Are you looking for a fun way to motivate your students to love reading? Epic! Books is an amazing online resource that my students can’t get enough of. They beg to read more, and your students will, too. Keep reading to find out my 10 favorite things about Epic!
What I Love About Epic!
#1 – Epic! is free for educators.
The absolute best thing about Epic! is that it is completely free for teachers. You don’t have to pay a penny to set up your class and give them access to 25,000 online books.
#2 – There are “Read to Me” books and “Audiobooks”.
Epic! has lots of books that your students can read themselves, but there are also books that read to them. That means even your lowest readers can benefit from Epic! books. My strong readers still love being read to and enjoy the audiobooks, too.
#3 – Epic! has an incredible selection of books on all topics!
There are a wide range of fiction and nonfiction books. There are chapter books and picture books. You can find any type of children’s book on Epic! They have many popular books as e-books, like The One and Only Ivan, Goosebumps, and Rainbow Magic. There are also nonfiction books on every subject. I have yet to find a student who can’t find something they enjoy on Epic!
#4 – There are educational videos about many topics.
There are short learning videos on many different subjects on Epic! My students love watching these educational videos. They like to read a book about a topic and then watch the video to learn even more.
#5 – Epic! creates a profile for your students.
When your students first sign in to Epic! books, they will answer some questions about their reading preferences. It asks for their age and favorite genres to read. From that, Epic! creates an individualized library of books for each of your students. This can help them discover new books and authors.
#6 – Many of the books have a quiz.
When a book is finished, your students often have the option of taking a quiz. This is a great way to check for reading comprehension. Each quiz has a few questions to see how well the child understood the book. If there isn’t a quiz yet, you can create one.
#7 – There are collections of books on Epic!
Collections are groups of books about one topic. If you want your students to read about a specific subject, search for a collection, and it will bring up a bunch of books about that subject. For example, my class is working on poetry this week. I search on Epic! for a collection of poetry books. I found one with 23 poetry books.
Once you find the collection, you can make a copy of it. That puts in into your library. From there, you can assign it to your students. You even have the option of selecting which students see the collection, so you can differentiate and give different students different books.
You can also create your own collections of books. If you can’t find one with the topic you want, search for that topic. Then, find a book you want and click “Add To” on the right side. Select “Collection,” and you can either choose to create a new collection or add the book to an existing collection.
#8 – Your students earn badges for reading.
As your students spend more time reading and read more books, they earn special badges. This is very motivating for them. They love to see how many badges they can earn. My students beg to go on Epic! to increase their collection of badges.
#9 – Epic! is easy to use.
Once you create your teacher account in Epic!, it’s really easy to set up your class. If you use Google Classroom, you can import your class from there. That makes it really fast!
Then, you will be given a class code. Send your students to the Epic! website, and have them go to “Student Sign In”. When they enter the class code, they will see pictures with their names. They just click on the correct picture, and they are in their own personal Epic! account. Any collections or books you assign are in their “Mailbox”.
#10 – Epic! saves you space.
There is only so much space in your classroom for books. I have a large classroom library, but I always have students who “can’t find anything to read”. Epic! solves this problem with its 25,000 books. I certainly don’t have enough room in my classroom for that many books, so having them on the computer is a huge plus!
Get Epic! Now
Do you want to try Epic! in your classroom? Go to the Epic! website, and click “Educators”. Then, select “Sign Up For Free” and “Get Started”. Fill in your information, and you’re all set. I hope you and your students love Epic! as much as my class and I do.
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What Do You Think?
What is your favorite thing about Epic!?
Let me know in the comments below.
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I did not know about this site. Thank you.
You’re welcome! It has a great selection of books!