Learning Ally staff member Meg Roe recently shared some great news with the rest of us:  in case we didn’t already know, we are real winners! Here are just a few of the organizations that have recognized Learning Ally recently:

Parent and Teacher Choice Awards Gold Medal Winner—Best Website

The Parent and Teacher Choice™ Awards from HowtoLearn.com are the most recognized and valued international awards by both parents and teachers. These awards honor educational products, services, media and toys with exceptional quality for their brain-based learning principles, creativity, innovation and fun. To be considered for this award, nominees must reflect proven learning values, stimulate higher-order thinking skills, employ brain-building principles, be innovative in their approach to helping children learn, play or be creative. Products must promote social and emotional growth, build character and help children see the joy in learning or play.

SIIA CODiE Awards Finalist—Best Solution for Exceptional Students

(This is a highly recognized and coveted award. Fingers crossed we will be a winner; will know soon!)

The SIIA CODiE Awards is the only peer-recognized competition in education and business technology. For more than 30 years, the SIIA CODiE Awards have been honoring software, education information and media products for excellence and innovation in technology. This year's program features 32 categories, several of which are new or updated to reflect the latest industry trends. “The 2019 CODIE Award finalists represent the finest in innovation and creativity in educational technology,” says SIIA President and CEO Jeff Joseph.  “These breakthrough products are opening doors for learners of all ages by developing and utilizing new technologies to respond to the diverse needs of student and educators.”

EdTech Digest Cool Tool Awards Finalist—Special Needs/Assistive Technology Solution

The largest, most competitive recognition program in all of education technology, the EdTech Awards recognizes people in and around education for outstanding contributions in transforming education through technology to enrich the lives of learners everywhere. Featuring EdTech’s best and brightest, the annual program shines a spotlight on cool tools, innovative leaders and innovative trendsetters in the K-12, higher education and skills and workforce sectors. The EdTech Awards recognize people, the products they produce and the lives they shape. Andrew Friedman, Learning Ally President and CEO, was a 2018 EdTech Leadership Award finalist for global leadership.

In addition, this past week we were pleased to hear from teachers at Woodmere Elementary School in Oregon:

Two students at Woodmere Elementary ranked in the top 5 percentile of students from nearly 1,000 elementary schools nationwide in a competition for nontraditional readers. Fifth graders Esnoy and Eric are graduates of Shadow’s Reading Mentors Program, which pairs students with a mentor and assistive reading technology designed for children with learning challenges.

Metrics Update for this week:

• Our readers increased to 201,345

• We had 41,350 reading at frequency*

• We had over 125 million pages read!

Great work, everyone!

*at frequency = students are reading books multiple times during the school year, with a general target of thirty times (more for lower grades, less for upper grades).  Our data shows that most of these students read for at least 20 minutes each time.

Are You Using Google Hangouts? 

Hangouts Chat messages are still the best way to get immediate responses to your questions about training. It's also a great way to see who else is involved in volunteering with you. You'll be using the Chat frequently in book production so take the time to get acquainted.

One of your fist steps in training is to sign up for our Google Hangout Chats, so make sure you don't miss it!

The instructions on installing Hangouts will also give you an introduction on how to use it. We have an instruction document and mini-lesson on how to use Hangouts in the Textbook Community, but much of it applies to any use of hangouts. Make sure you use chat the right way, playing up on its strengths:

• Join the right groups. Hangouts are for groups of people who are sharing in the same task, so they can better work together. If you have a question about a task, make sure you're asking the right group. Likewise with your replies. 
• Chats are best suited for conversations, so limit yourself to a sentence or two with each post. You want to give people time to catch up with your ideas, so covering too much ground in one post may confuse them. 
• Allow time for replies. Though people may see the notification right away, they aren't always in the right opportunity to respond. 
• Remember that your posts are permanent. Write with care and respect. Review your words before posting.

You can learn more in the lessons and by referring to Google Hangouts help. 

You'll find links to join various groups on the volunteer portal and project sites, like this one for the QA team:

Ask questions, offer answers, and get involved. Say "hello" every now and again in the water cooler and even in your project Chats. Your voice is what makes this a volunteering community.

Congratulations To Our Training Graduates!

Storyteller Course: Vance A., Jamal J., Gina L., Ripley J., Juliet J., Sam K., Jennifer B., T.A.N., Kian A., James R., Bruce S., Janique J., Kelly C.

Textbook Course: Lynn W., Juliet J., Marion H., Kate J.