VTech, the creator of the Electronic Learning Products (ELP) category and the award-winning InnoTab, MobiGo, and V.Reader handheld toys, is a world leader of age-appropriate learning products. Since 1980, VTech has been developing high-quality, innovative educational products that enrich children's development through fun and smart play.

According to the United Nations, world population reached 7 Billion on October 31, 2011.

At the end of March, Facebook announced that it has 1.11 billion monthly active users. eMarketer found that only 889.3 million of those users were humans.

Around noon on Sept. 14, the second floor was packed. In one of the common areas, a giant screen showed the number of active Facebook users worldwide. About 100 people, including Mark Zuckerberg and his top lieutenants, watched the numbers run up by about a thousand users per minute: 999,980,000 … 999,990,000 … 1,000,000,000. The counter paused for a moment when it rounded 10 digits, as if to emphasize the point: 1 billion users.

PBS LearningMedia's summer of literacy continues! Explore these dynamic resources designed to expand vocabulary, strengthen reading comprehension, and expose your students to notable authors and famous works of literature:

According to new research the use of “textisms” can improve literacy among pupils by giving them extra exposure to word composition outside the school day, it was claimed.

However academics from Coventry University said there was “no evidence” that access to mobile phones harmed children’s literacy skills and could even have a positive impact on spelling.

According to the report, the association between spelling and text messaging may be explained by the highly phonetic nature of the abbreviations used by children and the alphabetic awareness required for successfully decoding the words. The report, funded by Becta, the government's education technology agency stated: “It is also possible that textism use adds value because of the indirect way in which mobile phone use may be increasing children’s exposure to print outside of school.” Prof Clare Wood, senior lecturer in the university’s psychology department, said: “We are now starting to see consistent evidence that children’s use of text message abbreviations has a positive impact on their spelling skills. “There is no evidence that children’s language play when using mobile phones is damaging literacy development.”

The long-held belief that television is detrimental to child development, emotional health and overall literacy has been a stubborn one in North America. The opinion, largely fuelled by anecdotal evidence, and poorly constructed studies has, however, proven not only unfounded, but the bulk of research has actually demonstrated the opposite.

"Moderate amounts of television viewing were found to be beneficial for reading," states Annie Moses in the Journal of Early Childhood Literacy, further stating that "programs that aim to promote literacy in young children have been found to positively impact specific early literacy skills".

LeapFrog is a leading designer, developer and marketer of innovative, technology-based educational products and related proprietary content. LeapFrog is 100% focused on developing products that will provide the most engaging, effective learning experience - for all ages, in school or home, around the world. We put learning first - a philosophy that distinguishes us from our competitors and fuels the entire company.The LeapFrog learning experience is brought to life by our highly specialized teams who unite the three key elements that truly set our products apart:We start with a rigorous, proven learning methodologyWe create compelling, multi-layered contentWe deliver the content and learning experience through the use of technology that is intuitive, invisible and engaging

Facebook and Bebo should be used in the classroom to boost pupils' literacy skills, according to a Government-backed report.

t added: "Using sites to communicate, collaborate and create means learners use and can develop a wide range of literacy skills."

he study also said students should be allowed to use sites to "collaborate on homework projects or discuss lessons" with other pupils.

However, within the mobile phone group, there was evidence that use of text abbreviations was positively related to gains in literacy skills. Moreover, after controlling for individual differences in IQ, and the children's performance at pre-test, textism usage was able to account for a significant amount of variance in post-test spelling scores. These results show that text messaging does not adversely affect the development of literacy skills within this age group, and that the children's use of textisms when text messaging is positively related to improvement in literacy skills, especially spelling.

Although most participants in all three groups violated grammatical convention in their text messages, researchers found no evidence that this affected their understanding of written or spoken grammar at either point in time. For the primary school children, there was an association between punctuation errors in texts and spelling ability. Children who made fewer punctuation errors when texting tended to be better at spelling and quicker to process writing than those who made more errors in their texts.   For the undergraduate group, there was some evidence of a link between punctuation errors in texts and the spelling ability and grammatical understanding of participants. However, this link was weak and researchers concluded it was more likely related to the IQ score of students. The latest findings follow an earlier study led by Professor Wood that showed children’s use of text abbreviations can have a positive effect on literacy outcomes and may even enhance children’s understanding of conventional spelling.

Research literature throughout the past decade has shown that technology can enhance literacy development, impact language acquisition, provide greater access to information, support learning, motivate students, and enhance their self-esteem (ACT, 2004; CEO Forum, 2001; Boster et al., 2004; Mann et al., 1999; Tracey & Young, 2006; WestEd, 2002).

Activity theory provided a framework for data analysis and interpretation related to the patterns of activities that took place while students used each Web 2.0 tool. Web 2.0 was found to enhance all five information literacy standards. These standards related to collaboration, information organization, creativity, discussion, and technology education.[Copyright &y& Elsevier]