Personal narratives are an important part of the Common Core in 4th grade. Franki Sibberson shares a booklist of some of her favorite mentor texts for teaching narratives in the intermediate grades.
Amanda Adrian provides a framework, sample model lesson, and peer conferring guide for students to use as they learn how to respond to their classmates.
Heather Rader gives examples of convention conferences in this final installment of the conventions series.
It’s a dilemma many middle school teachers face. How do you construct anchor charts with multiple groups of students, when only one chart will be hung in the room? Katherine Sokolowski explains how she ensures all classes have input and a “clean slate” in constructing charts.
Heather Rader works with a team of intermediate teachers as they connect their plans for conventions instruction and the Common Core.
Teachers are always on the hunt for something new, even as we cherish what works well year after year. Franki Sibberson lists the activities that have stood the test of time in her classroom.
Heather Rader works with a team of intermediate teachers as they pore over student work together and analyze which conventions should be taught.
Katherine Sokolowski considers what anchor charts are essential in her fifth-grade classroom, and where they work best for posting.
Aimee Buckner makes some surprising discoveries about what types of texts support writers working in nonfiction genres.
Maria Caplin explains how she made the shift from spelling to word study in the intermediate grades.
Katherine Sokolowski explores the challenges and joys of coteaching with special education colleagues.
Do they care? That’s the question Karen Terlecky asks herself as she sets up book clubs in her fifth-grade classroom with a focus on empathy.
Aimee Buckner learns some important lessons about how images and words work together for student writers when she moves between second- and fifth-grade classrooms.
Are your book displays enticing to the boys in your classroom? Tony Keefer has suggestions for making classroom libraries more appealing.
Writers’ Notebooks are an important tool for writers. Ruth Ayres designed a field experience to showcase how elementary teachers use notebooks with young writers.
Compassion and understanding are as important to workshop instruction as strategies and routines. Ruth Ayres compiled a field experience to highlight the way understanding the social-emotional needs of students (and ourselves) allows for safe learning environments.
This field experience invites us to consider a handful of craft moves to teach young writers in minilessons, conferences and share sessions.
Spend time noticing the details that reflect beliefs and influence instruction. Ruth Ayres set up room tours for a field experience focused on more than trendy spaces.
Small group reading instruction is an important part of elementary literacy. This field experience is a sampling of a variety of examples.
The value of picture books with older students is often questioned. Ruth Ayres assembled this field experience to allow insight into the depth and power of picture books for older students.
This field experience invites us to consider the routines of opening the day, workshop norms, meeting areas and transitions to make workshop run smoothly.
Tony Keefer considers some of those awkward early conferences with male readers in his classroom, and shares advice on how to get the year off to a comfortable start with minilesson and conferring suggestions.
Karen Terlecky reflects on the power of read alouds in the intermediate grades for welcoming older students who struggle with reading into the “club” of kids who love books.
Knock knock. Who’s there? A boy who loves sports and has no motivation for reading. Barclay Marcell discovers an unlikely source of engaging text for a child who just doesn’t enjoy books.
"When given the choice between being right or being kind, choose kind." These words from the book Wonder set Katherine Sokolowski on the path of designing a shared reading experience at her school that will build community and empathy across the grades.
Teachers always have big plans at the start of summer for reading, reflection, and changing classroom practice. Katherine Sokolowski explains how she translates those plans into action as the summer winds down.
Katherine Sokolowski listens to her husband’s sage advice and develops a new relationship with graphic novels that disappear off her classroom shelves.
Franki Sibberson is on a quest to find the perfect first read aloud of the year, and the search helps her consider the goals and purpose of read alouds during the first days of school.
Franki Sibberson finds a new classroom, the Common Core, and tech considerations are changing the ways she organizes the nonfiction sections of her classroom library.
Karen Terlecky meets with a small group in her 5th grade class to discuss the strategy of inferring.
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