Building Foundational Reading Knowledge through Apps

Developing children's foundational reading skills can be enhanced with these apps.

Print Concepts
Print Concepts Level I (.99)

Teaches child how to use capital letters, punctuation, and to identify the first/last word in a sentence.

Sight Words
Kids Learn Sight Words 1-300 ($8.99) from Teacher Created Materials
Note: Available also: Sight Words 25 (Free), Sight Words 1-100 ($4.99), 101-200 ($4.99), 201-300 ($4.99)

Letters/Sound Relationships & Spelling
WordWagon HD (1.99)
Drag and drop spelling games.


Letter Formation/Tracing
Alphabet Tracing (Free)
Free app that offers tracing guides for upper, lower case letters and numbers.  This app would need to be used with parent or teacher guidance as there is no indicator of having traced the letter/number correctly or not. Provides picture(s) for each letter and numeral.

Letter/Sound/Word/Story Writing
Montessori Alpha Write App
With this app, children can compose stories with pictures, tap to hear sounds, practice spelling and writing with single letters (color coded vowels and consonants) and phonograms and save work to the camera roll.

For Teachers to Personalize Instruction
Show Me Interactive Whiteboard (Free)
Allows you to record voice over tutorials and share them with specific students online.  There is an online community that can be found here, along with examples of other teachers' use of the app. Here is an example by a teacher, Lynne Peabody teaching students the at and an family for word producing. I think it makes for an interesting way to up the production and learning at centers.