to Read is an application as well as a website, available on all iOS and Android devices. It is based on a child's early literacy development. This means that it includes basic skill-building from matching letters to letter sounds and pictures, to reading small skill-building books. This digital resource focuses on early phonics instruction and reading games, so it is the best fit for lower grades.
This resource has a great resource area for teachers to monitor and assign phonics development for early learners. Since it is aimed for early learners, teachers could utilize this program as a tool to reinforce and strengthen the reading skills of students who may be struggling to grasp these early concepts, or as a way to encourage and support ESL students to engage with the English language. Within the easily findable "Teachers' Area", there are resources for teachers to bring the program to a whole group setting, as well as tips for implementing and introducing the program. Teachers are encouraged to create profiles for their students, so that they can easily log in at home or in the classroom. By creating a class, teachers can also track progress, and recognize if a student has been on a "planet" for a long time, and may need extra support. Teachers are able to view reports of student progress, as well as find additional resources to reinforce phonics and reading development in early readers.
This program is designed based on research for phonemic, phonological, and reading development. There are no external advertisements, so it allows for minimal distractions. Since this program's skill practice is game-based, the students are consistently engaged and learning key skills to develop their reading. There is a strong reward system, which praises the students for their success, and inspires them to try their best and continue to succeed. The students cannot be monitored on their amount of time creating and editing their monster, which could be distractive. Since the content is repetitive, it ensures that the students have a lot of exposure to the concepts, and are receiving quality information and quality time with the phonics practice. Since it is a story-based program, there are not a wide range of texts or cultures represented, because the "champion readers" are reading simple sentences to build text awareness. One area I would be cognazent of would be assigning this as a resource for a whole class. Since students are at such varying ranges of reading development, it is important to only assign resources that will further the individual's reading development. This resource should be for early readers, before they have a lot of experience with time in text because it is a resource that builds student's foundation for reading.
For Students
This resource is designed to guide students through their first two years of learning to read through a progression of skills. Students are immediately engaged when they open the app or website and get to create their own monster. The program is story based, so the students are engaged in a mission to fix their ship and progress through the galaxy. There are three different "stages" of the program through which the students, and their monster progress. The first phase is called "first steps" where they build their letter-sound correspondence, as seen above. Here, they practice connecting sounds to letters and images. The second phase is called "Fun with Words", and is pictured on the left. Here, students learn how to segment and put letters and letter sounds together. The final stage, "Champion Readers", shown below, is where students put all of their knowledge together and read small introductory books. The other phases of the game are slow and repetitive, however, this section moves quicker and is more challenging so that it best fits the new abilities and learning speed of the student. The books are highlighted, and read aloud to the student to gain exposure with fluency, pace, and letter-sound correspondence. Here, the students are exposed to short sentences. Throughout the resource, students are able to progress through different planets, which keeps them engaged and encourages them to progress through the program.
For Teachers
This resource has a great resource area for teachers to monitor and assign phonics development for early learners. Since it is aimed for early learners, teachers could utilize this program as a tool to reinforce and strengthen the reading skills of students who may be struggling to grasp these early concepts, or as a way to encourage and support ESL students to engage with the English language. Within the easily findable "Teachers' Area", there are resources for teachers to bring the program to a whole group setting, as well as tips for implementing and introducing the program. Teachers are encouraged to create profiles for their students, so that they can easily log in at home or in the classroom. By creating a class, teachers can also track progress, and recognize if a student has been on a "planet" for a long time, and may need extra support. Teachers are able to view reports of student progress, as well as find additional resources to reinforce phonics and reading development in early readers. Response
This program is designed based on research for phonemic, phonological, and reading development. There are no external advertisements, so it allows for minimal distractions. Since this program's skill practice is game-based, the students are consistently engaged and learning key skills to develop their reading. There is a strong reward system, which praises the students for their success, and inspires them to try their best and continue to succeed. The students cannot be monitored on their amount of time creating and editing their monster, which could be distractive. Since the content is repetitive, it ensures that the students have a lot of exposure to the concepts, and are receiving quality information and quality time with the phonics practice. Since it is a story-based program, there are not a wide range of texts or cultures represented, because the "champion readers" are reading simple sentences to build text awareness. One area I would be cognazent of would be assigning this as a resource for a whole class. Since students are at such varying ranges of reading development, it is important to only assign resources that will further the individual's reading development. This resource should be for early readers, before they have a lot of experience with time in text because it is a resource that builds student's foundation for reading. 
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