Promotional Web Video: Learn with Homer’s First Readers

The full video that I created for the app update. It starts with a pan showing that First Readers live in the Story Time section of the app, and then shows how they build on the preceding Learn to Read phonics-based spelling and reading games to take kids from practicing reading skills to reading and recording their own stories.

First Readers In Story Time — Confession: this zoom on the Story Time menu starts the video to show the first readers in the context of the existing library. Although in that respect it plays an important role in the video, it is my least favorite moment of the video. If I were to do it over again, I'd change it to footage of a child—but I created this video in a weekend, so there wasn't time to bring kids in for a second take!

Spelling Game in Learn with Homer — This is one of the spelling games in Learn with Homer. At this point of the video, I'm setting up the idea of learning to read through practicing skills.

Decodable Reader in Learn with Homer — This is one of the children with whom we have tested the app, as she reads a page in one of Homer’s “First Readers.”

'Project' => 'This video was created when we were less than a week away from launching our newest feature in Learn with Homer, which would take our kindergarten curriculum a huge step forward: First Readers (also known in the educational space as ‘emergent readers’ or ‘decodable Readers’) that children could read and record using only the letter sounds and sight words that they had learned in the first several levels of our reading progression. We were still quite young as a company, and this was our first big feature update to the app, so we got to this point before realizing: "We should really have a marketing video that demonstrates first readers in the app, shouldn't we?"',

'Challenges' => 'Demonstrate where First Readers live in Learn with Homer, how they work, and their significance within Learn with Homer’s Learn to Read progression—all in about 30 seconds. Script it, schedule recording time with 3 children, film it, record audio, and edit the footage over the weekend—just before the app would be updated to include the new feature.',

'Solutions' => 'I came up with a simple script that introduced the concept of a first reader—that lives in the "Story Time" section of the app, and what it means in the context of a child learning to read. I recorded voicing from 3 children, as well as footage of them each manipulating the iPad in early sections of the app and reading sentences from the first readers against several different backdrops. I then edited that down to a 36-second video in Final Cut Pro.'

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