Articles
Here is where you’ll find all the latest print features from our contributors. If you’d like to browse specifically by grade level, topic, or contributor, you can use the links in the right sidebar.
Latest Content
Off the Beaten Professional Development Path: What I Learned from the Teachers as Writers Group
Teacher writing groups are a wonderful informal way for teachers to get together over the summer voluntarily. Heather Rader has format suggestions, as well as tips for helping your group run smoothly.
Nonfiction Favorites for Boys (BOOKLIST)
What boy can resist a book titled How They Croaked? If you're looking for some books to fascinate and delight the boys in your classroom, Tony Keefer has some terrific suggestions of recent nonfiction titles in this booklist.
The Power of Checklists in Primary Literacy Workshops
Knowing our most sophisticated professions use checklists to get it right, Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan share and explain checklists that work well for students.
Lesson Structure: Building a Strong Foundation
Stepping back to think about the design of quality instruction is essential for any teacher. Heather Rader looks to brain research and tried-and-true practices to lay out lesson components.
Making Connections as a Reader and a Scientist
Heather Rader finds that reading is at the heart of scientists’ work.
Pencil Plans
The care and use of the lowly pencil in classrooms says a lot about what we value and our relationships with students.
Linking Reading, Writing, and Getting to Know You Activities During the First Week of Middle School
Want to get your middle school students’ attention on the first day of school? Read a book about how to ruin it for them.
Calendaring a Literacy Coach
The joy and challenge of literacy coaching is creating a good structure for the day. Heather Rader has suggestions for short- and long-term planning on the coaching calendar.
Language Patterns: Reflecting with Transcripts and Wordle
If you are familiar with Wordle, you already know it is a great free tool on the web for creating “word clouds” – visual representations of language. Heather Rader uses Wordle in her literacy coaching to give new and veteran teachers a succinct and powerful visual representation of their teaching language.
Characters I Know Too Well
Books with themes of sexual abuse may be the most difficult for many of us to grapple with, if only because the issue horrifies us. Yet for some abused teens, a book may be the needed catalyst for breaking their silence about what's going on outside school. Andie Cunningham shares an annotated booklist on this tough topic.
Relentless Consistency: Finding a Common Teaching Language Without Scripts
Sharing a common teaching vision begins with a common language, but not a script. Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan share how teachers can work together to develop consistent ways of talking about literacy learning.
Read Alouds for the First Day of School
Choice Literacy readers share their favorite read alouds for the start of the year.
Injecting Writing into Everything: Cover-up Stories
Cover-up stories involve removing illustrations to heighten awareness of other story elements. Heather Rader explains how the instructional technique works.
The Email Mirror and Literacy Coaching
Are you a minimalist when it comes to email, or do you tend to send rambling and reflective posts? No matter your email style, it likely is a match for some of your colleagues, and a barrier to communication for others.
Save the Picture Books!
Are picture books endangered species? Sales are plummeting, in part because parents and teachers are pushing students into chapter books at ever-younger ages. Shari Frost turns a critical eye on her own practice, and brainstorms practical ways to promote the value of picture books in classrooms.
Social Justice Picture Books
If you’re looking for a read aloud to spark some discussions about making a difference in the world, you might enjoy Ruth Shagoury’s new booklist of children’s literature with a social justice theme.
Balancing Assessments Through Better Classroom Notes
Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan explain how literacy coaches can validate and support teachers by helping them refine their classroom notetaking skills.
Ways to Avoid Coaching Traps
There are many traps for new literacy coaches that are rarely discussed. Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan share the most common four they try to avoid.
Similes, Metaphors, Homophones and Synonyms: Children’s Books to Teach the Language of Words
Here are some delightful picture books to teach how similes, metaphors, homophones and synonyms work.
Favorite Spaces (Part 1)
What's your favorite literacy spot this year in your classroom? We asked our friends and contributors at Choice Literacy to send in pictures with brief descriptions for this two-part feature. Here is a peek in the classrooms of Donalyn Miller, Julie Johnson, Mary Lee Hahn, Katie DiCesare, and Mandy Robek.
Quick and Thorough: Literacy Coach Conferring Notes
Jennifer Jones finds in a time of budget cuts it is more important than ever for literacy coaches to keep good records of how they spend their time with teachers. She shares a very simple spreadsheet system which includes content codes and brief notes.
Launching the Newbery Club
Bill Prosser and Maria Caplin continue their series on a Newbery Club for 5gth graders in their school. In this installment, they write about the launch of the club.
Along Saplines
A poem and reflection to lift your spirits if you have the late-winter blues.
Great Little Books for Professional Book Clubs
What books are most likely to succeed in teacher study groups? Shari Frost shares her criteria for books teachers will embrace. . .and actually read with enthusiasm.
Primary Series Study
Katie DiCesare describes the primary series study unit she completes with her 1st and 2nd graders, combining reading, writing, and community building.
Ann Marie Corgill on Launching Writer’s Workshop (PODCAST)
Ann Marie Corgill has advice for launching writer's workshop in this podcast.
Favorite Spaces (Part 2)
We asked a few Choice Literacy contributors to share their favorite classroom spaces with readers. We hope you'll get some ideas for your own classroom design from these amazing teachers. This is the second installment in a two-part series.
Clearing Up Confusion
Katie Doherty works closely with a student who has an unusual request – he wants to take home a basal anthology for "pleasure reading." She puts a different text in his hands, and uses what she learns from the experience to design a for lesson her 6th grade students.
Young Learners and Martin Luther King Day (BOOKLIST)
Teachers of young learners face special challenges in honoring Martin Luther King and dealing with the violent nature of his death at the same time. Mandy Robek offers some insights into how to celebrate King's life with even the youngest students.
Math, Writing, and Coaching to Learn
Heather Rader works with a 5th grade teacher to infuse more writing into her math curriculum.
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