Imagine math class where, when the teacher asks for volunteers, every sixth-grader raises a hand. Imagine kids excited about learning because they think they're playing a game.

Technically they are playing games at Quest to Learn (Q2L), the first school in the United States with a curriculum focused on video games and game-based learning.

Students might learn about Newtonian physics through PS3's LittleBigPlanet, or design through Gamestar Mechanic. They learn how to research, work as a team, and solve puzzles.

Game-based learning has growing support. Earlier this year, the esteemed professor (emeritus) Edward O. Wilson of Harvard University said, "Games are the future in education." Kurt Squire, of the University of Wisconsin agrees. "We're starting to see agreement that video games are the new liberal arts," he said. "This school is the first implementation."

Q2L, a collaboration of the Parsons School for Design, New Visions for Public Schools, and the Institute of Play (a non-profit organization dedicated to game-based education), is a public (non-charter) school funded by the Department of Education. The school is in New York City, with 72 sixth-graders and six teachers. A new grade will be added each year until it reaches the 12^th grade.

With a 39% drop-out rate, New York City could be the ideal proving-ground for this type of innovation. Katie Salen is Q2L's executive director of design and believes that today's youth are digital kids. "They've already transformed society," she says, "why not education?"

Students not only needed to apply, but also to be chosen by lottery to attend Q2L. "I have friends who are jealous," says 11-year-old Beauchamp Baker. Baker has been diagnosed with attention-deficit disorder and had previous difficulty in school. His mother Lesli admits that it took "a leap of faith" on her part, but that Q2L is "a great match for him. He's really enthused about learning."

I feel like a proud Papa. The other morning I opened up my local paper and saw a story about Tucson students making holiday cards for our troops. The article referenced one of Reading A-Z's books, "Hugs for Daddy."

"Hugs for Daddy" is a special book--written by a woman whose husband was deployed to Iraq. The story speaks to the special bond that a little girl has with her Daddy, and how she copes without him in her daily routine. We've already given over 500 copies to various branches of the military and promised hundreds more.

Learning A-Z's mission is rooted in meeting the educational needs of all children and in building strong communities. That's why we continually respond to community needs whether providing books to remote schools in Africa and villages of South America or offering timely free resources throughout the world. For example, with the swine flu epidemic hitting school children across the country, we developed a teaching packet with various resources on swine flu. It's free and available for download on all of the Learning A-Z websites: Reading A-Z, RAZ-Kids, Reading Tutors, Vocabulary A-Z, Writing A-Z, and Science A-Z. I hope these resources are appreciated and widely used as it is our intent to continue reaching out to the broader community.

If you are serious about improving the reading performance of struggling readers in your school or district, including students with disabilities and those served by Title 1, I have some good news for you. A scientifically based one-on-one, reading mentoring program has been getting great results in Ohio. And the wonderful thing is that it's an extremely affordable program costing approximately from $1 to $2 per tutoring hour to implement. This is definite good news when districts are tightening their belts during difficult economic times.

The program, known as Project More (Mentoring in Ohio for Reading Excellence), has been in effect since 2002. The Center for Evaluation Services out of Bowling Green State University has been gathering, analyzing, and interpreting data on the program for each year of its implementation. According to Dr. Rich Wilson, Co-Director for the Center, "Over the past six years, evaluation results have shown that Project MORE students with specific learning disabilities (SLD) have made a one-month reading gain for each month of structured intervention."

Learning A-Z has had the good fortune to be part of this outstanding program. Our involvement began in 2004 when, in collaboration with the principals of Project More, Dr. Jan Osborne, Superintendent of Putnam County Schools, and Amy Freeman, Project MORE Director, we developed the Reading-Tutors.com website to deliver packets of reading resources for use during tutoring sessions. When a volunteer tutor enters a school to tutor a needy student, he or she is handed a Reading-tutors packet that includes a book, a lesson, activity sheets, and a game. These packets provide learning objectives and an instructional purpose to each tutoring session.

I have personally visited Project MORE schools and have witnessed the benefits that Project MORE delivers to struggling readers as students meet with their mentors three to four days a week. I have also witnessed the benefits gained by those who are tutoring children. In particular, middle- and high-school students, who are serving as tutors in many of the schools, are learning the value of volunteerism and community service. This program truly benefits kids, parents, tutors, and the entire community.

Project MORE has demonstrated that one-on-one volunteer tutoring programs can have EARS--that is, they can be effective, affordable, replicable, and sustainable. This program can be implemented anywhere in the country. If you are interested in more information about Project MORE, contact Amy Freeman, Project MORE Director, at 888.319.3560, email afreeman@pm.noacsc.org, or visit ohioprojectmore.org. I would encourage you to learn more about the project and ways in which it can help your school or district's reading program. The Project MORE team is a tremendously dedicated group of educators with a burning passion to help children with disabilities as well as others who struggle to read.

Some New Jersey schools are building a community of readers through a program called One Book, One School. Started by a Seattle librarian about ten years ago, One Book programs strive to get students reading and to build a sense of community through a shared experience.

The challenge, of course, is finding a book that will appeal to a wide range of people and reading abilities.

"That's very much a challenge," said Allentown principal Christopher Nagy. "We said: Will this be good for all ability-level students? Will this meet students' interest? Is it a book that can be read across all disciplines? I want to have a conversation about one book taking place among all students."

Schools vary in how strongly they enforce reading the selected book. "We wanted to create that shared experience. We didn't want to make it something punitive," said Hunterdon Central Regional High School superintendent Lisa Brady. She estimated that 75 percent of the 3,200 students read their school's One Book selection.

Student reaction varies as well. "At first I thought, 'This is ridiculous.' But you see people reading it," said Michael Thomas, 17. "It means some kid I don't know is a little bit more like me, and me a little bit more like him."

To me, that sure sounds like building a community.

Reading A-Z books could easily be adapted for an elementary school One Book program. There are over 1,000 titles spanning 27 levels of reading difficulty with 50 of these titles written to multiple levels of difficulty. Subscribers can print out enough books for all participants, and students can assemble them. Best of all, students can keep the books they read, which fosters ownership and interest in reading even more.