Literacy Toolkit
This literacy toolkit is designed to support families and educators in fostering student literacy development. We encourage you to explore these resources — many of which are free — and engage with your student in their learning journey!
- Adult English and Literacy
- K-12 Parent and Teacher Resources
- Early Childhood Caregiver and Teacher Resources
Adult English and Literacy
- Basic Computer Skills Class: This online class is offered for free from Northstar Online Learning. It teaches basic information and skills to help people use computers.
- St. Louis Park Public Schools Adult Options in Education: St. Louis Park Public Schools partners with Adult Options in Education to offer English Language classes, GED preparation and testing, and basic reading and writing skills classes.
- Hennepin County Libraries: Multiple locations throughout Hennepin County with events for everyone in the community. They are open throughout the week and have a wide range of resources including desktop computers, books, and more materials available for community members to borrow.
- 20 minute English lessons: ESL Lab offers a number of free video English lessons.
- Voice of America News for English language learners: This is a news website with stories adapted to intermediate and advanced English learners. The "Beginner" section of the website includes videos on news vocabulary and short video English lessons. Each news story includes video, audio, and text.
- Breaking News English: This website includes a number of news stories adapted to beginning, intermediate, and advanced levels of English.
- English Club Vocabulary Quizzes: This website offers a number of quizzes on vocabulary for English language learners.
- A 4 ESL: This website includes a number of English grammar and vocabulary quizzes, including bilingual quizzes in many different languages.
- Online phonics lessons: Although this website is designed for children, the phonics lessons are easy to find and navigate. It may work well for adults learning phonics as well.
- Google Chrome Screen Reader: This extension reads web pages aloud. Other popular web browsers also often have built-in settings that will read pages out loud.
- ESL Story Bank: This collection was created by Literacy Minnesota. It includes a number of stories and worksheets intended for high beginning English language students.
- Reading for Life: This is another collection provided by Literacy Minnesota, and mostly includes activities and resources to support English language learners in reading related to everyday life situations.
- Somali Literacy Project: This website offers an extensive collection of articles and resources around Somali culture and language as well as resources and information on building literacy with Somali children and adults.
K-12 Parent and Teacher Resources
- The Science of Reading: The Basics: A research-based approach to literacy, the Science of Reading provides evidence-backed strategies for effective reading instruction. Grounded in cognitive science, it emphasizes phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension to build strong, lifelong readers.
- Online Literacy Toolkit for Parents: A free resource to make reading a daily habit, the Barbara Bush Foundation’s Online Toolkit for At-Home Learning offers engaging activities, digital tools, and strategies to support literacy at every stage.
- Minnesota Humanities Center resource collection: Intended for educators, this "Absent Narrative Resource Collection" offers an extensive list of culturally-relevant materials for use in classrooms or at home.
- Tumble Books (English and Spanish language books available):
- An online collection of animated ebooks for K-12 students, offered through Hennepin County Library. Look for "TumbleBook Library" or "Biblioteca Tumble" under the many online resources offered by the library.
- Hennepin County Library: The library offers a number of events and programs for all ages on a number of topics, including reading and writing. See this page for upcoming events or explore the Hennepin County Library website for more resources.
- Great Schools grade level milestones videos: This series of videos demonstrates skills that children might have learned by the end of each grade level, from kindergarten through high school. Click on each video to see a different skill, and navigate between grades using the right sidebar.
- Learning Heroes Parent Resources: Learning Heroes offers resources for parents to understand what their children are learning at school and how to help them at home. This "Readiness Check" is a quiz your child can take to measure grade-specific readiness skills. Once the quiz is completed, the website will show you areas to focus on with your child at home.
- Standards and school involvement: The National Center for Families Learning provides an interactive online guide to standards in reading and math. On the same site are suggestions for how to be involved with your child's school and how to help students learn at home. Suggestions are organized by subject and grade level.
- Snappy Words: SnappyWords is an online word-finding and visual dictionary tool that helps users explore synonyms, definitions, and related words with graphical and interactive aids.
Early Childhood Caregiver and Teacher Resources
- Unite for Literacy! Online library with bilingual narration: This website is free to use and publishes online children's books. Books are written in English, and you can also listen in other languages, including Somali and Spanish.
- Storyline Online: This website features actors reading children's books out loud.
- Hennepin County Library Easy Audiobooks: Hearing new words and stories is an important step in learning how to read. The Hennepin County Library has a large collection of audiobooks: see this link for "Easy Fiction Audiobooks" and explore the website to find more books to listen to.
- Vooks: Vooks is an online library of popular children's books. As the books are read, the words pop out of the page so that children can see what the reader is doing in real time. They offer the first month free, or the first year free for teachers or homeschool educators. After that, the website offers paid monthly or annual subscription access.
- TumbleBooks: Free through the Hennepin County Library, these are animated videos of popular children's books available in English, Spanish, and French. Search for "TumbleBooks Library," "Biblioteca Tumble," or "BiblioEnfants," click the link, and enter your library card barcode and PIN number to be redirected to the free websites.
- Reading Rockets Resources on Early Literacy Development: Reading Rockets has numerous articles on all things literacy, developed for parents as well as educators. This page collects a number of resources on literacy development in early childhood; explore the site for even more resources.
- Zero to Three Early Literacy: Zero to Three's website offers a number of articles and resources for supporting early learning and literacy, as well as resources on broader topics related to early childhood development.
- Library Early Learning Resources: Your local library has both events and resources to help you support young children's learning. This web page includes videos, an events listing, and online resources.
- 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten: 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten offers a program at various libraries to support parents reading 1,000 books to their young children before starting kindergarten. Also, find tips for reading to young children and various other resources on their website.
- 1,000 Books booklist: This list of books has over 100 suggested books for reading with your child before she starts kindergarten.
- This flyer, published by Reading Rockets and ¡Colorin Colorado!, describes practical ways you can help your child build literacy skills during everyday activities.
- 0-5 Literacy Milestones: This chart, which lays out developmental milestones for literacy from birth to age five, was developed by Reach out and Read, a Boston-based nonprofit working in early childhood literacy.
- The National Center for Families Learning has published a guide for reading with your child. It includes suggested activities and strategies for building literacy skills with 0-2 year olds, 3-5 year olds, and 6-8 year olds.
- Bilingualism and reading at home: This brochure, published by the Minnesota Literacy Council, provides information about the benefits of knowing two languages and offers tips for parents reading with their children at home. It is written for Spanish-speaking parents.
- Parent Summer Reads handbook: This handbook, written by the Minnesota Literacy Council, offers tips for parents on reading with their children and includes a list of Twin Cities libraries with books in various languages.
- Songs for Children: The King County Library System in Seattle has put together a library of songs they use in their children's programming. Many of the songs have videos you can follow along with.
- Parent Powered Texts: ThinkSmall will send three texts per week to parents offering facts, tips, and activities for supporting young children's literacy skills. Texts are available in English, Spanish, or Somali--sign up or find more information on ThinkSmall's website.