Recently, the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) came out with their 25 Best Apps for Teaching & Learning for 2014. The apps were chosen because they foster innovation, creativity, active participation, and collaboration.
Subtext is one of these apps. The app is designed to help teachers with their Common Core instruction by encouraging students to analyze their material, clearly communicate what they think, and make connections to their real life experiences. A tip from AASL: “Teachers can assign an article to students and include the critical thinking questions directly in the passage so students will be able to connect the ideas as they read.”
Subtext is available on iOS or as a web-based app. It’s a great value because it is free and recommended for all grades K-12. See what educators have to say about Subtext:
So, I came back from the MLA and MEMO conferences charged up with new ideas, which is a good thing!
And, maybe because of some new awareness, three interesting things have converged in my world within the last two weeks….
One task I assigned myself is to finally enter my book collections into Goodreads, and take the hundreds of scraps of paper containing books I want to read, and enter them in my “to read” Goodreads shelf too. Now that there is a mobile app, I can go to the library and easily pull up my wish list right on my phone. And yes, eventually I can even scan in the new bestsellers while out shopping, that I want to read, but am too frugal to buy! So, I am well on my way with Goodreads!
Then, I heard about Subtext, an app that allows groups of people to read books together online, and comment in the margins, highlight text, do polls, and other things you might expect to do verbally in a face-to-face bookclub. Free books, by grade levels too, so this app has K-12 schools written all over it!
Then, I discovered a literature blog called, The Hub: Your Connection to Teen Reads, from YALSA,the Young Adult Library Services Association of ALA. This site provides a one-stop-shop for finding information about teen reads, including recommendations for great teen reads, information about YALSA lists and awards, book trailers and other book-related videos, and best of the best lists. They also just did a series of posts about “The Next Big Thing”, and the one about social reading caught my eye. Amazingly, they mention Goodreads and Subtext as tools for new online bookclub possibilities. So now, my head is buzzing with other new possibilities. Read the full blog post at http://tinyurl.com/9mkpygg.
Please share your comments about whether you use Goodreads or Subtext, and whether you already host or participate in online book clubs in your personal or professional life. Maybe we can form a little bookclub community!
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Recently, the American Association of School Librarians (AASL) came out with their 25 Best Apps for Teaching & Learning for 2014. The apps were chosen because they foster innovation, creativity, active participation, and collaboration.