Raz-Plus for Reading Support in our Homeschool
We have been homeschooling for 3 years now, and I have tried many things, but, I want to share with you what has been doing wonders for my kids and in turn, me! Raz-Plus from Learning A-Z. They have more readers than you can count. In all grade levels. Plus lesson plans, worksheets and more.
Ras-Plus works great for my kids + for me
They have an app too, Kids A-Z which my kids just love ? to use! They pick and choose the books they are interested in, within their appropriate reading level (which, you set as the teacher).As the teacher and when you order Raz- Plus, you have a lot of great resources at your fingertips. Add students, passwords, levels, assign books to read, check up on the books they are reading, listen to their readings that they record and see the results from the quizzes they take.
Every time your child reads a book on the Kids A-Z App and does a quiz (quizzes begin at level A) they get more⭐ stars!My kids enjoy seeing them add up, which is both fun and motivating! It gets them to read another book and take another quiz.
In the app, the books read to you the first time you choose it, to help your kids hear what the book is about. As it reads, each word is highlighted. After that, your child can then go and read it themselves and record them reading it, or you can record them reading it with you. ?I do this with my younger sons, who enjoy doing things with me still and aren't really ready for reading alone. I hope this will encourage them to read on their own.Once this recording is done, it is saved to their account and you can access it anytime, listen and see how they did and you can send them bonus stars and messages too! They can also play it back and listen while they go through the book again.
My kids are really enjoying this reading program and the Raz-Kids app! They enjoy the books and the books are being reread often. I think their favorite aspect of this program is the recording you can do of the books and listen to it back.The quizzes are easy to take, and they have the audio button options for them to listen to the questions and the answers.
Because my kids love technology and apps, this really is a great program for reading that doesn't feel like too much of a chore. It also gives them educational screen time.
What other teaching resources does RAZ-Plus have?
When you sign up for Raz-Plus, you get Raz kids (all the books for them to read) but also access to the teacher zone which is basically the back end with unlimited downloads, ability to manage your students and much more!I really enjoy it, it's easy to jump from reading level to reading level, print out a few books and worksheets, and assign those books to your students. We have tried Reading Eggs in the past, and it seems to focus more on the interactive lessons then reading books. Those lessons became too repetitive and ultimately lead to my children not doing it at all. The other downside I see to Reading Eggs is that it removes me from their lesson. I prefer to have the lessons be one on one, about 20 minutes a day.Raz-Plus has an incredible amount of lesson resources, such as guided reading lesson plans, phonics and grammar worksheets for you to use in addition to the books on the app, that all correspond to the reader.My favorite part about the books is that you can download and print them to keep a real physical copy for your kids to read any other time.
How we use it in our homeschool
We use it in addition to other great Language Arts Curriculum such as the Peaceful Preschool and the playful pioneers. More about these coming soon! I want to share with you how we store all of the books and the worksheets in our homeschool.
Here is our trusty caddy. I store all their readers in this caddy for easy access, along with the worksheets. It has come in handy in our homeschool and it seems to be a popular choice for storage.
Here are the books and worksheets I have printed out for Connor to read this month.
Printing, and assembling the books is one of my favorite things to do actually because it is so simple. I print them in black and white but when we get more color ink I may print some in color.
And here are the books for Logan to read this month with corresponding worksheets. He is my preschooler, and before this, I didn't really have anything as simple for him.
When you have multiple ages of students learning at home, it can get out of control with methods and plans for teaching language arts, at least it has been for me. I print them off, and when we get the one on one time to sit down we just get right to it.
We are using personal bulletin boards and the drawer system for our kids right now, so they can store what they need and show off their work. I pin up the books for the week or month that we are going to be working on. My kids like going and grabbing their book and sitting down to do their work.
Here is Logan (PreK) enjoying reading this book about farm animals and cutting out the activity. This was easy to do, he enjoyed it and really felt good about the school work he had accomplished that day.
We read the book a couple times, and he does his own twist on the worksheet.
Because he is a Pre-writer, he dictates to me and I write down his thoughts and stories.Connor found some books he really enjoyed, while he was on the app so those were the ones I printed off for him because we are working on what his interests are, to help motivate him to do the table work.He too is in the jot-it-down stage and so he will draw pictures and dictates to me his thoughts or answers.
What do I like most about the Raz-Plus reading program?
The thing I like most about Raz-Plus is that the kids really do enjoy the books, and I feel good about being able to offer them books that are at their reading level, along with lessons that can help further them along.With multiple ages and levels, I really did feel a bit lacking for them in this department. I kept on trying to create lessons from scratch, with free printables here, and laminated packs there. Those were fun, and they worked at the time. But now, I just love how simple this is, and how efficient as well, because when it comes to lessons, these are all done, easy to print, easy to assign and if you have an iPhone or iPad for the kids, all of them can be reading at their own pace anywhere in the house, anytime. Also, for those of you who like to know what level your child is reading at, and support them in their reading journey, this is a nice one for just that.
There is a Free 14 Day Trial
If you are curious about this program and wondering if it could work for you and your kids, I suggest that you give it a try! They have a 14-day free trial of Raz-Plus. Go for the Raz-Plus! Check out what it has to offer you as the teacher.And that's a wrap everyone! Thanks for stopping by! I would love to hear what you guys think in the comments below. Do you use Raz-Plus in your homeschool?Till next time,Breathe deeply and enjoy building your masterpiece with scissors and glue!-Alexandra