Teaching Reading
Our contributors lead reading workshops in classrooms with creative flair. Over the past 12 years, we've filled our site with loads of suggestions, tools, and tips for using engaging books throughout the curriculum to hook kids on reading. Here is where you will find many stories of successful and not-so-successful workshop days, and what we learned from them. We bring these stories to life through hundreds of video examples.
Latest Content
Using Picture Books for Rhetorical Analysis
Gretchen Schroeder finds that picture books are the perfect tool for rhetorical analysis with her high school students.
Flipping Literature Discussions
Gretchen Schroeder realizes her experiences from decades ago as a student are clouding her perspective on “flipped” literature discussions. Once she gets over her biases, she finds that online discussion of literature is a powerful equalizer for student voices.
Lessons and Minilessons: What’s the Difference?
What’s the difference between a lesson and a minilesson? Christy Rush-Levine finds that flexibility is just as important as length in making minilessons work well.
Varying Workshop Structures to Meet Student Needs
Tara Barnett and Kate Mills give guidance and support for varying the structures and routines in literacy workshops.
First Grade Minilesson: Connections
Melissa Atwood leads her first-grade class with a minilesson early in the school year on making connections to text.
Picture Books for Persona Poems
Gretchen Schroeder uses picture books to help her high school students understand and write persona poems.
Interpretation and Comprehension
Teaching comprehension skills can be a complex and overwhelming task. Tammy Mulligan shares a process for expanding and deepening student interpretations of text.
First-Grade Guided Group: Reading Practice and Recap
Melissa Atwood leads a first-grade guided reading group. This is the second video in a two-part series.
First Graded Guided Group: Chunking Words
Melissa Atwood leads a first-grade guided reading group. The focus at the start of the lesson is on chunking words. This is the first video in a two-part series.
Exploring Author’s Craft in Graphic Novels
Christy Rush-Levine finds her middle school students need more support and scaffolds to understand authors’ craft in graphic novels.
30-Second Pair-Share
Sean Moore leads his second graders in a quick pair-share to help everyone reflect on what they learned during independent reading.
Reading Mats Build Confidence
Tammy Mulligan explains how the use of the popular “reading mats” can help build reader confidence.
It’s All in the Details
Tara Barnett and Kate Mills find their middle school students need some scaffolding to tease out essential details in literature.
Teaching Theme Before the Holidays
Tara Barnett and Kate Mills take advantage of students’ knowledge of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer to teach the concept of theme before the holiday break.
Comparing Authors Minilesson
Jen Court uses text sets from three authors to help second graders ferret out different elements of the authors’ styles.
Text Set Resources
Melanie Meehan shares some of her favorite resources for developing text sets.
Conferring to Connect: First-Grade Reading
Bitsy Parks confers with first grader Ella about the Brown and Pearl book series, and then listens to Ella read. She closes the conference by encouraging Ella to make more personal connections to books.
Text Sets: Reading Beyond Just Facts
Franki Sibberson explains how carefully curated text sets can help students move beyond a “just the facts” exploration of nonfiction topics.
Textual Lineage
Christy Rush-Levine uses book covers to help her middle-school students explore their histories (or “lineages”) as readers.
Moving from Interactive Read Alouds to Book Clubs
Tammy Mulligan shares how teachers can move seamlessly from thoughtful conversations during whole-class read alouds to lively book clubs.
Do Students Need to Love the Books We Read Aloud?
Franki Sibberson asks a critical question: Do students need to love the read alouds we share in classrooms? She works to move students beyond shallow like/don’t like responses to books.
Read Aloud in Middle School
Katherine Sokolowski values read aloud for her middle school students and struggles to find time for them. Her solution? A picture book a day, better known as the #bookaday activity.
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.
Back-Channel Conversations During Read Alouds
Christy Rush-Levine considers some of the “underground” ways in which she converses about books at conferences and on social media, and decides to set up a back channel for similar conversations about read alouds in her classroom.
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.
Speed Reading
Adolescent learners can face daunting reading loads in high school that they need to tackle at home. Jen Schwanke has tips for how teachers and parents can work together to help teens develop strategies for dealing with a lot of complex reading quickly.
Read-Aloud Annotations: Google Slides
In this video series, Franki Sibberson’s fifth graders share their strategies for annotating the class read aloud. In this installment, Antonio shares his Google Slides.
Read-Aloud Annotations: Google Docs for Questions
In this video series, Franki Sibberson’s fifth graders share their strategies for annotating the class read-aloud. In this installment, Lauren uses Google Docs to record questions to explore as she listens.
Read-Aloud Annotations: Expectation and Reality
In this video series, Franki Sibberson’s fifth graders share their strategies for annotating the class read-aloud. In this installment, Lizzie uses her notebook to focus on expectations and reality for characters, especially when it comes to stereotypes.
Read Aloud Annotations: Using Google Slides to Focus
In this video series, Franki Sibberson’s fifth graders share their strategies for annotating the class read-aloud, In this installment, Reagan uses Google Slides to focus her thoughts and analyze different characters.
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