Newsela is an all-inclusive database consisting of current event stories tailor-made for classroom use.
The stories are nonfiction in the genre and mainly consists of a relevant daily article from trusted news sources. Topics covered in the articles are from diverse fields such as astronomy, economics, geopolitics, music, sports, and zoology.
It consists of common core quizzes that conform to the reading levels and are used to check the comprehension level mainly. Further, the writing prompts after each article is designed to assess reading comprehension of the students.
Brief on the tool
1. The tool helps in building reading comprehension with a wide variety of article selection on diverse topics. Students can read these articles at their personal reading levels.
2. For the teachers, they can use this tool to create classes and assign their reading level specific articles to individual students.
3. With or without a paid subscription, the students can access news article of high quality and get adapted to a range of reading levels.
4. It is a tool with the help of which currents events can be brought forward, level-appropriate texts and flexible assessments can be carried out quickly.
5. Different assessment features of the tool such as customized quizzes and structured writing prompts are a great boon for the student as they can demonstrate their learning progress and analyze plus discuss on what they have read after every reading session.
Few Benefits of Newsela Features
1. Features of Newsela offer short multiple choice quizzes that are aligned to specific common core standards.
2. The tool has a streamlined search technique that helps in filtering article specific to the lesson, standard addressed or based on grade level.
3. While students are reading, with the help of its feature they can mark-up text or highlight text which they find is of importance.
How to begin with Newsela?
To start working on Newsela, check out the registration steps level by level in the video mentioned below.
Our Key Observation on the Tool
From what we reviewed on Newsela, we found it an amazingly benefiting reading resource for the students. It kindles a curiosity among the students to follow current events and non-fiction articles without facing any challenge. Not only this, the beauty of the product is that it allows students to change the reading level by selecting a Lexile to match their reading comprehension. The content does not change after students choose their reading level, but what changes is the vocabulary and syntax of the article.
The topics that are covered on the website are comprehensive, and this is mainly because they collate information from other news sources as well.
And since the Tool is a cloud based solution, hence both students and educators can access it anywhere and anytime. For the teachers by using this website and App solution, they can enrich the reading level of students. They can use this learning support to help students stay tuned to current news and use the information in their studies too.
