Library & Digital Resources
Library Materials
The Heartland AEA library contains many resource materials on English Learner/diversity issues that educators may check out at no cost. The library is located in the Johnston Regional Education Center at 6500 Corporate Drive in Johnston. Educators may stop by and check out items, or they can reserve materials through the online library catalog. In addition to materials in English, the library contains children and young adult books that are written in other languages such as Bosnian, Spanish, Russian, Vietnamese and Arabic (some are bilingual).
Benchmark Education Kits
The library has RIGOR EL leveled readers ready for checkout. Materials are marked that they are for preview only and no copying is allowed.
Immigrant and Refugee Collection
The library also has numerous books that speak to the immigrant and refugee experience.
Immigrant & Refugee Collection
Digital Resources
Heartland AEA also provides no-cost access to numerous digital resources to assist students and educators.
BookFLIX
The fiction/nonfiction book pairings in BookFLIX are great ways to engage students. While only in Spanish and English, the visuals, audio and word highlights as the ebook is read, which may provide some nice practice opportunities for students. Related digital resources such as TrueFLIX, ScienceFLIX and FreedomFLIX will also be of interest to students.
CultureGrams
CultureGrams includes text, video, interviews, maps, charts and more on countries and states.
Encyclopedia Britannica
Visit the Encyclopedia Britannica website, click “Your Britannica Resources” in the upper right, and you’ll find French, Spanish and Japanese versions. The built-in dictionary may also come in handy. If you go to an article, highlight some text, then click the globe icon on the right, you can translate the text. It uses a machine-voice read-aloud. Don’t forget that there are lots of photos, maps, charts and graphs in Britannica to support the written text.
Learn360
Learn360 contains mainly streaming videos. Most of the videos are closed captioned, so students can listen and read. If you click “Advanced search,” you can limit to videos in different languages such as Korean, Chinese, Dutch, French, German, Italian, Japanese, etc.
MackinVIA Ebooks
You’ll find 2,500+ ebooks in MackinVIA, many of them read-aloud so students can listen and follow the text. The ebooks work on any computer at school or home. About 100 titles are in different languages. You’ll find fiction and non-fiction titles at a variety of interest levels.
MackinVIA Read-alongs
Read-alongs in MackinVIA are a great way to engage students and support independent reading. These ebooks feature human-voice narration with expression that is synchronized with the words on the screen. Words are highlighted as they are read, and variable speeds are available. Over 200 titles are available for K-6, 40+ titles for middle school and 30+ for high school. Visit the MackinVIA website, click “All Resources,” scroll down and click “More.”
PebbleGo and PebbleGo Next
The ebooks and articles in PebbleGo and Pebble Go Next are meant for our youngest researchers. Pebble Go is for grades K-3 and is available in Spanish and English, written and read-aloud. Pebble Go Next is in English only for grades 4-6.
New: Hyperlink Feature: You can link a PebbleGo or PebbleGo Next article or a category in SeeSaw, in a Google Doc or another learning management system. You don’t need to be logged in to PebbleGo or PebbleGo Next.
Important Contacts
