What is Relay Reader?
No doubt: reading is important. But reading a whole book can be quite daunting, especially for young or developing readers. Relay Reader is an app for young and old readers who want to develop their reading skills in English. When reading a book in this app, the reader takes turns with a native speaker narrator. This makes reading a book fun, engaging, and much less of a daunting task.
You can choose from a number of books in the app such as the literary classic The Adventures of Pinnocchio by Carlo Collodi.
How does it work?
The reader reads a few paragraphs and then listens to a native speaker narrator read another couple of paragraphs. Your reading is recorded in the app and you can listen to yourself reading and you can switch turns and read the passages that were first read by the narrator. While the narrator is reading, the passages he reads are highlighted so you can follow it easily. Ever so often, a pop up shows easy reading comprehension questions to keep readers engaged.
The app also gives you your reading history. It shows progress, number of pages read, reading time, and how many questions you got right.
Who developed it?
The Relay Reader app was developed by Dr. Beata Beigman-Klebanov (a mom of 4 bilingual children herself) and her team at Educational Testing Service. The app has been empirically supported by research with young readers in middle schools and summer camps who loved reading with it.
Where can I get the app?
The app is available for free for iOS and Android (although for Android it’s still the beta version). Plus, you can access it via a web-version on Google Chrome. Interested? Then join in the Relay Reader experience!
Source of main image: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/relay-reader/id1478453360
