About Core Clicks

What is Core Clicks?

• Core Clicks is a dynamic digital nonfiction reading program designed to meet Common Core and other rigorous state standards in the K-5 classroom.
• Each rich instructional unit in this easy-to-use web-based supplement guides whole classes or small groups through three "reads" of an engaging informational text.
• Each read has a specific learning objective and is supported by interactive tasks that reinforce that objective.
• Exciting multimedia elements capture and sustain readers' interest over multiple encounters with a text to make learning fun as well as challenging.
• Developed by the award-winning nonfiction team at Scholastic, working with experts including Nell K. Duke, Ed.D., a nationally recognized leader in literacy development, Core Clicks gives teachers unparalleled support in building the close reading, comprehension, and analysis skills that the Common Core Standards demand.
• Core Clicks works on any web-enabled device as the basis of whole-group,
  small-group, or individual instruction. Students may complete lessons, activities,
  and performance-based assessments through a protected Student View. Teachers
  may track, score, and report on work completed. Core Clicks is available by subscription to schools and can also be purchased by districts.

What grade levels does Core Click support?

It supports grades K-5.

How does Core Clicks support teachers in implementing CCSS and other rigorous standards for ELA?

• Multimedia instructional units provide quality informational texts at varying levels of complexity
• Multiple encounters with each text build close reading and analysis skills that are critical to mastery of informational text
• “Spotlight Skills” in each text study help all readers reach proficiency in key literacy skills for their grade level
• Text-dependent questions prepare students for the types of questions they will encounter on new, more rigorous standardized assessments
• Lesson plans support struggling readers, English language learners, and (in grades 3-5) advanced readers—helping teachers reach diverse learners
• Interactive lessons model best practices for teaching close reading and analysis of informational texts, supporting teachers in the instructional shifts demanded by the standards

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Instruction and Implementation

What is the Core Clicks instructional model?

The Core Clicks instructional model incorporates the time-tested arc of engagement, instruction, practice, and assessment. Multimedia elements, high-interest content, and stunning visuals build engagement; the interactive Text Studies offer instruction on key aspects of comprehension; multiple encounters with each text provide reading and skills practice; and Reading Checkpoints offer students the opportunity to demonstrate mastery of skills in independent, performance-based assessments.

What is the recommended implementation plan for the Core Clicks program?

Core Clicks complements and can be integrated into a teacher’s existing curriculum. As a supplemental ELA product that supports content-area instruction, the completion of one Text Study every two weeks during time devoted to Literacy, Science, or Social Studies curriculum is recommended. The completion of each Text Study will take an estimated 4 instructional sessions of 20 minutes (for younger readers) to 30 minutes (for older readers); the completion of each Reading Checkpoint will take one additional instructional session. Following this implementation plan, you will have more than enough material to complete 1 text study every 2 weeks or 36 weeks.

How long does a Core Clicks Text Study take to complete?

The completion of each Text Study will take an estimated 4 instructional sessions; the completion of each Reading Checkpoint will take one additional instructional session.

What is the suggested pacing of the Core Clicks program?

Although Core Clicks may be implemented with great flexibility, we suggest completing one Text Study every 2 weeks, following the implementation schedule below that best suits your classroom needs:

Model A:

Complete a Core Clicks Text Study in 2 sessions per week across 2 weeks. Sample schedule below.

Advantages: As reading informational text is integrated evenly into each week, students build reading comprehension skills, critical thinking, and content knowledge as they progress. This model also allows ample time each week for other enriching literacy-building activities such as literature studies, vocabulary building, and project-based learning.

Model B:

Complete a Core Clicks Text Study in 4 sessions per week in alternating weeks. Sample schedule below.

Advantages: Using Core Clicks on 4 days every other week allows students to focus intensively on reading and analyzing informational text. This approach offers a deep focus on reading comprehension skills, critical thinking, and content knowledge on consecutive days every other week. This model also allows a similar intensive focus every other week on other kinds of enriching literacy-building activities such as literature studies, vocabulary building, and project-based learning.

What skills are being developed using Core Clicks?

The program offers instruction, practice, and assessment on 13 “Spotlight Skills.” Spotlight Skills are key standards-aligned skills for the mastery of informational text. Spotlight Skill “Workouts” hone the tools needed for deep comprehension grade by grade. Spotlight Skills include: Author’s Purpose, Cause & Effect, Cite Reasons & Evidence, Cite Text Evidence, Compare & Contrast, Determine Word Meaning, Main Idea & Key Details, Make Inferences, Point of View, Problem & Solution, Sequence, Use Text Features, and Use Visuals.
As students read, interact with, and discuss a variety of texts along a staircase of text complexity, they also build key speaking/listening and language skills, critical-thinking skills, and academic vocabulary.

How does Core Clicks meet standards for English Language Arts?

Core Clicks meets the standards for ELA through exposing students to a wide range
of short informational texts at varying reading levels and varying levels of text complexity, as well as through providing embedded activities to build related skills.

Does Core Clicks support the needs of diverse learners?

Yes! Core Clicks supports the needs of diverse learners in several ways:

• By offering a range of texts at varying reading levels and varying levels of text complexity so you can choose appropriate texts. All texts are searchable by reading level, grade, and topic, which further helps to identify appropriate texts
• By providing optional human-voice audio support, synced with word-by-word highlighting, for every read of every Text Study
• In the Teaching Guide, by providing suggested modifications for every lesson to help meet the needs of struggling readers, ELL’s, and (for Grades 3-5) advanced learners

In what types of group settings does Core Clicks work best?

Core Clicks is designed for flexible use in multiple settings: whole-group instruction, small-group instruction, or independent use. The Text Studies are designed mainly as group lessons for whole-group (on an interactive whiteboard or with a digital projector) or small-group (with iPads or other tablets) instruction. The Reading Tasks are designed primarily for individual skill practice and performance-based assessment. However, teachers may assign any component of the program for individual completion in the password-protected Student View. Certain program components (Reading Checkpoints and Question Quests) may be scored and tracked for reporting.

How does Core Clicks incorporate vocabulary instruction?

Each Text Study builds students’ working vocabulary by focusing on selected
high-leverage (Tier 2) academic vocabulary as well as domain-specific (Tier 3) vocabulary.

“Word Workouts” embedded in the text lessons teach not just the words themselves, but strategies for vocabulary acquisition such as context clues, word roots, and affixes.

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Components

What does the Core Clicks program for K-5 include?

• 120 Text Studies (20 per grade level): Each Text Study is a complete instructional unit that guides students through multiple reads of a short, challenging informational text. Through multiple encounters with the text, students build close-reading and text-dependent analytical skills. High-interest topics grab students’ attention while interactive tasks and multimedia elements keep engagement high. A text study will take approximately 4 instructional sessions of 20 minutes (for younger readers) to 30 minutes (for older readers) to complete.
• 20 Skill Videos (9 for K-2, 11 for grades 3-5): Fun videos offer direct instruction Spotlight Skills, helping students grasp analytical concepts like Cause & Effect, Citing Text Evidence, or Main Idea & Key Details.
• 33 Reading Checkpoints (4 per grade level for K-2, 7 per grade level for grades 3-5): Based on new informational texts that students will not have encountered in the Text Studies, each grade-level Reading Checkpoints may be used for independent skills practice or informal, performance-based assessment. Reading Checkpoints are designed to be completed independently by older students and in small groups or one-on-one with teacher support by the youngest students. Checkpoints provide extra practice with the kinds of analytical questions students will encounter on new, more rigorous standardized assessments. Reading Checkpoints are scored and tracked by the Core Clicks program.
• Implementation and Teaching Guides: The program includes an online Implementation Guide for incorporating Core Clicks as a supplemental program within the ELA curriculum, or to support and extend Science and Social Studies content-area topics. In addition, every Text Study comes with an online Teaching Guide featuring ELA and content-area correlations, scaffolding tips for struggling readers and ELL students, writing prompts, and extension activities.
• Tracking and Reporting Tools: Digital locker technology allows teachers to track and report on work for students who complete and submit assignments through a password-protected Student View. The program tracks completion of all assigned work, and provides performance metrics on work intended for assessment, including Question Quests (multiple-choice quizzes within the Text Studies) and Reading Checkpoints.

What types of embedded resources does Core Clicks include?

Core Clicks includes embedded resources such as videos, audio clips, interactive skills-based tasks, and text-to-talk audio support.

Is the material leveled?

Yes, all informational texts are leveled according to industry standards: Guided Reading Level (GRL) for K-5 as well as Lexile® levels for grades 2-5. In addition, texts for grades 2-5 are assigned a qualitative text complexity measure. The four text complexity bands are: Moderate 1, Moderate 2, Complex 1, and Complex 2.

Which elements of the product are printable?

Although Core Clicks is designed as an online program, we realize that teachers might need or prefer to be able to print some key assets. The printable elements are: : Teaching Guides, Implementation Guide, and all of the texts that form the basis of the Text Studies. Plus, every Skill Workout includes a printable skill sheet for extra practice. Reports are also printable.

What in the product is searchable?

All content is searchable by skill, standard, reading level, text complexity level, subject area (Science or Social Studies), and keyword.

What is a Text Study?

A Text Study is a complete instructional unit designed to be completed in 4 instructional sessions of 20 minutes (for K-2) to 30 minutes (for K-5). It is a set of interactive lessons and activities based on one high-interest informational text. Specifically, each Text Study includes three “reads” of a digital version of the text. Each read has a different learning objective, with specific interactivity to support that objective. A printable version of the passage is also available for each Text Study.

• First read (Read It!): This read introduces the text as a whole and focuses on vocabulary. Fun multimedia elements get kids excited to read, while contextually-based vocabulary support builds vocabulary skills and supports comprehension.
• Second read (Analyze It!): Text-dependent interactive tasks, including text-marking and multiple-choice questions, take students deeper into the text to build the close-reading and analysis skills they need for mastery of the Common Core Standards.
• Third read (Discuss It!): Pop-up discussion questions guide students in thinking deeply and critically about the text in whole-group or small-group settings.
• Skill Workout: In-depth workouts reinforce a single Spotlight Skill. Each workout includes a Skills Video for direct instruction, a text-dependent, interactive activity with immediate feedback, and a printable work sheet.
• Question Quest: A light assessment consisting of five multiple-choice questions. The multiple-choice comprehension check can be completed as an interactive group review with immediate feedback or as an individual assignment given directly to the students. In the password-protected Student View, individual responses and scores are trackable.

What are the 13 Spotlight Skills?

These key skills for the mastery of informational text are:

How is a Question Quest completed?

Question Quests, at the end of each text study, can be completed as a group or individually. If assigned by the teacher within the Student View, Question Quests can be scored and tracked for each student.

What does Close Reading or Close Reads mean?

Close reading means using critical thinking and taking time to delve into a text—usually multiple times—to gain ownership of a particular text. Core Clicks provides engaging interactive lessons that entail multiple reads of each text. This builds both the deep comprehension and the persistence students need to be independent, analytical readers of challenging texts.

What is text complexity? Why is it important? How is it measured?

Text complexity is, in brief, the degree of challenge a text is likely to present to readers. Research strongly links the ability to access complex text with a higher degree of general academic success. For these reasons, the Core Clicks text complexity system offers a way to build young readers’ ability to access a range of increasingly challenging texts. Core Clicks interactive lessons offer support tailored to the specific demands of each text as measured by three metrics of complexity:

• Qualitative measure: Considerations such as purpose, structure, levels of meaning, language conventionality and clarity, and knowledge demands can make a text challenging to young readers and pre-readers. In Core Clicks, we assign each text in grades 2-5 to one of four text-complexity levels as a qualitative measure of complexity: Moderate 1, Moderate 2, Complex 1, or Complex 2.
• Quantitative measure: Sentence length, vocabulary, and other “objective and measurable” aspects define this dimension of text complexity. In grades 2-5, Core Clicks indicates the quantitative measure of a text’s reading level with a Lexile® score.
• Reader and Task: The third part of text complexity looks at reader and task, considering such factors as: knowledge and experience, purpose for reading, complexity of text-based tasks, and complexity of text-based questions. While the first two measures focus on the inherent qualities of the text, Reader and Task is a complexity value that can vary greatly from child to child and from group to group. In Core Clicks, engaging text and interactive tasks always promote and support in-depth reading. You, as your students' teacher, are of course best suited to judge students' ability and how challenging a particular task may be for them.

For all grade levels, a Guided Reading Level is provided for each text as an additional, familiar measure that integrates both qualitative and quantitative aspects of complexity.

In Kindergarten and grade 1, emerging readers are not expected to read complex texts independently. However, they are expected to be exposed to a variety of appropriately complex texts through read-aloud, read-along, and independent viewing and reading. For these grade levels, Core Clicks does not apply a Lexile® score or qualitative text complexity measure. Instead, we assign a Guided Reading Level, since many K-1 teachers use this leveling system.

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Teacher and Student View/Access

What does the teacher have access to?

Teachers have access to all components of the product, including:

• ALL Text Studies, Skill Videos, and Reading Checkpoints, for all grade levels
• The Teacher Space, including class management, assignment, and reporting tools
• All teaching resources, including the Teaching Guides, FAQ, and Implementation Guide

What does the student have access to?

Students have access to the password-protected Student Space, where they will complete and submit any work assigned by the teacher. This may include, Question Quests (quizzes within Text Studies), Reading Checkpoints, or, Skill Videos. The teacher may also assign all or part of a Text Study.

Each student will have a unique user name and password and will have access only to specific lessons and tasks assigned by the teacher; students will not see any material that has not been assigned to them.

How does the student interact with the program?

Teachers “push” assignments to students to be completed on an individual basis. Assignments may include Question Quests (quizzes within Text Studies), Reading Checkpoints, Skill Videos, and all or part of a Text Study. For example, if the teacher wants his/her class to preview the “Read It” component of a Text Study for homework, each student would access the assignment at home by logging in to the Student View. When a student has completed the assignment, the teacher is notified.

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Reporting and Assessment

What types of reporting tools are included with Core Clicks?

Teachers may track and report on individual performance of two components in the program: Question Quests and Reading Checkpoints. Students complete assignments in the password-protected Student View and submit them to the teacher.

Core Clicks software will automatically score multiple-choice and text-marking questions. For short answer questions, we provide a rubric in the teaching resources so that the teacher can manually score student work and record their scores within the program. For other components (any of the three reads of a Text Study, Skill Workouts, Skill Videos), Core Clicks tracks whether individuals have begun or completed the assignment.

How do I score student performance?

In Question Quests and Reading Checkpoints, multiple-choice and text-marking questions are scored automatically. For short answer questions in Reading Checkpoints, there is a rubric available for the teacher to score manually.

For other components (any of the three reads of a Text Study, Skill Workouts, Skill Videos), the teacher may track whether individuals have begun or completed the assignment.

How can a teacher/administrator access data?

Teachers will always be able to generate reports at the student or class level. A designated administrator at the school level will be able to access all data.

How often should I administer Reading Checkpoints?

There are 6 Reading Checkpoints per grade level for grades 3-5 and 3 Reading Checkpoints per grade level for grades K-2. It is recommended to assign one Reading Checkpoint as skills practice or performance-based assessment about every 6 weeks for upper grades and about every 12 weeks for lower grades during the school year.

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Professional Development

How do I begin using Core Clicks? Is training available?

Core Clicks is built to be truly plug-and-play, meaning the program is designed to be very intuitive with minimal preparation needed by the teacher. Core Clicks is structured to lead teachers and students together easily through the lessons and activities that make up each Text Study. A printable Implementation Guide outlines best practices for integrating the program into K-5 literacy instruction. Additionally, an Online Teaching Guide provides teaching resources for every Text Study, including specific supports for struggling readers and English Language Learners. Lastly, we will have a web tutorial available to review and use as a starting point with Core Clicks.

Purchase and Support

How can I purchase Core Clicks?

There are two ways to purchase: (1) contact your local Scholastic sales representative, or (2) call 1-800-387-1437 and ask for a “Core Clicks” sales representative.

How much does Core Clicks cost?

For pricing, please contact your local Scholastic sales representative, or call
1-800-387-1437 and ask for a "Core Clicks" sales representative.

How long will I have access to Core Clicks?

Core Clicks is a yearlong program running August 1 through July 31. Special offers may provide additional months to the program and will be indicated on the final agreement.

How do I access the content?

Once the online agreement has been approved, there will be a main contact appointed that will set up access to Core Clicks for your school or district. Then, at the teacher level, each teacher will be asked to set_up a user_name and password for
each of their classes. The teacher will always log in via
www.scholastic.com/coreclicks and log in their unique username and password.

What devices is Core Clicks compatible with?

Core Click is device agnostic—ready to use on interactive whiteboards, computers with or without digital projectors, laptops, and iPads or other tablets.

How do I log in for the first time?

How do I contact technical support?

Customer service may be reached at:

• Phone: 1-800-724-2222
• Email: edservice@scholastic.com

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System Requirements

What are the technical requirements for Core Clicks?

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