Sora

"Sora is your school’s gateway to the industry's largest catalog of ebooks and audiobooks in the classroom and beyond. Students can read and listen on any device, and teachers can assign and track students' progress."

With Sora you can:

• Read with the touch of a button
• Read across devices (chromebooks, laptops, tablets, or smart phones)
• Add notes and highlights to your reading
• Check your reading stats
• Earn badges for achievements
• Read across libraries - school libraries and your local public libraries
• No overdue books - books return automatically (usually after two weeks) unless you renew the book
• And more!

• Powerful tools: Add bookmarks, make notes and highlights, define words, and more.
• Fixed-layout support: Comic books, graphic novels, picture books, and textbooks as they’re meant to be read.
• Read-alongs: Select titles have professional narration so you can follow along with the text.

• Reading settings for everyone: Adjust the font type (including dyslexic font), font size, and lighting in most books.
• Synced progress: Your place, bookmarks, notes, and highlights sync between devices, so you can pick up right where you left off

• Jump around: Swipe on the book jacket to jump backward or forward, or use the seek bar to go to a specific spot.
• Set a timer: Customize the sleep timer for a certain amount of time or the end of the current chapter.
• Adjustable playback speed: Increase narration speed up to 3x.
• Bookmarks and more: Add bookmarks, notes, and highlights as you listen.
• Synced progress: Your place, bookmarks, notes, and highlights sync between devices, so you can pick up right where you left off.

• The headphone icon underneath the book image means it is an audiobook.
• No headphone icon means it is an ebook.
• Search for a specific book, by author, or by genre
• Browse the collection through subjects or within a librarian-created collection (ex: road trips for teens or Hispanic Heritage Month)
• You can narrow searches by interest level, audience level (elementary vs. young adult), text difficult, Lexile, availability, and more!

Educational experiences with interdisciplinary approaches in STEAM education have guided Martha’s library program as does her pedagogical belief the library is the heart of the school where knowledge and empathy is constructed not just books but from collaboration and inquiry. The library should be an innovative space in which students ask questions, create new learning experiences, and collaborate to deepen their knowledge of the curriculum and the world around them.

Martha resides in Lawrenceville, Georgia with her husband (who is also a teacher) and two spunky children. When she is not working or volunteering for the Georgia Library Media Association, she and her family can often be found hiking or fostering a love of all things nerdy in her children by adventuring to historical places, festivals, or DragonCon.

Martha holds a Bachelors in Middle Grades Education, a Masters in Learning, Design, and Technology, and Ed.S. in Instructional Technology. Her accolades include being the 2019 Fulton County Library Media Specialist of the Year, a 2019 AASL Social Media Superstar Finalist, and the 2018 Coastal Georgia Library Media Specialist of the Year. She founded #GaLibChat, is President-Elect of the Georgia Library Media Association, and maintains Discovering the Remarkable, a website and blog dedicated to middle grades library resources.

Skills

Martha's certifications include receiving Levels 1 & 2 Google Certifications, being a Microsoft Innovative Educator Expert and Microsoft Trainer Expert, and serving as a Flipgrid Student Voice Ambassador. She is also confident in her ability to embed literacy within STEAM and uses AR/VR in the library.

Email: bongiornom@fultonschools.org
Website: http://www.discoveringtheremarkable.com/
Twitter: @mrs_bongi