Weekly Reader Adds Lexile Measures to Its Award-Winning Publications

PLEASANTVILLE, N.Y., April 13 /PRNewswire/ -- Weekly Reader today announced a partnership with MetaMetrics®, developer of The Lexile Framework® for Reading, to assign Lexile® measures to articles in many of its popular classroom magazines for grades preK–12. Lexile measures offer valuable information about an article's text demand, allowing teachers and librarians to connect students with reading assignments that best match their abilities and goals.

Weekly Reader provides teachers with resources that include three research-based components of reading-comprehension instruction—inferential thinking skills, vocabulary and background knowledge—and supplements its rich content with follow-up activities and assessments. The incorporation of Lexile measures reinforces these efforts and adds significant value to Weekly Reader's outstanding educational materials.

"We are truly pleased to be working with MetaMetrics," says Ira Wolfman, Weekly Reader's senior vice president of editorial. "Lexile measures provide teachers with an excellent tool to help them assess students' reading levels and tailor instruction to their individual needs."

Weekly Reader began working with MetaMetrics last year to incorporate Lexile measures into ten of its award-winning publications, including Current Events, Current Health 1 and 2, Current Science, READ, ScienceSpin Primary and Senior Editions, and WR News Editions 2, 3 and Senior. By the end of the 2009–2010 school year, approximately 330 Lexile measures will have appeared in some 135 Weekly Reader print and/or digital issues. In addition, the Weekly Reader Archives subscription-based Web site now enables users to search for articles by Lexile measure.

"For over a century, teachers and librarians around the country have relied on Weekly Reader magazines to help students learn about the world around them," says MetaMetrics President Malbert Smith III, Ph.D. "We are pleased that Weekly Reader has joined the growing list of publishers who are promoting the importance of childhood reading by providing Lexile measures for its widely recognized and respected publications."

What makes the Lexile Framework unique from other measurement systems, and what has led to its widespread use, is that it measures both reading ability and text complexity on the same developmental scale. Lexile measures help educators, librarians and families select books, articles and other materials that provide the right level of challenge for a reader's skills and goals, while still maintaining interest and learning. More than 115,000 books and 80 million articles have Lexile measures, and the number of resources with Lexile measures continues to grow. For more information and to access free Lexile resources, visit www.Lexile.com.

About Weekly Reader (www.weeklyreader.com)

One of the great innovative forces in American educational publishing, Weekly Reader has been creating exciting, curriculum-rich supplemental materials for more than 100 years. Its unique digital products and 12 classroom magazines give teachers tools that help them achieve their goals while inspiring students and igniting their love of learning. Every year, Weekly Reader materials reach more than 200,000 teachers and 7 million students from Pre-K to grade 12.

Weekly Reader magazines and Web content are built on a framework of skills that provides teachers with a systematic, explicit approach to teaching reading comprehension throughout the elementary school grades. Called the Concepts of Comprehension,© this research-based curriculum, developed by the nonprofit Urban Education Exchange, builds students' understanding of what they read and helps them to move successfully from one academic year to the next.  In January of this year Weekly Reader successfully implemented the Concepts in its new Weekly Reader Connect (www.wrconnect.com), an online reading program for students in grades 1 through 6.

Weekly Reader also includes Weekly Reader Custom Publishing and Weekly Reader Curriculum Publishing.  Weekly Reader is part of The Reader's Digest Association, Inc.

About MetaMetrics

MetaMetrics, an educational measurement and research organization, develops scientific measures of student achievement that link assessment with targeted instruction to improve learning. The organization's renowned psychometric team created the widely adopted Lexile Framework for Reading (www.Lexile.com); El Sistema Lexile para Leer, the Spanish-language version of the reading framework; The Quantile Framework® for Mathematics (www.Quantiles.com); and The Lexile Framework for Writing. In addition to licensing Lexile and Quantile® measures to state departments of education, testing and instructional companies, and publishers, MetaMetrics offers professional development, resource measurement and customized consulting services.

For additional information or sample material, contact: Janna Sakson, Managing Editor, Online Publications

Weekly Reader, 1 Reader's Digest Road, Pleasantville, NY 10570, [email protected].

www.weeklyreader.com

SOURCE The Reader's Digest Association, Inc.; Weekly Reader Publishing Group