The International School Bangkok (ISB) has a large, multi-lingual student population. It has a strong emphasis on assistive technology to support diverse learning needs, including students with English as an additional language. The school turned to the Read&Write literacy toolbar to support its drive to support access and engagement.
Acclaimed as one of the world’s premier international schools, The International School Bangkok (ISB) in Thailand caters for a diverse community of expatriate students representing over 60 nationalities.
Read&WriteI’m so passionate about Read&Write because it does such a good job with students. When the students see it, they immediately take to it.”
Background
Set in an expansive 15 hectare campus just outside the city centre, the International School Bangkok (ISB) serves 1,850 children aged 4-18 from a diverse range of backgrounds. These include English Language Learners as well as young people with diagnosed learning needs.
The independent non-profit institution places a strong emphasis on educational technology to support every student’s personal learning goals. “We know that assistive tech is such an important piece of the puzzle,” says Philip Bowman, High School Learning Support at ISB. “Assistive tech is so critical for all our students being able to access content and focus on their strengths.”
“We’re very much a laptop school,” concurs Learning Tech Coach Michael Boll, who supports Elementary and Middle School students at ISB. “Every kid has a device, and they’re using them for pretty much everything.”
Read&Write for all
Read&Write is deployed across ISB, giving Elementary, Middle and High School students of all backgrounds and abilities a friendly literacy boost with their classroom studies and homework. The discreet toolbar supports every student, helping them access documents and online content more easily while adding polish to essays and assignments.
With a click, students can hear web pages - or their own work - read out loud in a choice of voices. There’s a choice of dictionaries and picture dictionaries to explain unfamiliar words. Read&Write also offers word suggestions to enrich written work and encourage students to stretch their vocabulary.
The whole class
Read&Write has been embraced by teachers at ISB who use it with their entire class, explains Tammie Scherrer, Elementary School Learning Support: “There’s a very strong appeal because everyone in the room’s using Read&Write, so kids don’t feel that using it makes them stand out."
Teachers at the school have also noted that Read&Write has allowed students to really push themselves in the amount and quality of work they can produce.
"It allows typical kids to really push themselves in the amount they can produce. Their ideas are much deeper. There’s a lot more detail in what they’re writing, and they’re able to explain themselves much better than if they were writing by hand.”
Read&Write’s broad palette of literacy support tools – and its no-fuss simplicity – particularly resonates with Philip Bowman: “I was extremely impressed with the number of options in one place, so students don’t have to open multiple tabs or different pieces of technology to get all these benefits. With Read&Write it’s all in one spot, so it’s everything’s really easy to access.”
