Videos
Here is where you’ll find all the latest videos from our contributors. These videos are all captured in classrooms with crews using multiple cameras during regularly scheduled reading and writing workshops.
Latest Content
Student Notes: Keeping Track of Many Characters
Tre uses lots of sticky notes to sort through and keep track of characters in a book with a whole classroom full of personalities.
Student Notes: Experimenting with Two Strategies
What do student notes from independent reading look like when students have free choice? In this video series, fifth graders from Franki Sibberson's class explain their notetaking strategies. We start with Ally, who tries out two different strategies to figure out which one will help her the most.
Conferring: Establishing a Setting in a Novel
In this week's video, Aimee Buckner has a quick conference with a fourth grader about ways to solve a dilemma — how to figure out the setting in a historical fiction novel when there are no pictures.
Leads Minilesson
This fifth-grade minilesson from Franki Sibberson is a lovely mix of mentor texts, Franki's own writing, and honesty about the writing process.
Using a Storyboard for Reflection and Comprehension
Christy Rush-Levine shows a group of three students how they can use a storyboard to help track thinking while reading.
Talk Guide
Gigi McAllister presents a guide to her fourth-grade students to improve talk in reading trios.
Group Meeting: Sharing Resources for Animal Study
Katherine Sokolowski helps her fifth-grade students expand their territory for their animal research projects by sharing information sources and peer connections.
First-Grade Conference: Reading with Feeling
In this week’s video, Katrina Edwards confers with first grader Ellie. She helps Ellie read more fluently and with expression by transferring her feelings to those of characters.
Book Talk: “The Last Fifth Grade of Emerson Elementary”
Katherine Sokolowski demonstrates her book talk skills when she presents The Last Fifth Grade of Emerson Elementary to her students late in the school year.
Building a Next-Read Nonfiction Stack
Katherine Sokolowski helps fifth grader Jack build a next-read stack of nonfiction, highlighting a variety of text features and historical references.
Peer Support in Writing Workshop: Conferring with Jaden
Christy Rush-Levine meets with eighth grader Jaden, who talks through his struggles in writing a conclusion to his literary analysis, and how his peers helped him improve the writing.
Object Poetry Lesson in Second Grade
Linda Karamatic explores poetry with her second graders. She displays poems students have written and teaches them about fresh language using a poem about a pencil sharpener.
Grammar Instruction in Fourth Grade
Melanie Meehan coaches a fourth-grade teacher who is trying to improve his grammar instruction.
Writing Minilesson: Feelings
Katrina Edwards uses read alouds as mentor texts for writing minilessons in her first-grade classroom. In this example she focuses on character feelings.
Conferring in First Grade: Focus on Goals and Strengths
Katrina Edwards confers with first grader Wyatt about his goal of increasing the volume of his reading, helping him self-assess what’s going well and what lies ahead.
Big Question Minilesson
Katherine Sokolowski models how readers make choices as questions arise while reading independently. She also demonstrates how she moves between a novel and web resources.
The Importance of Context Minilesson
Christy Rush-Levine uses a vivid anecdote from her youth to teach her middle school students about the importance of context in literary analysis.
Close Attention and Reading Response: Conferring with Tori
Christy Rush-Levine confers with eighth grader Tori about her reading response to Why We Broke Up. She encourages Tori to make connections between the characters in her current book and her previous reading by paying close attention to surprising action.
Minilesson: How to Retell a Story
Katrina Edwards uses the children’s books They All Saw a Cat and Be a Friend for a minilesson with her first-grade students on how to retell stories with a partner during reading workshop.
Quick-Write with a Video Prompt
Katherine Sokolowski refreshes the quick-write routine in her fifth-grade classroom by using a video as a prompt.
First-Grade Conference: Stretching Writing
Katrina Edwards helps her adorable first-grade student Dylan stretch out his writing. He adds details by first talking about playing with friends near his home.
Teaching Fifth Graders to Make Peer Recommendations
Katherine Sokolowski confers with her son Liam and his friend Caden, helping them learn how to make peer book recommendations.
“If You Like” Reading Recommendations Conference
Building "next-read" stacks with students before holidays is a great way to ensure they have books in hand that they will be excited to read over break. Katherine Sokolowski helps Taryn finds books that are similar to those written by Rick Riordan (Taryn's favorite author).
First-Grade Minilesson: Repeated Phrases
Bitsy Parks uses mentor texts and her own writing in a minilesson on how her first graders might use repeated phrases in their writing for more impact.
Writers and Themes: Fifth-Grade Discussion
Acclaimed children’s book author and teacher Jennifer Richard Jacobson talks with a group of fifth graders about how writers establish a theme early in stories and then braid elements of the theme throughout the text.
Writing a Strong Conclusion to a Literary Analysis Essay
Christy Rush-Levine helps eighth grader Katherine sort through tools and strategies for writing a strong conclusion to her literary analysis essay.
Girls’ Book Share in Fifth Grade
Katherine Sokolowski demonstrates how she helps a group of girls in her fifth-grade classroom learn to help each other select books based on previous experiences and tastes.
Big Picture to Close-Up Lens: Conferring with Kellan
Katrina Edwards confers with first grader Kellan about her love of the Danny book series, moving from a "big picture" discussion of patterns in the book and Kellan's reading strategies, to close-up decoding of individual words.
First-Grade Minilesson: Emotions in Writing
Katrina Edwards reads aloud a Kate Messner mentor text to build an anchor chart on emotions with her first graders.
First-Grade Reading Share: Connections
Bitsy Parks helps her first-grade students complete “thumb reflections” on making connections in reading early in the year by modeling connections from three conferences in a whole-class share session.
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