4 guys and a queen

First, children watch a lot of TV – on average four hours a day, which turns out to be more time than they spend in school each year. Second, having print and reading materials at home helps kids learn to read. And, the more they read, the better they read. Unfortunately, more than 30% of city children live in poor households which tend to have few books or reading materials.  One study found that poor families had, on average, less than one book per household. The third reason is that TVs must all have the technology to show captions and most programs and movies must have written transcripts. So, if you turn on your TV’s captioning feature, the words that are spoken – and many of the sounds as well – will appear in writing at the bottom of your screen.

It stands to reason that children who read and write more are better at reading and writing. And writing blog posts, status updates, text messages, instant messages, and the like all motivate children to read and write.

Here is a little information on this expert on the English language from Wikipedia:

Texting and it’s impact on reading and writing “It turns out that the best texters, are the best spellers.” “The more you text, the better your literacy scores.” “The earlier you get your mobile phone, the better your literacy scores.” “What is texting?  Texting is writing and reading.” “The more practice you get in writing and reading, the better writer and reader you will be.”

The good news is that research shows that worried parents and concerned educators can relax. Studies have shown that the frequent use of text abbreviations does not harm children’s literacy and best of all may even improve it.

Pearson's Quick Reads, as examples of tools that can improve students' reading fluency.

teachers have found that using technology may help address students' specific learning needs.

"The only tool that has enough research behind it is plain, old word processing," MacArthur says. "Students with writing difficulties are able to produce a text that looks good, and they can go back and fix things without introducing new mistakes."

Computers enable people to be more reflective about their writing," Wise said. "When a student is writing an essay and is not sure it is structured right to make a good argument, the text can be moved around and the different versions can be compared.

Using a computer can help support higher literacy skills.

Many websites offer free, printable resources that can be used to support literacy development. Some are designed to suit the age group of the child and others for the ability level of the child. The internet can also be useful in finding materials that specifically target children who have been identified in having difficulties with their literacy development. There are various resources available that support different aspects of literacy development. For example, some will target reading skills, whilst others will focus on spelling or handwriting.

Type literacy games into the toolbar of your search engine and it will come up with a large number of websites that offer activities which are both fun and educational.

There are games on the internet that suit all ages and ability levels. If you are a teacher, it can be a fun activity to devise a list of potential sites which you may use as short activities in your lessons, or with specific students who have difficulties with literacy development.