Teach Effectively!

One of the folks at the Access Center wrote to me a while ago to promote its Web presence. There are some free resources available, and some readers might find them instructive.

The Access Center: Improving Outcomes for All Students k-8 (www.k8accesscenter.org), [is] a federally funded national technical assistance center. I am taking this time to introduce you to our free resources. Our resources focus on core content areas - language arts, math, and science - as well as on instructional and learning strategies to provide students with disabilities access to rigorous academic content. We have a series of professional development modules and information briefs that are available on our Web site as well as on a CD-ROM, if requested.

The Access Center training modules are multi-component training packages designed to enhance content and pedagogical knowledge and can be integrated into teacher education coursework and used for professional development. They include:

* Effective Interventions for Struggling Readers: The Alphabetic Principle
* Effective Interventions for Struggling Readers: Fluency
* Effective Interventions for Struggling Readers: Vocabulary
* Effective Interventions for Struggling Readers: Comprehension
* Strategies for Accessing Algebraic Concepts (K-8)
* Enhancing Your Instruction through Differentiation
* Improving Access to the General Curriculum for Students with Disabilities through Collaborative Teaching
* Supervising Co-Teaching Teams: Whose Line is it Anyway?

Our information briefs are short documents that cover a range of topics (mathematics, reading, language arts, science, instructional and learning strategies, and Universal design for Learning) and include supporting research and suggestions for facilitating the application of research into practice. Many of the information briefs can be used in combination with our modules as additional research-based references or further examples of teaching and learning strategies. Briefs also can be used to supplement teacher education coursework and provide students with additional resources to explore.

I might’ve mentioned the Access Center previously, because I made an electronic presentation for it a few years ago. That may lower the opinion of the resources even before folks have reviewed them. And, by the way, I’ve not reviewed the materials closely, so I can’t vouch for their utility or accuracy. But, take a look!