What is Epic! Books?

Epic! Books is an online platform that offers a variety of storybooks, audiobooks, and other resources for children. Epic! Books are free for elementary school educators worldwide. Parents/Guardians can access this program by paying a monthly fee ($11.99/month) that you can cancel anytime. https://www.getepic.com/

How Can You Utilize Epic! Books In The Classroom? 

Epic! Has a tool in the app that reads the book aloud to the child. This is a great tool for getting students to develop their reading fluency by being able to hear the correct pronunciation and read the book at the same time. Once the students have a good grasp of the book and the proper pronunciation they can turn the audio off and practice reading the book aloud themselves. The key part of this exercise is rereading the text in multiple ways as rereading the same text builds fluency. 

Mini research projects are another great way to use Epic! Books in the classroom. I would get the students to pick a book that is at their individual reading level and a book that sounds interesting to them. After the book is chosen you can get the students to summarize what the story is about (focusing on characters, setting, plot, etc). Then I would get the students to write a couple of short sentences summarizing the story. Once the sentences are completed I would get each student to vocally share what they summarized/learned about their story. Depending on your class you could also make this a group project if that works better for your students. 

If you have access to iPads or laptops in your classroom you could use Epic! Books during quiet reading time. Epic! Books have a ton of variety when it comes to books and quiet reading time is a great time to get the students familiar with the online program to look at books you may not have in your classroom library. 

On the Epic! Books they offer tons of audiobooks. This is great if you have students who prefer to listen instead of read or students who have trouble paying attention long enough to focus on actually reading a book. Audiobooks are great for getting children to work on their visualization skills. An exercise you can get your students to do is after reading a chapter you can ask the students to close their eyes and think of a scene that they either really liked or thought was important to the story. Then give them a piece of paper and ask them to draw what that scene from their book looked like in their mind.

Resources:
The Importance of Bedtime Reading for Kids (getepic.com)