Community Building
It's one of the big paradoxes of literacy instruction - students best learn how to read and write independently when they have a strong community of support in classrooms. How teachers build those thoughtful, kind, and challenging classroom communities is explained in these resources.
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Grand Conversations and Read Aloud
Are your conversations during read aloud stilted or shallow? Tammy Mulligan recommends weekly “grand conversations” to spark more thoughtful talk. She provides the tools you need to get started in your classroom.
Jane Goodall Inquiry: Introducing Expectations
Katherine Sokolowski introduces her students to routines and expectations early in the year with a unit on Jane Goodall, including many short read alouds.
Interactive Read Aloud and the Whole-Class Notebook
Tammy Mulligan enhances the quality of the class read aloud and student discussions with the use of a whole-class response notebook.
Student Greeting
Students in the first-grade classroom of Bitsy Parks lead a morning greeting at the start of the day. It’s a quick activity to check attendance, build reading skills, and help students learn the names of classmates in the community.
Linking Literacy and Community at the Start of the Year
Tara Barnett and Kate Mills start with the poem “Where I’m From” to build community through literacy at the start of the year.
Strategies for Sustaining Student Attention
Jen Schwanke shares some strategies for sustaining student attention beyond just calling out a student’s name over and over and over again.
Forgetting and Remembering
In the end classroom management often comes down to students valuing the same things we do. Jen Schwanke has tips for how high school teachers can create a culture where there is better communication and more shared values.
Setting and Using Classroom Norms
Class promises, rules, and norms—most teachers set them at the start of the year. But how can we make sure students live them? Dana Murphy shares some tips from her fifth-grade classroom.
Homework: I Challenge You!
Heather Fisher helps a first-grade teacher create a homework challenge as a way to make the practice more meaningful and engaging for students and families.
Becoming More Inclusive
Every teacher wants to be more inclusive. But where do you begin? Melanie Meehan presents three practical starting points.
Whose Point of View Matters? Considering Multiple Perspectives
When it comes to including and understanding others, it may be hardest to empathize with those who disrupt or bully others. Tammy Mulligan shares her four favorite mentor texts for understanding students who are angry and lash out.
Fewer Books and More Options at the End of the Year
Cathy Mere considers the dilemma teachers face when the bookroom, library, and tech departments require books and devices to be returned late in the year . . . but there are still a few weeks of school. She shares many suggestions for fostering literacy and community when there are far fewer books in the room.
Who Owns the Learning?
An enthusiastic student response to an author visit inspires Christy Rush Levine to revamp her upcoming unit on craft moves to foster more student ownership.
Slowing Down
Bitsy Parks comforts a crying child after lunch, and realizes how essential it is to continually slow down the fast pace of learning in her classroom.
Secret Reader
Suzy Kaback marvels at a very young learner who is a “secret reader,” and this leads her to reassess the value of constantly celebrating new skills in school communities.
Reading Bingo
Gretchen Schroeder has developed a fun version of Reading Bingo to help students explore their identity as readers. The activity includes clever social media inspired options like creating memes and “bookstagram” posts.
An All-School Writing Project: Six-Word Memoirs
If you want to bring everyone in your school together around writing, you can’t beat the simplicity and fun of six-word memoirs. Jennifer Schwanke describes how she sparked enthusiasm for the project in her school.
The Magic That Might Go Down
Christy Rush-Levine decides to slow down in her classroom and engage more fully with a student who is a wiseacre and resistant reader. What happens next can only be described as magic.
Sharing Writing in a Class Celebration
Do celebrations matter? If you know Ruth Ayres, you know her answer is always a resounding YES. Here are her best tips for sharing writing in a class celebration.
Shoulders-Down Spaces
Suzy Kaback feels rising unease as a tourist in unfamiliar neighborhoods. The experience provokes empathy for students who find classrooms strange or uncomfortable.
Does the Pencil Still Have Power?
Ruth Ayres wonders if the pencil still has power, taking readers through a whirlwind history of the writing tool in her life, schools, and the world.
Building Routines
Bitsy Parks teaches the foundations of first-grade classroom life through minilessons early in the year.
Getting to Know Each Other Through the Work
Mark Levine explains why he dives right into work in his middle school classroom, rather than getting-to-know-you activities. And through the work, a community is born.
Seeking Personal Relevance
Christy Rush-Levine has to figure out how to engage a class of students that is compliant and dutiful, but shows little passion for reading and writing.
Invitations vs. Accountability
It’s not an invitation if students are required to accept it. Franki Sibberson explains how engagement depends upon true choice and lots of options in her fifth-grade classroom.
The Year’s First Read Aloud
From length to heart, Tara Smith provides seven criteria for selecting the first read aloud of the year that can engage students right from the start.
Compass Points and Empathy
Andrea Smith uses the “compass points” strategy to provoke better whole-class discussions and reflection during read alouds.
My World Maps
Creating “world” maps is a great way to explore the territories beyond school that matter most to everyone in your classroom. Suzy Kaback explains how to create them with students early in the year as a way to get to know them as learners and community members.
Spreading Love with Compliments
Tara Barnett and Kate Mills close out the year in their eighth-grade classroom with a compliments activity.
Looking Forward with Students
Melanie Meehan uses reflective questions and video to build a library of materials at the end of the year to use with next year's class.
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