The Blaster Learning System is an educational video game series originally created and published by Davidson & Associates, but is now owned and published by Knowledge Adventure, after the two companies were acquired and merged by CUC Software. Titles in the series have been produced for several computer systems, video game consoles, and as standalone handheld units. Originally, the series simply learned mathematics, but eventually expanded to other subjects, such as language arts (reading) and science. Because the first Math Blaster series was so popular, Davidson made Reading Blaster in 1994, which also went on to be a hit.
Introduce essential pre-reading skills Progressively challenging activities in phonics, the alphabet, and word knowledge introduce critical pre-reading skills. Eight read-along storybooks and problem-solving challenges develop basic literacy and the thinking skills needed for reading comprehension.
Reading Blaster Vocabulary
The Blaster Learning System is an educational video game series originally created by Davidson, but is now owned by Knowledge Adventure. Titles in the series have been produced for other computer systems, video game consoles, and as stand-alone handheld units. Originally, the series simply learned mathematics, but eventually expanded to other subjects, such as language arts (reading) and science. Due to the popularity of the original Math Blaster series, Davidson introduced Reading Blaster in 1994, which also went on to become successful.
Dive into an ocean of reading fun with G.C. and Max Blaster! Discover an undersea world of adventure as you learn about letters, sounds, spelling, phonics, stories, and more! (CD in Gift Quality Jewel Case)
McCormick’s (1994) case study of a nonreader postulated that motivation is instrumental to reading achievement. She stated that, especially with students who have experienced recurring reading failure, intervention should be structured to be highly motivating and novel. The computer can provide such novel motivation.
Another reason for choosing computer-based interventions with less skilled readers has to do with the amount of time-on-task necessary for positive learning effects. Independent computer instruction allows for more time-on-task than traditional methods. Roth and Beck (1987), for example, saw positive effects at the word and subword level after 14 hours of computer-based practice over a 12-week period. Jones, Torgesen and Sexton (1987) found substantial increases in both speed and accuracy of decoding after 10 weeks of daily 15-minute sessions of computer-based instruction. They also found that this improvement in decoding individual words led to improvements in reading connected text. After eight weeks of instruction, Torgesen, Waters, Cohen and Torgesen (1988) found that significant improvements in accuracy and speed of word identification was made using their WORDS program with 17 learning disabled children in first through third grades.
Also, Wise (1992) used corrective feedback in a study using a voice synthesis system in which whole words, syllabic units, subsyllabic units, and single grapheme-phoneme units were used in word learning. The computer voice synthesizer pronounced the words or word segments while highlighting the matching text elements on the monitor. Wise found that poor readers made about twice the gains in word recognition and decoding skills as those in control groups receiving regular classroom or traditional remedial reading instruction.
A fourth research-based reason for using computers with reading disabled children has to do with the nature of electronic text (as opposed to traditional paper-based text) and with the benefits computer presentation of text has to offer (McKenna, Reinking, Labbo, & Kieffer, 1999). Disabled readers can perform repeated readings of electronic text supported by computerized speech, on-line glossaries, graphics, and note-taking capabilities. Reading disabled youngsters can be taught to effectively take advantage of such resources to adopt learning strategies that lead to success in school tasks (Horney & Anderson-Inman, 1999).
In the summer of 1997, 37 graduate students at the end of their master’s degree program in reading and literacy education took a required clinical course entitled "EDUC 513: Practicum in Reading Instruction." The students were divided into two sections (morning and afternoon) and each was assigned a child for whom it was the clinician’s responsibility to plan and provide instruction in literacy for 90 minutes per day, four days a week, over a five week period. As part of their responsibilities, clinicians were to examine existing information on the children’s personal and educational background, carry out a detailed assessment, and finally write a case study.
Clinicians were required to write a daily lesson plan outlining their objectives and plans. They were supervised by a reading professor, who also led class discussions during a one hour per day time period in which the clinicians met as a group. The course requirement was that the clinician plan a balanced curriculum, which made use of both holistic activities and attention to development of reading and writing skills. While the clinicians were given a great deal of freedom to choose their own instructional strategies, the focus of most previous courses in the graduate program had been on helping children acquire literacy through meaningful, rich literacy experiences. Unified, collaborative experiences were encouraged by the requirement that small groups of teacher/student teams choose a high-interest unit topic around which reading and writing tasks could be carried out. Topics included foreign countries, sports, and animals.
The children were all remedial readers of varying ability. They ranged in age from 7 to 12, and from grades 2 (that is, just finished first grade) to 7. They had been accepted from a pool of applicants on the basis of needs indicated in the applications, which had been completed by parents and teachers. Almost all had very severe difficulties in acquiring literacy and were well below their peers in reading achievement.
Observation indicated that the clinicians appeared to be less intent on carrying out activities that they thought would result in concrete achievement gains when using computers. In non-technology teaching situations, clinicians were spending the majority of their time in two ways. First, they were involving children in meaning-oriented reading and writing activities that provided the children with time-on-task: Journaling, researching and writing reports on topics of high motivational value to individual students, and reading high interest children’s picture books or novels. Second, they were targeting direct instruction to reading and writing skills identified by ongoing diagnosis as needs: Word identification (especially sight word development, synthetic phonics instruction, word families, and structural analysis--through both drill and practice activities and language experience activities) and fluency development (as in choral reading and echo reading activities) were two common instructional components.
This lack of specificity appeared to have three causes. First, much of the software use was not well-planned. Clinicians would explore the Internet with their children for information on a particular sport, for example. But they had not previously explored and chosen effective websites. Clinicians would choose a particular program for word recognition development at the child’s approximate reading level, but they had not examined it previously closely enough to identify the specific skills being addressed nor to ascertain where those skills fit into the tutorial curriculum.
Third, some of the computer use was designed simply for motivational value. Much of the motivational need depended on the individual child. As those familiar with clinical situations will know, motivation in a university clinic setting is commonly not much of a problem. The children are highly motivated simply by the rare opportunity to have the undivided attention of a caring adult. The clinician further motivates by choosing activities that will appeal to the child, such as choosing books that are on topics of greatest interest to the child or creating skill drill and practice games that appeal to the child (such as sight word baseball or vocabulary football). The major motivational issue facing most clinicians has more to do with encouraging a long-lasting love of reading and writing that will go beyond the clinical situation.
In the end, however, only 9 uses of electronic books were indicated. It may be that clinicians believed that too much off-task behavior resulted from use of the books, as children used point-and-click game activities that would take away from learning time. It may also be that the clinicians did not see use of the books as a valuable use of their tutorial time. That is, they may have concluded that electronic books are more for independent use by students than for tutorial settings. Clinicians gave the rather vague objectives of reading Arthur’s Teacher Trouble (Living Books) as "for enjoyment and interaction with a story" and of reading Ruff’s Bone (Living Books) as "to have fun with reading." It was apparent that the program played no central part in the instructional plans for their children.
Yet, the final questionnaires indicated a good deal of enthusiasm on the part of those who chose to use the electronic books. One wrote that Just Grandma and Me (Living Books) was "highly entertaining and appropriate language ability" for his child, who was a fifth grader reading at a low third grade level.
Another problem mentioned by clinicians had to do with the children’s ability to read Internet material, a challenge pointed out by Balajthy, 1997, in a column article on advantages and challenges presented to reading teachers by the Internet. Many children were reading at levels far below those needed for success with typical Internet material, even that designed specifically for children. One clinician noted that children need both help in recognizing what information to read (i.e., selecting relevant material; one child was confused by the ubiquitous advertisements) and also "a lot" of help in the actual reading task. For the most part, clinicians with older children (fourth to seventh grade) were more likely to use the Internet. 2ff7e9595c
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