Exploiting the Reading/Writing Connection

Using Digital and Online Tools

A collection of digital media currently being explored by members of the University of Maryland Writing Project to
improve student reading and writing through increased engagement, inquiry, collaboration, and publication

Research has demonstrated a strong link between reading and writing (between writing and learning to
read). Among many other benefits, writing helps students organize and record their thoughts in response to a
reading, connect their personal lives to a text, manipulate ideas or information from a text in order to gain
more ownership over the material, improve language fluency (improvements in recognizing and understanding
more complete vocabulary, sentence structures, style, etc.), and read as "writers" in a way that makes them
more aware of author purpose, audience, and organization.
Modern digital and online resources now give teachers new and highly engaging, interactive, and
collaborative ways to take part in compositional activities to complement their reading. The list below includes
but a few of the tools currently available. While many of these tools are entertaining and enlightening, it is always
important to be sure that new technologies are being used to further concrete, educational goals. Also, as these
tools are now constantly changing, and new programs are frequently coming into being, it is important to remain
on the lookout for new tools that may make a difference for your students.

StoryBird
www.storybird.com
Allows your students to put together children's
books using professional artwork and text of their
own. Students may tell their own story, continue
a story they've already read, develop a new story
collaboratively based on similar theme to
previous readings, etc.

PhotoStory
www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/using/digitalphotography/
PhotoStory/default.mspx
Allows students to arrange photos into a slide show and
record audio narration. Students may illustrate a story or
poem, create a short story with drawings of their own,
create visual poems, etc.
 VoiceThread
www.voicethread.com
Allows students to record audio over shared photos or
drawings. Viewers may also record audio responses to
these recordings, and these become part of the growing
document. Students may create slide-show stories of their
own, respond collaboratively to images related to previous
readings, explain facts about themselves or their
community, etc.

Class Wiki
www.wikispaces.com
Gives classrooms an online work and display space with
easily-created pages that can be edited by anyone.
Students or teachers may create collaborative Web pages,
display calendars and other information for students and
parents, store and show digital media creations, etc.

Audacity
www.audacity.sourceforge.net
Records audio and allows students to cut, arrange, and
save voice recordings. Students may record readings or
reading responses as podcasts, record slide-show
narrations to be imported into PhotoStory or other
program, mix their voice recordings with many others
and save it as one sound file, etc.

For more information about the University of Maryland Writing Project or to contact someone at the site, visit
www.education.umd.edu/EDCI/CLLC/mdwritproj.html or take a look at our online community at
www.umdwritingproject.ning.com

Additional Resources:
 Writing to Read: Evidence for How Writing Can Improve Reading, a report by the Carnegie Corporation
of New York (available at www.carnegie.org/fileadmin/Media/Publications/WritingToRead_01.pdf)
 The Digital Writing Workshop online community hosted by Troy Hicks (available at
www.digitalwritingworkshop.ning.com)
 Read-Write-Think Classroom Resources interactive activities and lesson plans (available at
www.readwritethink.org/classroom-resources)