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Program Benefits

Oral language fluency is a strong predictor of reading success, yet  many children start school with language gaps that hinder their reading achievement.
  • Johnnie Max builds oral language fluency with explicit instruction for nonfiction content to give children the literacy and content foundation needed for their academic success.
  • Johnnie Max supports all children, including English learners, bilingual children, and dual-language students.

Explore Components and Features:

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Build the Foundations of Early Literacy! Johnnie Max supports the development of the whole child.

Oral Language, Literacy, and Content Knowledge

Developing oral language and building content knowledge is at the heart of Johnnie Max.
  • Explicit dialogic reading strategies for eBook read-alouds in Teacher and Home Guides support the adult-child interactions critical for oral language development. 
  • Lesson content built around topics in science, social studies, and math builds content knowledge and academic vocabulary.
  • Strong oral language skills and deep content knowledge prepare students to read and comprehend text fluently by Grade 3.
Aligned to CASEL’s Framework, the Johnnie Max social-emotional learning content is integrated throughout components and supported in Teacher and Home Guides.
  • Video lessons present explicit opportunities for social-emotional development.
  • eBooks feature SEL Conversation Starters to prompt adult-led interactions.
  • Relatable characters model social-emotional development in The Adventures of Johnnie Max read-aloud series.

Social-Emotional Learning

Global Awareness

Global awareness in Johnnie Max develops through photographs of people, places, and animals from every continent on the planet.
  • World maps in eBooks locate  each photograph’s origin.
  • In The Adventures of Johnnie Max read-aloud stories, children follow Johnnie Max and Sarabella, who discover and share the unique beauty of each continent.

Multi-disciplinary Content Is
Integrated Across All Lessons

Introduce

Videos

Introduce concepts and build background
  • An engaging video for each lesson introduces concepts and vocabulary.
  • Teacher and Home Guides provide discussion support at key teachable moments. 
Program Overview
Program Overview

Teach

Interactive Nonfiction eBooks

eBooks form the program’s instructional core and build the foundations of digital navigational skills.

With flexible implementation for whole class instruction, small group centers, or independent learning exploration, ALL text is supported with audio.

  • Explore academic concepts with standards-aligned nonfiction content.
  • Engage with dialogic reading to develop oral language and vocabulary skills.
  • Advance English learners with strong text-to-picture support.

Multi-disciplinary Content in Three Book Types

Label Books

Label Books

Concept Books

Concept Books

Sentence Books

Sentence Books

Assess

Vocabulary Games

Assess lesson content vocabulary with fun, interactive games that provide useful insights into children’s progress with automatically-generated reports.
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Program Overview
Program Overview

Deepen Engagement

Fiction Read-Alouds

In the charming stories of The Adventures of Johnnie Max, the relatable characters, Johnnie Max and Sarabella, engage children in global exploration and teachable moments of social emotional learning. 

Extend Learning

Hands-On Activity Videos

English- and Spanish-speaking teachers model hands-on activities related to each lesson for extended learning fun in class or at home!
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Learner Management

Assessment and Reporting

Easily track learner progress with Benchmark, Ongoing, and Summative Assessments.
  • Oral language assessments provide benchmarks for literacy growth throughout the year.
  • Automatically-generated reports monitor all lesson activity, track ongoing assessments in each eBook, and, capture end-of-lesson vocabulary game scores .

Communication

School-Home Connection App

Easy communication for teachers and families!

The Johnnie Max Communication App comes free with the program and provides a direct line of communication between school and home. Available in iOS and Android.

Program Overview
Allison Shelley for American Education: Images of Teachers and Students in Action
Allison Shelley for American Education: Images of Teachers and Students in Action

Additional Resources

  • Teacher and Home Guides

  • Phonological Awareness Activities 

  • Animal Alphabet Book Activities

  • Animal Alphabet Writing and Coloring Book

  • Content and Academic Vocabulary Lists

  • Outdoor Adventures

Technology Integrations

  • Seamless rostering support, including OneRostering

  • SSO with ClassLink, Clever, Canvas, Schoology, Microsoft, and Google

Want to learn more? We’ll give you a walkthrough!

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Our mission is to build the foundation of early literacy, empower child-driven learning, and expand children’s worldview with equitable and safe digital access for all young learners and their families.