It's Back-to-School time once again! In this blog post, we’ll look at three ways to help student readers prepare for the new school year.

Does Back-to-School feel like a giant “Sunday Scary” to you? If so, you are not alone! “Sunday Scaries” is a term that many use to capture the overwhelming feelings of anxiety mixed with anticipation that come with Sunday evenings. For educators, students, and families, this term accurately describes the many feelings that come with the start of the new school year. Well, never fear! Capstone is here to help you get your school year started right and fight off those Back-to-School Scaries!

In this post, we explore media literacy, and how curiosity connects with this 21st century skill set. It may be no surprise that media literacy–the ability to access, interpret, and create ideas using various media forms–is also closely associated with intellectual curiosity. Whether the media is books, newspapers, movies, television shows, or websites, they all provide children with a way to answer the questions they are individually curious about.

On August 30th at 4pm CT, we're tackling the topic of differentiation through the lens of time-saving tips. Please join us for a brand new webinar!

You don’t need test tubes and beakers to foster meaningful science engagement. Everyday life events, like a neighborhood walk, cooking dinner, and casual conversations with teachers and caregivers, can all spark scientific curiosity. Read on to learn how to organically support children’s natural curiosity, and build lifelong science skills in the process!

We are pleased to announce the release of “Past and Present,” 12 brand-new articles on how everyday life has changed over time. Last fall, we removed a set of PebbleGo Social Studies articles about life in the past because they no longer met our standards for inclusivity. This new set of texts covers a range of engaging, standards-aligned topics, from clothing to transportation to games and fun in the past and present.

It’s that time of year when school is out for summer! That is, unless you are teaching this summer. Many educators, myself included, teach some type of programming in the summertime. Below are some of my favorite tips for using PebbleGo and PebbleGo Next to help you and your students succeed this summer school season!

How do you introduce informational text features to students? When talking about informational text with your class, you might point out captions, or talk about paragraph structure. With online articles, you might show students how to tap on a word to find its pronunciation or definition. As you model informational text features to students, there are differences in both online and offline reading materials to consider.

For the voracious readers out there, it may be no surprise that curiosity and literacy go hand in hand. After all, books allow children a way to explore the unknown, to answer their questions about the world, and imagine fantastical possibilities for themselves. By supporting young children’s curiosity and wonder, educators and caregivers are also supporting a child’s desire to read – even before they can actually do so on their own!