2 authors: Gina Biancarosa University of Oregon 49

Tools for Building Knowledge and Supporting Reading to Learn

Digital text gives educators access to tools that allow more flexibility regarding content selection and layout of the text, as well as the means to modify content based on the particular needs of students and local communities. The use of ancillary materials such as original source documents and alternative multimedia presentations of information has helped compensate for struggling readers’ limitations in background knowledge and has enriched learning opportunities for all readers.³⁸ For example,
teachers can use online multimedia resources from respected sources, such as PBS and National Geographic, to augment their presentation of new content to all students and as a tool to build background knowledge for students who lack it.³⁹


Manipulable embedded graphics have been associated with improved outcomes in science learning and have also been shown to support iterative conceptual development, allowing students, for example, to interact with a graphic or even an animated representation of repeated random sampling to understand the Central Limit Theorem, a foundational but difficult-to-grasp concept in statistics.⁴⁰

Online learning communities can also support individualized pursuit of learning interests beyond the classroom.⁴¹ Innovative work using chat functions allows students to collaborate and interact to solve online problems.⁴² Connections to digital reposito- ries enable students to access authentic source materials such as scanned original letters exchanged between writers of the Declaration of Independence or recorded speeches by public figures such as Martin Luther King Jr.⁴³

Positive outcomes for improving background knowledge, strategic use of technology, and innovative applications of technology have also been shown in evaluations of Community Technology Centers, community-based services located in independent facilities or embedded in public libraries and after-school programs such as Boys and Girls Clubs.⁴⁴ These centers provide students access to a variety of up-to-date equipment and high- speed Internet access that, coupled with workshops and mentoring from staff, allow the youth to learn to use technology for a variety of purposes.⁴⁵