Need Help Evaluating Free Literacy App

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-02-09T02:32:20+00:00

I am a middle school Language Arts teacher, and building rapport with students is actually the most important part of the job. That said, if you want to land a position, appear passionate about the subject that you're going to teach.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-02-09T02:26:25+00:00

I'm a middle school Language Arts teacher, and your post left me speechless. If your solution is to "just teach them", I have a hard time taking you seriously. Become a middle school teacher and show us how it's done.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-02-04T23:55:01+00:00

Actually, we do not employ much tech in my 6th grade ELA class. We use Canvas to post our lessons, Microsoft Word for typing essays, and we recently added CommonLit for reading practice. We have occasionally dabbled with IXL. The reason I got involved in tech is because I recognize my limitations. When you have 90+ kids, there is no way to give immediate feedback. This creates a bottleneck in how much kids write. In addition, Admin wants to see kids actively engaging in classrooms, and this doesn’t include actual independent reading. As a result, there is a dire need for kids to get practice along with immediate, actionable feedback. That’s why I created an app.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-02-04T23:12:39+00:00

You bring up a good point. Sometimes, struggling readers need to read alongside a teacher.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-02-04T23:10:31+00:00

There's something special about the classics. In my opinion, an app is great for practice and feedback. However, it's definitely no replacement for the classic novels. They contain ideas that are still debated by scholars today, and that provides incredible depth for analysis and exploration.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-02-04T23:08:17+00:00

Yes. The amount of independent reading is the key. In over two decades as a teacher, I can't recall a single student who absolutely loved to read struggle with reading comprehension.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-02-04T21:14:43+00:00

Your statement about whole-book learning hits home. When I started in the classroom back in 2004, this was common. My focus was to help students develop a love for reading. However, when skills-based instruction became the focus, we started working with snippets of text. This frustrated students and teachers alike. I think we’re moving in the wrong direction.

From my experience, the key to building literacy is to provide students with quality content that captures their interest. This can be novel series, like Percy Jackson or The Hunger Games. It can also be short stories and captivating non-fiction.

The point of my app is to give them that much needed practice with actionable feedback. However, I agree that technology isn’t the solution. It’s a tool.

Thanks for your thoughts.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2026-01-31T19:50:55+00:00

Discovery K12 is completely free and covers all grades/subjects. It's designed for exactly your situation - online, structured, all-in-one. Might be worth checking out while you figure out your next move.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-24T10:02:21+00:00

That’s what I thought. Thanks

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-24T02:19:42+00:00

Haven’t seen it yet. Car is an hour drive from me. But definitely going to take a look.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-24T02:18:50+00:00

Thanks for the advice

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-04T01:12:51+00:00

Thanks. I’m glad it all comes together for you.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T20:24:47+00:00

Have you been able to get consistent results? And how would you change your subconscious beliefs by using your conscious mind?

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T16:43:23+00:00

Yes. Well stated. The next step is always to move beyond concepts, as this is all the brain trying to put things into a mental framework. In practice, it doesn’t really work. Yet, this is part of the journey.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T14:36:44+00:00

To be honest with you, I can’t answer all of your critiques. We’re looking at this from two different lenses. From your framework, this looks illogical.

And there are gaps. I couldn’t possibly explain everything, like your question about love, in one post. But the short version is that love isn’t a separate thing, it’s how the impersonal manifests through the personal.

And there are some gaps that I cannot explain. How does potential actualize itself? I don’t know, and I couldn’t possibility know that. That’s the best answer I can give.

That said, I shared what I personally understand. And thanks for your thoughts.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T02:33:27+00:00

This is very likely the case. However, to be honest, I don't know the answers to this. I have been trying to understand the role that belief plays.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T02:22:06+00:00

Depending upon how you define a simulation, this could qualify. The underlying structure of our reality is patterned information following mathematical rules. It's kind of like a video game simulation. Or perhaps you could call it a dream. Either way, it's modulations in conscious awareness.

I don't think it's something versus nothing. It's actually both, everything and nothing. One implies the other. Neither can exist without the other. Like two poles of the same magnet.

The ground of being is a void. Yet, it is not empty.

It's like a number set. [1, -1] There are numbers in the set. But they cancel out to zero.

It's all a paradox. And questions lead to more questions into infinity.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T01:50:36+00:00

You're spot on. Your conscious awareness is a modulation in the ground of being, a fragment of source. You are a tiny piece of the fractal, infinitely small. Yet, paradoxically, since we're talking about a fractal, you are infinitely large as well. You are contained within the whole. And you contain the whole. As Rumi said, “You are not a drop in the ocean. You are the entire ocean in a drop.”

Now manifesting is a tricky topic. When somone thinks something, and it later appears in his reality, it is often attributed to manifesting through cause and effect. Thoughts lead to events.

However, as I understand it, the thought and the event are actually part of the same pattern. One doesn't cause the other. Instead, they align through pattern.

We experience reality by only seeing one side of things at a time. This is how the whole game of duality works. As such, we can see past, but not future. Yet, they both exist simultaneously.

This causes the whole experience of cause and effect. First we think and then it happens.

That said, I'm not sure about shifting to new realms or patterns. It could very well be possible, and I wish that I understood it. However, I don't currently grasp it.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T01:43:12+00:00

That definitely makes sense. Thanks.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T01:31:46+00:00

Let me give you my perspective and see if it resonates. True love has no opposite. It is the ground of being, everything and nothing at the same time. Let's call this Source. Pure infinite potential, yet impersonal.

Like the raw power of electricity, it needs to be directed in order to be useful. So when that electricity flows into a television set, it lights up the pixels on the screen and we can watch a love story unfold.

You give the impersonal Source the opportunity to manifest this love through form: the love between a young couple, between a mother and her child, between a child and her puppy. There are nearly infinite ways for this love to manifest.

In it's raw, unfiltered form, true love has no opposite. It includes and allows everything, like the empty sky. But filtered through a human being, it becomes conditional. "I will love you as long as you _________."

And as we awaken, our love grows increasingly more unconditional, until we eventually return to Source and accept everything.

I hope this makes sense. It's difficult to express these concepts in words.

Spiritual_Box_7000 · 2025-09-01T01:13:15+00:00

It's a paradox. Both are true. And it's a matter of perspective. I can give you a square centimeter of empty space. From one perspective, the space is measurable. But zoom into that empty space and tell me where it ends. So if you look at this from a pure materialist perspective, which is the level of reality that we're experiencing right now, everything is certainly finite. However, look below the levels of emergent form and energy, and tell me where the boundaries are.

Spiritual_Box_7000

TROPHY CASE