Samson’s Classroom: Product Review & Giveaway

Have you heard of Samson’s Classroom?  It is an online reading program for children in grades K-5.  The goal of the program is to help children become better readers by focusing on three core areas: sight words, spelling, and reading comprehension.  I was recently given the wonderful opportunity to try Samson’s Classroom and found it to be an engaging, educational program.

Samson’s Classroom is divided up into three core areas: Sight Words, Spelling, and Reading Comprehension.  I absolutely love this because, as teachers, we all know there are different components to building reading proficiency. Students can work on one specific area, a mixture of areas, or all three areas together, which is a great way to tailor learning to their needs.

No matter which area students work on, they will be guided by Samson, the program’s dog mascot.  All of the activities are interactive and engaging, and Samson offers praise and encouragement when needed.

The Samson’s Classroom Sight Words area does an excellent job at helping students learn their sight words.  This area is broken into the following areas: Learn Words, Build Words, Identify Words, and Quiz.  There is also an additional fill-in-the-sentence game.  The brilliance behind Samson’s Classroom is that sight words are broken down into levels and each level contains different lists of words.  I absolutely love this because it allows teachers to differentiate instruction.  Teachers can easily assign students a certain level or list to work with.  I think it would be a great idea to integrate the Sight Words program with The Moffatt Girls’ Ready2Read Sight Words program.  Teachers can easily take a look at the lists on Samson’s Classroom and choose the one that works with their sight words for the week.  I also have to mention how wonderful Samson’s Classroom is for including lesson and game ideas as well as worksheets to use when teaching sight words. There are so many fun ideas included, and teachers will find them quick and easy to implement.

The next content area of Samson’s Classroom is Spelling.  Samson’s allows you to use their premade spelling lists or upload your own.  Teachers can upload their weekly spelling list for the entire class to practice with as well as sight word lists for struggling readers so they can gain extra practice.  With either list type, students have the option to identify missing letters, unscramble spelling words, or practice spelling words.

Last but not least, is Reading with Samson.  This content area is definitely for more advanced readers.  The reading passages are divided up into different levels.  Students are asked to read a passage and answer comprehension questions about their reading.  If a student answers incorrectly, the program is great about highlighting the area of the passage where the answer can be found.  I like this because it forces students to go back and reread to find the correct answer.  I have had SO many students who never go back to reread and find the correct answer, and I believe this game will help train students to go back and reread.

Another reason I love Samson’s Classroom are the many resources they offer teachers.  Everything you need to successfully implement this program into your classroom is included.  I have used other reading programs in my classroom before but have yet to see one that really thought about teachers and what resources they might need/want when using their program.  Samson’s offers lessons plans, awards, worksheets, parent letters, and so much more! One of the most exciting things I found was a section containing literacy articles for teachers.  I found an incredibly entertaining, insightful article there that I have told so many other teachers about!  I am looking so forward to Samson’s building upon this section.  It’s a wonderful resource for teachers!

How would you like to use Samson’s Classroom in your classroom?  Thanks to the wonderful folks at Samson’s Classroom, I have a one-year subscription to giveaway!