SBIR Phase I: Using Real-Time, Synchronous Collaborative Technologies to Support Elementary and Middle School Students in Developing Reading, Writing, and Collaboration Skills

THIS SBIR Phase I project's broader/commercial impact is to raise the bar for the educational technology industry and for K-8 classrooms. While classrooms today generally make do with a collection of unrelated applications, this project provides a coherent, cohesive suite of apps that squarely support the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) as well as the Next-Generation Science Standards. In addition, the technology which will power the suite of apps will enable students to collaborate even when they are not located in the same place, both writing onscreen and talking together. This kind of distance collaboration and sharing of information are important features of 21st century literacy skills and eventual workforce readiness. With the accompanying professional development materials and the step-by-step guides designed to support educators in using the materials in their classrooms, this project is well positioned to be adopted nationwide. The project addresses a pressing, national need to improve reading skills amongst children in grades 3-8, especially in the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) disciplines. The strategy is to use low-cost, Internet-connected, mobile computing devices ? technology that children find exceedingly engaging as well as increasingly available ? as the anchoring platform upon which to build a collaborative learning environment. This project will support writing to read, writing for an audience and writing collaboratively, three strategies that have been shown to produce positive gains in both reading and writing skills. More specifically, this project will offer a complete suite of tools that will enable the target population of students (grades 3-8) to read mentor texts (professionally-written examples of quality nonfiction writing), to collaborate with peers in a safe, engaging environment, to create multi-media projects that develop both verbal and visual literacy skills, and to publish and share their work over the Internet. The impact of these activities on the amount and quality of student engagement in reading, writing and collaboration activities will be empirically assessed. To better prepare teachers to use this project, educators will be provided with curricular and professional development materials.