Literacy Guide

You can find a collection of recommended literacy resources and information for parents, adults, children and teens, and professionals. These resources can help you on your journey of learning more about literacy, but don’t know where to begin.

"Unlock the potential of every child through reading." CommonLit is a comprehensive literacy program with thousands of reading lessons, full-year English Language Arts (ELA) curriculum, benchmark assessments, and standards-based data for educators.

Includes tools to get kids enthusiastic about reading by helping them explore their passions as they build literacy. Whether they're analyzing news stories, finding resources online and connecting to other readers, or taking assessments and monitoring their growth, students will be developing essential skills for comprehension and fluency.

Educators Technology is a blog owned and operated by Med Kharbach. Dr. Kharbach holds a PhD in educational studies from Mount Saint Vincent University in Halifax, Canada. He was also a K-12 teacher with over 12 years of classroom teaching experience.

Take educational quizzes on English, geography, math, and science. Ad revenue goes to the United Nations World Food Programme to provide help for children and their families.

Gateway to the Classics is where you can find one of the best online collections of classic literature for children and the young at heart.

The mission of the International Children's Digital Library (ICDL) is to promotes tolerance and respect for diverse cultures by providing access to the best of children's literature from around the world.

The International Literacy Association (ILA) "is a professional organization with a mission of connecting research and practice to continuously improve the quality of literacy instruction across the globe."

Khan Academy is a nonprofit organization with the mission to provide a free, world-class education for anyone, anywhere.

Safe search: sites appearing in Kiddle search results satisfy family friendly requirements, as they filter sites with explicit or deceptive content.

KidLit TV is a winner of the Parents’ Choice Gold Award and has been selected as an American Association of School Librarians Best Digital Tool for Teaching and Learning. KLTV is available in over 800,000 schools worldwide via their website and video distribution partners. They are a team of parents, educators, librarians, authors, illustrators, and filmmakers creating fun ways to inspire a love of reading.

Free public domain audiobooks are accessible online and read by volunteers from around the world.

The Literacy Research Association "is a non-profit professional organization, comprised of individuals who share an interest in advancing literacy theory, research, and practice." They are a community that engages in research and dialogue pertaining to literacy and related topics. They support the professional development of emerging and established scholars. They advocate research-informed improvements in education. They seek engagement with high-quality research and discussions of important theoretical, methodological, practice and policy issues.

Missouri adopted a new early literacy policy in 2022. "To achieve a comprehensive approach, the Show-Me State should consider early identification of struggling readers through universal screening three times per year. The state should also consider adopting policy supporting and sustaining literacy coach placement in schools, identifying a teacher licensure assessment aligned to the science of reading and creating a promotion/retention policy with good cause exemptions and multiple options for promotion."

Missouri Humanities’ programs remember the past by exploring Missouri’s Heritage, sharing Veterans' stories, and preserving Native American and Civil War history. Additionally, they offer digital programming that includes a streaming service, videos, and podcasts, and they foster young readers through their children’s Read From the Start literacy program.

From the University of Missouri St. Louis: "Transforming Literacy Education for Today and Tomorrow - The goal of the Missouri Language and Literacies Center (MLLC) is to transform education to meet the complex language and literacies needs of the 21st century." The MLLC gathers University of Missouri scholars from various disciplines and across UM system campuses with invested stakeholders from Missouri Public Schools to bring current, research-based information regarding language and literacy into preK-12 classrooms.

The Missouri Literacy Association's mission "is to empower educators, ensure equity, inspire students & encourage leaders with the equitable resources they need to make literacy accessible for all in our diverse community."

Missouri Open Educational Resources Commons (OER) was developed by MOREnet, in cooperation with the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education for Missouri educators at all levels.The content on these pages offers a wide selection of resources

Missouri Reading Initiative is "dedicated to working with public and private schools to ensure every student will read and write proficiently."

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) is the primary federal entity for collecting and analyzing data related to education.

NCFL works to eradicate poverty through education solutions for families.
They believe education is a nonpartisan, shared responsibility. Partnering with educators, families, literacy advocates, and communities, they have worked for over 35 years to eradicate poverty through equitable education solutions for families across multiple generations.

The National Center on Improving Literacy is a partnership among literacy experts, university researchers, and technical assistance providers, with funding from the United States Department of Education. Includes resources for improving outcomes for students with literacy-related disabilities, including dyslexia.

This site includes general literacy tips, information about the importance of the first five years of life and brain development, award -winning book lists, and many other children's literacy resources.

The National Coalition for Literacy is an "alliance of the leading national and regional organizations dedicated to advancing adult education, family literacy, and English language acquisition in the United States. Through collaborative efforts with other advocacy organizations and individuals, NCL ensures that leaders and legislators at the national level make informed decisions about policies, regulations, and funding for adult education and family literacy."

Includes games, videos, animals, brain boosters and much more.

Parents as Teachers is a national home visiting program recognized by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Home Visiting Evidence of Effectiveness project as a home visiting model that meets the criteria as an “Evidence-based Early Childhood Home Visiting Service Delivery Model.” The national Parents as Teachers model program builds strong communities, thriving families, and children who are healthy, safe and ready to learn by matching parents and caregivers with trained professionals, known as Parent Educators.

Browse standards-aligned English Language Arts (ELA) resources for students in all grades.

Includes searchable poems, poets, poem-a-day, literary seminars, materials for teachers and poetry near you.

Project Gutenberg is a library of over 70,000 free eBooks. They are accessible online or you can download titles. Emphasis is on older works for which U.S. copyright has expired.

Reading Bear, a project of WatchKnowLearn.org, is the first free program online to teach beginning readers vocabulary and concepts while systematically introducing all the main phonetic patterns of written English, all using innovative rich media.

Reading Is Fundamental (RIF) is the nation’s leading children’s literacy nonprofit. They focus on disrupting the U.S. literacy crisis by bringing the joy of reading to children to create skilled readers.

Founded in 1966, Reading Is Fundamental’s Literacy Central creates engaged readers. This award-winning digital library hosts over 10,000 resources directly tied to the books teachers, caregivers and community partners turn to everyday. Organize all of your book resources in one place, create and share book lists, find helpful reading tips and strategies and track student reading progress by creating and signing into your free account today. Choose a path to begin exploring resources.

Reading Rockets is a national public media literacy initiative providing information and resources on how young kids learn to read, why so many struggle, and how caring adults can help.

Personalized reading comprehension exercises for K-12 and ESL students.

​ReadWorks reaches more than 13.5 million students and teachers each year with a mission to serve every district, school, and student, while prioritizing low-income communities.

From National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) -

Scholastic inspires all children to become life-long readers and learners, unlocking an imaginative curiosity about themselves and the world.

You can explore exciting and mind-blowing experiences at the Smithsonian. Whether you are interested in nature, science, art, technology, design, history, culture, or all of the above, the Smithsonian has something for you. So, if you want to enhance your skills and knowledge in a fun and engaging way, the Smithsonian is the place to be.

Starfall was founded by Dr. Stephen Schutz, who had difficulty learning to read as a child due to dyslexia. He created a learning platform with untimed, multisensory interactive games that allow children to see, hear, and touch as they learn. Starfall was developed in the classroom by teachers and opened in August 2002 as a free public service to teach children to read.

Includes a new audio story each week. You can find classic and original stories that have been adapted from stories around the world.

StoryPlace has been newly redesigned to present favorite stories and activities in a format compatible with desktop and mobile devices. The site also now includes early literacy information for parents and caregivers.

Great progress has been made in literacy with most recent data (UNESCO Institute for Statistics) showing that more than 86 per cent of the world’s population know how to read and write compared to 68 per cent in 1979. Despite this, worldwide at least 754 million adults still cannot read and write, two thirds of them women, andUNESCO works through its global network, field offices and institutes and with its Member States and partners to advance literacy in the framework of lifelong learning, and address the literacy target 4.6 in SDG4 and the Education 2030 Framework for Action. Its Strategy for Youth and Adult Literacy (2020-2025) pays special attention to the member countries of the Global Alliance for Literacy which targets 20 countries with an adult literacy rate below 50 per cent and the E9 countries, of which 17 are in Africa. 250 million children are failing to acquire basic literacy skills.

At Unite for Literacy, they picture a world where all children have access to an abundance of books that celebrate their languages and cultures and cultivate a lifelong love of reading. Unite for Literacy has developed the platform, publishing tools, and systems-based strategies that support public and private sector partners to change the literacy landscape of communities. Their projects build home libraries and support families to develop a daily habit of reading, both of which are key factors in growing lifelong readers.

Explore. Imagine. Laugh. Share. Create. Learn. Smile. Grow. Wonderopolis is a place where natural curiosity and imagination lead to exploration and discovery in learners of all ages. Each day, they pose an intriguing question, and explore it in a variety of ways. Wonderopolis was created by the National Center for Families Learning (NCFL) in 2010, and it has become one of the most popular education sites today.

The World Literacy Foundation is a global non-profit organization striving to ensure that every child, regardless of geographic location, has the opportunity to acquire literacy skills and books to reach their full potential – succeeding at school and beyond.