Awesome Program–It is hard to believe this is a freebie!

To activate the website, you will need to sign up by going to the site (https://readtheory.org) or click here.

Take a look at the About Us page and you will find the articles are written by professional writer, educators, and award winning teachers.

Step One:

There are two options to create accounts. The teacher can click the create new student accounts and enter data for the students or in the case of older, more-independent students, have them navigate to ReadTheory.org, click students sign up, and follow the prompts. They will need your teacher email to enter into the form. When they have completed the task they will click the “Send Invitation” button.  The teacher will then log i ad accept the student from their account. Teachers will receive progress reports AFTER students have completed a pretest and taken one program quiz. You can create multiple classes and easily add students by checking the box next to their name and using the drop down “add to” button.

Step Two:

I recommend sending home the parent flyer (click on FAQ to access) or access here. It gives a good overview of the program and let’s parents be aware their student can access this from anywhere with internet.

Step Three:

Students will automatically be given a short pre-test (8 questions). This can be used as a benchmark. Students are placed according to their pretest scores and are leveled up as they score well on quizzes. The teacher can access the lexile level of the passages they complete. One nice feature is the ability to “reset progress” if you have a student who took a pretest and you feel it is not reflective of their ability.  (I know–they ALWAYS do their best and give 100%–but just in case). Please note the short pretest needs to be finished in one setting.

Step Four:

Students move directly from the pretest to a level-appropriate passage. Passages are high interest and vary from early elementary to college level. They are aligned with the common core. Students can change the text size by selecting the A under the title.

A big +

Students receive instant feedback. They earn knowledge points which can be motivational. These unlock extra titles and games built into the program. Challenge questions are slightly more difficult and worth additional knowledge points. After each question, there is a bar at the top indicating how many questions they have answered and how many are left.

At the end of the passage, students are given a progress report.

Teacher tracking:

Wow–Data collection is made easy in a free program. The teacher dashboard (accessed by clicking on the graph icon) gives a graph of your students knowledge points. quizzes taken, grade level performance, and lexile level performance. On the grade level graph, green scores indicate the student scored 90% or above and will be moved up a level. Blue scores are scores between 70-90 percent and the student will remain where they are. Red scores indicate a score below 70% and the level will be easier on the next passage.

Written Response Question

This can be toggled off/on. If selected, students will be given a written response question for each quiz they take. Student responses are sent to the teacher dashboard and their responses may be accessed by clicking the pencil at the top. The teacher will see a graphic organizer with the name of the student author, date written, and quiz level which they may score.

Advantages:

Quick assessments.

Some free printable which can be used for RTI.

Excellent valuable data in easy to access form.

Individual practice at reading level.

Free!  Wow–what a great resource to supplement instruction.

Disadvantages:

You cannot print passages and have students complete on paper. Internet access is required. There are, however, assessments available for printing. Click the printer icon to access.

Pretest gives lexile of each passage so students can see their level and infer whether they answered the previously question correctly. This is may be discouraging for struggling readers.

Does not allow student choice of passages.

Need additional reading resources to track student reading?  Check this out from my TPT Store.

Questions for each passage appear in standardized test format, helping students to prepare for high-stakes testing. Each passage contains these types of questions
 Main idea
 Vocabulary
 Organizational patterns
 Inference
 Summarizing

Nonfiction passages are based on events which occurred on this day in history. Although the topic was selected to correspond to a historical event, the passage is completely stand-alone and appropriate for any day of the year. Mix and match by purchasing the topics you want or save with monthly bundles and give your students daily opportunities to develop background knowledge and improve their comprehension.

The May Bundle contains the following passages:
May Day-Haymarket Incident May 1
Osama bin Laden
Kentucky Derby 
Freedom Riders 
Palace of Versailles
Mount Everest
Crown Jewels and Thomas Blood
J Edgar Hoover and FBI
Euros
US Constitution
WWII Gas Rationing
Cultural Revolution China
Brown v Board of Education
Plessy v Board of Education
Plato
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle
Bonnie and Clyde
Brooklyn Bridge
St. Louis Arch
Scripps Spelling Bee
Sojourner Truth
Memorial Day
Big Ben

Click here to see this product in my TPT store. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Brown-v-Board-of-Education-Differentiated-Reading-Passage-May-17-3719172

Want to try just one? Nonfiction passages are based on an event which occurred on this day in history. On May 17, 1954 the US Supreme Court delivered a unanimous ruling in Brown v. Board of Education. This passage is completely stand alone and appropriate for any day of the year. Mix and match by purchasing the topics you want or save with monthly bundles and give your students daily  opportunities to develop background knowledge and improve their comprehension.   Passages have been evaluated using a minimum of 5 different readability formulas. The first passage is the most challenging, with an average reading level of 9th-10th grade. The second passage has an average readability of 8th grade. The third passage averages a 6th-7th grade level.  With teacher introduction and  background information, the passages have been used successfully with younger readers.   One subject for the class with differentiated passages allows the teacher to discuss, develop background knowledge, show a video clip or engage the full class yet provide for individual differences.   Students and teachers using multiple passages can assess student progress. Diagnostic charting shows teachers and students patterns of errors with main idea, vocabulary, organizational patterns, inference, and summarization. Compiling data is easy  and motivating with student completed charts.   Included in the lesson: ➢ A nonfiction passage written at three different grade levels ➢ Questions over the passage for each level. ➢ An answer key ➢ A chart to monitor progress and collect data in the five assessed areas (main idea, vocabulary, organizational  patterns, inference, and summarizing)   Click here to view this product on TPT. Product is available for $3.00.