Fast ForWord Literacy

Fast ForWord to Literacy builds cognitive, language, and literacy skills for the adolescent student.

Through an integrated set of computer-based exercises this scientifically validated product can deliver a two-year reading gain in as little as eight weeks. Based on neuroscience research, Fast ForWord to Literacy creates an intervention like no other, which gets to the underlying foundational issues that challenge the struggling reader.

Combined with data-driven educational content it adapts to a student's skill level so adolescent students are continually challenged rather than being frustrated by tasks that are too difficult or bored with tasks that are too easy.

Using graphics, characters, and themes that are appealing to today's adolescent, this product provides advanced grammatical structures, places increased demand on listening for comprehension tasks and advances student vocabulary, including terms from math and science.

Product features support students in achieving rapid success, often without any additional intervention. Some of these include introductory trials with visual-help, a vocabulary tool that allows for pre-learning words and concepts.

Fast Forward Literacy moves middle and high school students toward grade level reading skills, with a focus on listening accuracy, phonological awareness, and language structures.

To accelerate reading progress, Fast ForWord Literacy develops critical brain processing efficiency in four key areas:

Improves memory by requiring holding a word or statement in short-term memory while retrieving picture-concept associations from long-term memory.
Improves attention by making students focus on the tasks at hand.
Strengthens processing ability through auditory, visual, and linguistic processing of orally and visually presented stories for meaning and comprehension.
Develops sequencing through exercises that require using word order to comprehend simple and complex statements and instructions and organizing a response that follows the specified sequence of actions.

What are the Fast ForWord Literacy exercises like?

The Fast ForWord to Literacy product consists of six exercises: three sound exercises and three word exercises. The exercises work together to help develop the understanding of basic speech sounds as well as the fundamental cognitive skills essential for learning and reading.
The sound exercises present complex auditory information in a sub-word format, such as frequency sweeps and syllables. In some instances, the speech sounds have been digitally generated using patented methods (including selective intensity increases and duration extensions) to provide enhanced learning opportunities. The following are the three sound exercises:

• Space Racer
• Galaxy Goal
• Spin Master

The word exercises present words, either in isolation or within sentences, with various levels of linguistic complexity. In some instances, the speech sounds have been digitally altered using patented methods (including selective intensity increases and duration extensions) to provide enhanced learning opportunities. The following are the three word exercises:

• Lunar Tunes
• Star Pics
• Stellar Stories

Space Racer

Space Racer helps improve the speed at which the participant identifies and understands rapid, successive changes in sound (listening accuracy), and the ability to recognize and remember the order in which a series of sounds is presented (auditory sequencing).

Space Racer presents sound sweeps using different frequency ranges, different sequences of sounds, and different time durations. The frequencies and durations of the sound sweeps correspond to some of the rapid transitions in the sounds of the English language.

The object of Space Racer is to race on the space track as quickly as possible by correctly identifying a sequence of two sound sweeps.

Galaxy Goal

Galaxy Goal helps improve the ability to identify and manipulate speech sounds in a quick and efficient manner (phonological fluency), the ability to remain focused on a given task while ignoring distractions and refraining from impulsive behavior (sustained attention), and the capacity for holding speech sounds in memory (phonological memory).

The object of Galaxy Goal is to click the soccer ball after correctly identifying when a new syllable interrupts a repeated syllable.

Spin Master

Spin Master helps improve the ability to make correct distinctions based on individual phonemes (phonological accuracy), the ability to identify and manipulate speech sounds in a quick and efficient manner (phonological fluency), and the capacity for holding speech sounds in memory (phonological memory).

The object of Spin Master is to identify a target syllable when presented in a sequence of two syllables.

Lunar Tunes

Lunar Tunes helps improve the ability to accurately identify spoken words by relying on sound cues alone, without the aid of visual or context cues (auditory word recognition). It also helps develop the capacity for holding speech sounds in memory (phonological memory), the ability to identify and manipulate speech sounds in a quick and efficient manner (phonological fluency), and the ability to make correct distinctions based on individual phonemes (phonological accuracy).

Lunar Tunes displays an amplifier with speakers in groups of four, eight, and sixteen. Each speaker has a syllable or word associated with it. The object of Lunar Tunes is to match all the syllables and words into pairs using the fewest clicks.

Star Pics

Star Pics helps build knowledge of the phonological structure and meaning of words (vocabulary), and helps develop the ability to accurately identify spoken words by relying on sound cues alone, without the aid of visual or context cues (auditory word recognition).

Star Pics also improves the ability to make correct distinctions based on individual phonemes (phonological accuracy), and the ability to identify and manipulate speech sounds in a quick and efficient manner (phonological fluency).

The object of Star Pics is to identify the picture that represents a pronounced target word.

Stellar Stories

Stellar Stories helps improve the ability to understand successive sentences and derive meaning from a story (listening comprehension). It helps improve the ability to listen to spoken directions of increasing length and complexity, comprehend them, and keep them in memory long enough to plan and carry out the required action (following directions).

Stellar Stories also helps build an understanding of the elements of the English language, including proper word order, syntax, prefixes and suffixes, plurals, and subject-verb agreement (English language conventions), and helps build knowledge of the phonological structure and meaning of words (vocabulary).

The object of Stellar Stories is to listen to a story, and then answer questions and follow instructions related to the story.

The following scope and sequence explains the tasks involved, the language and reading skills targeted and the cognitive skills developed.
Download Scope and Sequence pdf>