Frequently Asked Questions
We would like to use the material in our school. Does each teacher have to have their own account?
The subscription belongs to anyone who purchases it, as do the individual downloads of Units or purchased hard copy materials. For school use there are two subscription options which are excellent value. Read Think Learn reminds the user that these materials are copyrighted and may not be reproduced for purposes other than Personal and Classroom Use. Reselling, electronic copying and sharing, reproducing or editing is strictly prohibited. No commercial use is allowed under our terms and conditions.
When we subscribe – how do we access the activities?
If you have paid directly by PayPal the system is automated to create changes that allow you to download the activities you choose. If you have elected to pay by account (New Zealand only) into our bank we will manually activate your subscription once the funds have been cleared. The activities and/or units can then be accessed by using the filters on the left of the page. Rather than ‘add to cart’, you click on the activity title and it will open in a new page which will have the green ‘DOWNLOAD” button. When you click that button it will open the pdf in your browser which will allow you to print or to save the file.
What resources do you have available?
We have:
- Activity Sheets – these can be used to enhance the children’s thinking and reading skills. They are linked to school readers published by a variety of publishing companies and Unite for Literacy online readers. We also have created generic activities which link to our published Learning Intentions.
- Units – these encourage high quality responses to popular hard copy and online picture books. They incorporate Gardner’s learning styles and Bloom’s taxonomy of cognitive domains.
- Hard copy resources – these focus on strategies that children need for effective reading results. They are presented in bookmark format to encourage regular reminders of the strategies. We also have them available in A5 or A4 wall charts.
- Books suitable for use with ESOL students
What books do you have activity sheets for?
We have accessed books from a wide variety of publishers and both the pool of activity sheets and publishers continues to grow. You can view the lists of publishers on the search page titled Publishers.
Can the activity sheets be done on iPads or android devices?
We believe the evidence that learning outcomes are just as effective with pen and paper as with digital devices and so the activity sheets will remain as they are. However we are developing apps that will allow for practice activities of the reading skills we have included in our learning intentions.
Are the activity sheets only available for school reading series books?
No. While we have primarily focused on the different reading series we also have a activities linked to the Unite for Literacy free online readers and International Children’s Digital Library (ICDL) books. There are also generic activity sheets that can be used with any reading material. You can easily search for these using the highlighted key words in the pink search box on the top of each page.
What is the font used on the resources?
We use Open Dyslexic which is a new open sourced font created specifically to increase readability for readers with dyslexia. See more information at opendyslexic.org
I am getting a Font print error – what can I do?
While we embed our open dyslexic font in our pdf files sometimes a computer will not print the pdf. Instal the free font opendyslexic on your computer and you should find the problem resolved. However if the problem is not resolved then please contact us and we will do our best to help.
Is there only one activity sheet for each book?
Many of the books already have two or more resources each with a different learning intention. We will continue to produce material and over time will have an increasing number of activities for each book that feature differing learning intentions.
What are Learning Intentions and where did the Learning Intention list come from?
Learning intentions are specific skills that children need to master, in this case, in the reading process. We sourced the learning intentions from a variety of different resources, compared and reviewed them and compiled our own list using Blooms Taxonomy in the wording. The list of Learning Intentions will never be a finite list and will be something we will be continually researching and refining. The intentions are also intended to be fluid in nature and so many sheets may have intentions from higher or lower reading levels.
Can we teach using the activity sheets?
These resources are designed as follow up activities for reading. They may be used to reinforce skills or strategies that have already been taught. You could also use them as a focus for your reading lesson -Your imagination is your limit!
How do the Search Tools work?
You can search by Publisher, Subject, Author, Reading Age, and Learning Intention. The system will filter down and so you can use any combination of search parameters. You can also do a keyword search in the pink resource search at the top of the page which will help you find a specific resource.