A. Parent and teacher feedback is very important to our continued efforts. Please feel free to contact the Literacy Center Education Network at the following email addresses:

• RequestInformation@literacycenter.net
• Donate@literacycenter.net

A. Schools around the world are currently linking to the LiteracyCenter.Net and we appreciate and encourage their support. All are free to link to the LiteracyCenter.Net, without written permission. We do request, however, that we be given full credit for our work. Please use the LiteracyCenter.Net name when you link to our site. If you are linking to multiple sections of the LiteracyCenter.Net you may use the following names (and urls) to identify various sections of our curricula:

• Letter Center (www.lettercenter.net)
• Number Center (www.numbercenter.net)
• Writing Center (www.writingcenter.net)
• Shape Center (www.shapecenter.net)

A. We do not allow deep links. (This is a link that requires some engineering and makes a visitor feel as though our lessons are actually living on another site.) Any site that is currently doing this, will find that our technology no longer allows it. These links will need to be re-established using the LiteracyCenter.Net linking guidelines.

A. The LiteracyCenter is an open and free forum where parents and teachers can find professionally designed educational material to share with their children. Initially funded by a U.S. Department of Education Small Business Innovation Research contract, the LiteracyCenter.Net was designed to develop web-based learning strategies for “at risk” children in the United States.

Today, the Literacy Center brings together the best and the brightest professionals—educational technologists, human factors experts, interface designers, web designers, medical professionals, psychologists, brain researchers, and engineers—in an effort to find answers to the following very pressing questions:

• How can we help children learn to read?
• What are we doing in the modern world that makes their job easier or more difficult?
• At what point in their development should children be systematically introduced to second or other languages?
• What is the relationship between early second language acquisition and the study of music?
• Why are children in some countries excelling at reading, math, and science?
• Why are children lagging behind in the United States?
• What are the advantages of multimodal, multimedia, educational material?
• Since most children born in the twenty-first century will be working with 3-D animation and visualization technology, is there an advantage to early learning material that utilizes real-time 3-D?

A. In an effort to optimize mission critical learning, we watch carefully to see evidence of what is working and what is not. Currently, we have one lesson with train/car/motorcycle animated characters that tow letters on and off of the screen. We created this lesson to see if children would be drawn to characters if they were given equal access to material that included more creative placement of actual subject matter. Believe it or not, our usability experts were not surprised to find that children prefer playing with other lessons.

Learning how an alphabet looks, sounds, and performs in words is a big job for small children. Our research has found that characters, which are generally larger than the actual subject matter and often bouncing around and talking, can confuse the learning environment. Children who have trouble recognizing letters report that they have no trouble remembering how characters look, sound, and behave. This is basically because most characters are actually branded products such as Big Bird, Barney, Thomas the Train, etc. Well meaning companies have invested in branding their “properties” through something called “product placement” which means they place products in multiple environments to improve brand recognition. Small children in the United States are exposed to branded characters throughout the day. When they find these loved characters in educational environments, their attention is naturally more drawn to the character more than the subject matter.

At the LiteracyCenter.Net, we are working to provide a direct link between children and developmentally appropriate educational material. We rely on parent and teacher feedback to make certain we are hitting the mark. As part of this process, we have chosen not to confuse the learning environment with characters. Based upon the feedback we have received, it appears that this choice is helping children master material. Many report that children who play at the LiteracyCenter.Net begin to think that letters, colors, numbers, and words are as fun and engaging as branded characters.

A. We consider the LiteracyCenter.Net English, French, German, and Spanish curricula to be a Level One introduction to basic concepts. Since we have teachers who teach different methodologies –i.e., phonics, whole word, hybrid phonics/whole word—and since we all know that learning to read requires the development of multiple strategies, the LiteracyCenter.Net takes a very traditional approach to letter recognition. We begin by introducing letter names. Since alphabets are limited datasets, most young learners will be able to learn all the letter names of their first language alphabet in a relatively short period of time. Most teachers then begin by introducing upper case letters and then lower case letters. This method reinforces what the child has learned in the first instance. We repeat lesson styles in four languages at the LiteracyCenter to help support the systematic introduction of new material, and trust that parents and teachers will work with their children until they have been able to master the first task before moving to the next. The LiteracyCenter.Net Level Two Curricula will begin where these exercises leave off. Phonetics and a new phonetic strategy will be the focus of the Level Two lessons.

A. Vowels are always red in the Level One curricula. This helps children understand that vowels are different from consonants. In the English and Spanish Curricula, we introduce vowel sounds as part of the early word formation exercises. Through creatively animating each vowel shape, children are able to literally see the different sounds that each vowel makes.

A. All exercises at the LiteracyCenter.Net have been developed so that each click counts. Children are encouraged not to randomly click or stab at the screen. The object of the build the letter exercise is to help children create a mental model of letter shapes, and to see how each letter is constructed. It leads to improved letter recognition and, later, to improved writing ability. Parents and teachers are encouraged to begin the lesson by showing the child that she can either fill the gray space by clicking on the gray or by dragging and dropping the letter part onto the gray. Through this method, the child will discover that she can “unstick” and control the letter simply by clicking on the gray.

A. This is a difficult question. At the LiteracyCenter.Net, we promote active learning. We also stress concentration. In terms of media use, we prefer erring on the side of conservatism. In certain environments, children may need to have headphones to be able to concentrate on the material at hand. In other environments, teachers might allow one student to teach other students. (This is a great method because it enables children to move freely and dance as they learn.) In circumstances where it has been determined that there is a need, the LiteracyCenter.Net design team would suggest that parents and teachers consult medical professionals before using headphones or any other head-mounted device on young children. Your school or family physician should be able to provide guidelines for the appropriate weight of devices before you purchase them. Once in use, guidelines for volume should be strictly adhered to.

A. It is our goal to utilize the proceeds from your donations to add more lessons to the LiteracyCenter.Net and to provide instructions in all languages that we offer.

A. Because so many children around the globe are learning British English, we are very mindful of the differences. The good news is that there are few differences in the Level One Curriculum. Among the most notable are the spelling differences between Center/Centre and Color/Colour. As we gather more international support, we plan to offer full British and American English curricula.