"It is our role at Weston Woods to create audiovisual adaptations that are faithful reflections of the books themselves. We seek the best books from all over the world and adapt them in such a way as to preserve the integrity of the original. By doing so, we help children discover the riches that are trapped between the covers of the books and motivate them to want to read for themselves. We believe that a child who wants to read will easily learn to read, and we believe that a child without reading problems will be a child without learning problems."

Desirability: We choose only those books which have received special recognition by such organizations as the American Library Association and from teacher recommendations. Books are carefully scrutinized for the following attributes:
• Do children relate to and enjoy the story and meaning of the book?
• Do the illustrations stand up on their own and interact artistically with the text?
• How universal is the message?
• Will the book withstand the test of time?

Once a book is chosen each adaptation is produced in such a way as to retain the original artist's intent, and as much as possible be a "mirror image" of the book. With the addition of originally composed music, inspiring narrators and realistic sound effects, the book is "brought to life" for every child, regardless of his/her learning style. Our videos and read-along audiocassettes provide formats whereby children can easily experience the text over and over again. This process helps to build a reading scaffold - broadening vocabularies, stretching attention spans and flexing thinking skills.

Additionally, the most difficult job of reading teachers is to reinforce reluctant readers' self-image and restore their self-confidence. To do so, such students must be "turned on" to books and derive enough satisfaction from reading to become independent readers. In working with beginning, reluctant and struggling readers, it has been found that high interest materials, such as the classic children's literature adapted by Weston Woods, motivate a child to want to read. Since the heart and soul of a Weston Woods video captures the essence of the original book, children viewing the materials are actually experiencing the book itself with all their senses engaged and are thus motivated to want to read the book for themselves

Recent brain development and language acquisition research shows that one of the best ways to teach children to read is by reading to them. Every time a child hears a story repeated, he or she picks up something new. In today's busy classrooms or home settings, use of Weston Woods videos and read-along audiocassettes allow a child to view a video or listen to a read-along cassette and easily experience the text over and over again.

"Students hear vocabulary words and see them at the same time, which helps with
pronunciation and word recognition."

Repeated exposure to words in context enhances student learning.

"Captioning contributes to learning new vocabulary words by providing visual
reinforcement."

Foreign Language versions of Weston Woods titles are also excellent choices for not only teaching foreign languages to primary students, but also to help limited English
proficient students transition to English. In best practices gathered from around the world, the most effective method of using foreign language versions is to allow a child to experience the same story in both English and the language he/she is transitioning from. This allows a child to infer the meaning of key vocabulary words by the visual clues of the animated action in the video, and thus gain greater comprehension of the overall story and words.