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Literacy resources for older students with reading difficulties | | | Years 5 to 9 | | |
Spinout Stories are collections of high interest stories and related activities especially designed to appeal to upper primary and lower secondary students who are still struggling with literacy.
Each story is available at three levels of reading difficulty, to suit a wide range of students. - Topics to suit older “early” readers
- There are two topics in each pack.
- Each topic offers two stories of different styles.
Some stories are fictional, some are informative. Some are both. All are designed to grab the attention of reluctant readers.
| Pack | Story | Topic | Style | | Blue | | | | | | Diesels and Dirt | large machines | information | | | The best mechanic | large machines | fiction | | | Saltwater Crocodiles | crocodiles | information | | | Reptile Zoo | crocodiles | narrative | | Red | | | | | | Gorilla Gang | dreams | fiction | | | Dream to stay alive | dreams | information | | | Shark Ride Bay | surfing | fiction | | | Surf Shop | surfing | narrative | Enrichment reading
Clicking on key words gives access to Spinout’s powerful hypertext facility, which encourages students to follow up more details of the story. This encourages students to read more and more in order to obtain information beyond the basic text of the main story.
For example, clicking on “trucks” (or on the truck in the picture) opens a new window of text that gives more detailed information about trucks. This text offers further links to words such as “engine” and “tray”, giving even more leads for students to follow their particular interests and encouraging them to read more adventurously.
Read it, hear it, write it, print it!
The computer can read all the story text aloud (with an Australian accent). It can also help students check their own reading by saying individual words (in a different voice) upon request. Voice Sample
Students can use Spinout’s facilities to write their own version of a story and print it, complete with all the illustrations, in black and white or colour.
Full colour books
The Spinout stories are supplied in book form as well as on CD. Extra copies are available: contact Greygum Software for details.
Extra skill-building exercises
Each CD contains related reading activities, based on the text of the stories on the CD. The activities are designed to develop students’ basic skills and to give them confidence in reading and understanding. All the exercises have been carefully designed by experienced teachers.
Pack | Exercise | Activity | | Blue | | | | | Jigsaw | word recognition
| | | Concentration
| word recognition
| | | Word Ladders
| building vocabulary
| | Red | | | | | Cloze
| reading with comprehension
| | | Wordsquare
| word recognition
| | | Quiz | comprehension
| Meeting individual needs
Using the Teacher Controls, Spinout Stories can be set up to meets the needs of individual students. Level of difficulty, fonts, special needs requirements and availability of printing are just some of the options that can be set.
The teacher can also check a log of the time each student spends on each activity to help identify an individual’s strengths and possible weaknesses.
Bonus package
Also included in each pack is a copy of Spinworks, a powerful teacher’s helper that turns any of the Spinout Stories, PM Story Books, Fitzroy Talking Readers or any text file into a set of worksheets in seconds. Details... Platforms Package includes CD suitable for both Windows and Macintosh.
Online Shopping
Please use this facility only if you want delivery within Australia, where the freight and tax charges are fixed. You don't need a PayPal account, just a credit card. If you want delivery outside Australia, or you are an educational institution and prefer to be invoiced, just fax or email us your order and we'll contact you for payment and shipping details. | Spinout Stories - Single User $143.00 (inc GST) | | | Spinout Stories - Site Licence $286.00 (inc GST) | | |
