Project Description

Take Me To Your Readers for grades K – 2 was created by Vanderbilt University’s Young Children’s Literacy Project under the direction of Dr. Diana Sharp and supported by a grant from the IERI consortium of the National Science Foundation, the U.S. Department of Education, and the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development. Targeting word-recognition skills and the development of literacy habits, Take Me To Your Readers has 8 components that are connected by a common theme and a set of engaging outer space characters know as the “aliens.”
	Videos: Take Me To Your Readers presents a set of 12 animated videos that provide instructional information for parents and children in a "fun" context. In these videos, aliens from a non-reading planet come to earth to learn how to read. A variety of children partner with the aliens, teaching them to read and providing models of effective parent-child interactions around books. Recurring themes include: Reading Books, Talking about Books, Building Vocabulary and Knowledge, and Cracking the Code. These videos may be sent home with each student to be viewed with a parent or reading partner.
Coloring Books: 12 printable coloring books are available from the Take Me To Your Readers software. These coloring books supplement each video with a variety of comprehension games, quick art activities and tips for parents to help their children become strong readers. Books: A set of 41 books for beginning readers in grades K - 2 can be printed from the software to aid students in learning the single and multi-letter patterns of the English code. These books are written for use in a Co-Reading Model. In the Co-Reading Model, children and a reading partner read a book together. Certain words in the text are in bold, and the student’s job is to "read the dark words," which correspond to the systematically presented word-family and letter-sound patterns. The reading partner reads the rest of the text. All books fall under the categories of "Animal Secrets," "People Secrets," or "Lost Stories--Multi-cultural Folktales from Around the World." These books help the earliest readers develop their reading skills with material that also builds their vocabulary and background knowledge. Children are assigned one book each week. Fun Sheets: Each of the 41 books of the program is accompanied by a printable 4-page activity booklet that children take home to work on with their parents or complete with a reading partner in an after school program. The fun sheets provide additional activities for practicing the words from the software and books. The back of each fun sheet suggests titles for quality books containing the same particular letter patterns that the child is practicing. Children should be assigned one fun sheet each week.
	Software Activities: TMTYR software activities are used by children in their classrooms or after school programs to help "teach their alien" how to read. Based on cognitive research, these activities assist children in decoding letter patterns in new words and in learning to automatically recognize familiar words as they read. There are 3 sets of activities that supplement each book. The first activity involves the children “helping the aliens” to read one of the Take Me To Your Readers books. Next, students create a chart of letter and word patterns and lastly, students play a game that requires them to read words before they disappear. Each time a student completes an activity, a report is generated for teachers to track their student’s progress. Children should work on these activities at least three times a week. Each session lasts approximately 15 minutes.
Website: www.takemetoyourreaders.com or www.tmtyr.com Take Me To Your Readers website offers children the opportunity to hear each of the 41 books read to them. Also, links are provided that will take children to sites that give additional information about the topics of each book in the series. For example, after reading the book, "Secrets of the Humpback Whale," children can click on links that will take them to sites that have wonderful pictures of humpback whales, more fun facts about whales, and even audio files of humpback whale songs. In addition, parents are linked to resources they can use to support and encourage reading at home. Sample Parent/Reading Partner Letters: 3 sample letters are printable from the Take Me To Your Readers program. These letters introduce and suggest to parents or a reading partner how to use the videos, books and fun sheets with their child. One letter is specifically written for parents whose children have previously participated in the program. Word Wall: The Word Wall is a visual display to focus students’ attention on letter patterns within words and build their word recognition skills. Teachers can print the Word Wall from the software, display it in their classroom, and integrate it with their ongoing instruction. Vanderbilt University Research and Development Team: Diana Sharp, Ph.D., Susan Goldman,Ph.D., John Bransford, Ph.D., Tracey Lewis, Cynthia Mayfield, Jennifer Wagner, Lisa Foster, Sam Cammack, Ashley Lovell, and Carrie Fekete.

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 9979881. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation (NSF).

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