You probably recognize Larry’s blog from a few of our Literacy Voices Roundup posts. He writes a great blog full of useful links for teachers. Since it’s that time of year when folks are heading back to the classroom, I asked Larry to write a guest post for us on his favorite sites. You can check out more of his suggestions on his blog by clicking here.

Luther Burbank High School in Sacramento, California, has sponsored a Family Literacy Project for the past three years. The school provides home computers and Internet access to over forty immigrant families, and 80% of household members use the school’s English-learning website at least one-hour each day.

The project was awarded the 2007 International Reading Association’s Presidential Award for Reading and Technology. Students participating in the project have gained between twice and four-times the English reading improvement than immigrant students who are not in the home computer project.

Our website is used by students throughout the world, and we have blog that provides updates to new resources, including over one hundred “The Best…” lists sharing the best websites for various learning opportunities.

Here are our choices for the best websites to teach and learn English literacy:
The Best Websites To Help Beginning Readers - The number one website to help beginning readers is Starfall. Starfall has been helping people learn to read for years, and it’s still the best. Its scaffolding is great, and its stories - both fiction and nonfiction - are engaging

The Best Websites For Beginning Older Readers - the number one ranked website for beginning older readers is Reading Skills Stories from Marshall Adult Education in Minnesota. They have Reading Skills Stories 1 and Reading Skills Stories 2. There are many leveled, high-interest accessible stories with several follow-up activities for each one. They also have a great Student Lessons section, too.

The Best Websites For Intermediate Readers - The very best website for Intermediate readers is Into The Book. This is an absolutely incredible resource designed to help students learn reading strategies - visualize, predict, summarize, etc. For the past couple of years it had only been partially completed, but now all its exercises are finished. Users are led through the process of learning each reading strategy with interactive exercises.