Audiobooks
Overview
Audiobooks allow students to hear fluent reading and to experience books that may be above their reading skills. They can help with Disciplinary Literacy and Vocabulary building by allowing learners to focus on their comprehension when navigating higher level informational texts rather than working to decode difficult texts. Using audiobooks along with printed texts has been shown to greatly benefit literacy outcomes for those with dyslexia and for multilingual learners.
Example: Use This Strategy in the Classroom
See how this teacher uses audiobooks in multiple ways to encourage better comprehension. By incorporating audiobooks with other learning tools, such graphic organizers and drawing, learners explore different ways of understanding the text. By discussing the differences in comprehension between listening and reading it on their own, learners also understand the benefits of using audiobooks as a strategy.
Design It into Your Product
Videos are chosen as examples of strategies in action. These choices are not endorsements of the products or evidence of use of research to develop the feature.
Starting at 1:41, watch how Learning Ally includes features that encourage learners to engage with their audiobooks in several ways. Features like highlighting the text being read, controlling the speed of reading, and re-listening to the last 30 seconds support Attention and agency for learning.
Additional Resources
Additional examples, research, and professional development. These resources are possible representations of this strategy, not endorsements.
Factors Supported by this Strategy
More Multisensory Supports Strategies
Communication boards are displays of graphics (e.g., pictures, symbols, illustrations) and/or words where learners can gesture or point to the displays to extend their expressive language potential.
Dictation, also referred to as speech-to-text, an assistive communication technology that translates voice dictation to digital text, provides students with transcription difficulties the opportunity to participate in the writing process by allowing them to use their voice to generate and record ideas.
Dictionaries and thesauruses can serve as resources for students to expand their Vocabulary knowledge, as they provide easy access to definitions and similar words to help students remember words and meanings more readily.
Adding gestures and motions to complement learning activates more cognitive processes for recall and understanding, particularly within content area instruction.
Short breaks that include mindfulness quiet the brain to allow for improved thinking and emotional regulation.
Brain breaks that include movement allow learners to refresh their thinking and focus on learning new information.
Connecting information to music and dance can support Short-term and Long-term Memory by engaging auditory processes, Emotions, and physical activity.
Using earplugs or headphones can increase focus and comfort.
Transforming written text into audio supports learning by activating different parts of a learner's brain for comprehension.
Visual supports, like text magnification, colored overlays, and text manipulation, help students focus and properly track as they read.
Research has shown that students write longer pieces with stronger quality when they use word processing software.
Word sorts are multisensory activities that help learners identify patterns and group words based on different categories while promoting Vocabulary development.
