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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
Books That Invite Thoughtful Conversation in Grades K-2
Nothing beats an engaging and fun text to spark conversations among young children. Here are some suggestions of terrific read-alouds to get the chatter started in classrooms.
Changing the Learning Landscape: Organizing My 6th Grade Classroom (PHOTO ESSAY)
Ann Marie Corgill switches from a 1st to 6th grade classroom, and finds herself immersed in rethinking the “learning landscape” as she unpacks boxes and sets up her classroom. While the room looks a little different, the principles for classroom design are the same. She shares her process in this photo essay.
How to Be of Use: Starting Strong
"Peppers make cats cry." If you want to understand the wise advice for literacy coaches within this mnemonic device, you'll have to read this article.
Cap’n George: Mentors Who Matter
Shirley McPhillips finds the mentoring that helps her most as a poet includes principles that are useful in any teaching situation.
Ecstatic: When Words Shape Thinking
Carol Wilcox prepares her struggling intermediate readers for state exams, and finally experiences a breakthrough in linking vocabulary learning to authentic reading.
Our Living Minute: Integrating Nonfiction Study into Morning Meetings
Teachers can accomplish plenty in a minute if they want to add more nonfiction to their day. Learn how from Andrea Smith.
How Do We Talk with Parents About What It Means to Be Challenged in Reading?
Discussions with parents of precocious young readers can be tricky. Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan have some tips for these conferences.
Countdown: Keeping Children at the Center of My Plans for the New Year
Cathy Mere reminds us that the excitement of facing new students is always tempered and enriched by the lessons from last year’s students we carry with us.
Lessons from Family Writer’s Workshop
Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan remind us that our own children are often our best teachers. Here they share all they learned from their children during a summer of writing together.
Great Nonfiction for Elementary Students
As the quality of nonfiction for students has grown, so have our expectations for using these books with students. Franki Sibberson's presents texts that can help students move beyond "skimming and scanning," and into more in-depth reading.
Expanding the Ways We Preview Books
Franki Sibberson discovers new ways technology can expand and enrich how students preview books.
Days Ease
"Some people suggest that in summer's ease, we have the time to rethink our curriculum, to read and select books we want to use next year, to consider how we will begin again in the fall, to get better organized. Yes, we do. And, yes, we could. But somehow just thinking about all that makes me tired." If you couldn't agree more with these words from poet Shirl McPhillips, you are sure to enjoy this poem.
Word Storms: Integrating Nonfiction, Word Study, and Technology
Word Storms help students see the power of rich vocabulary for describing the natural world around them. While Andrea Smith is working with 4th graders, the activities can be adapted for older or younger students.
A Three-legged Dog and a Show About Nothing
If you've resolved this year to keep up with your own writing journal so that you can share the good, bad, and ugly of your process with students, you'll enjoy Jennifer Jones' inspirational and practical new piece.
5th Grade Grandfather
Misunderstandings abound when working with struggling readers and writers. Jennifer Jones connects an experience in her personal life to one student she is supporting and gains new insight.
My Colleague Refuses to Collaborate with Us (LITERACY COACH CONFIDENTIAL)
What do you do about a colleague who refuses to collaborate with other teachers on her grade-level team? Literacy Coach Confidential takes on the problem, with suggestions from seven Choice Literacy contributors.
A Coach’s Perspective: Is Sarcasm in Style This Season?
When is sarcasm appropriate in classrooms? Never, yet more is popping up all the time in schools, even from teachers. Here is some advice for dealing with sarcasm.
Bilingual (English/Spanish) Books that Celebrate Language, Family and Culture
Stella Villalba shares her favorite bilingual (English/Spanish) books for helping young English language learners feel at home in new classrooms early in the year.
Twitter Me This: Using Cell Phones to Build Literacy Skills and a Reading Community
Lisa Koch found herself a bit irritated as her high school students would discreetly send text messages as she tried to teach them literary terms. Her solution? Tweet tweet! You can read here about her successful summer experiment of tweeting literary terms and staying in touch with students over summer reading assignments.
Making the Case for Literacy Coaches
If your district is considering cuts to its literacy coaching program, you’ll appreciate Shari Frost’s advice.
Picture Books for Shared Reading
Shared reading builds skills and community in Katie DiCesare's 1st grade classroom.
Sarcasm Is a Useful Teaching Tool — NOT
How does sarcasm hurt students? Heather Rader counts the ways.
Thinking About 5th Grade Read Alouds
Karen Terlecky develops a plan for read alouds with her 5th grade students. She explains her choices, comparing selections to last year's list.
A Sponge is a Summary
Heather Rader shares a concrete analogy that students (and teachers) love for understanding how summaries work.
Using Summer Reading to Expand the Whole School Reading Community
What big messages do we give to students with summer reading assignments? Franki Sibberson considers this question and shares the template she sends home with children of all ages.
Book Basket Idea: Cars and Trucks
Katie DiCesare remembers books that were fought over among the boys in her 1st grade classroom, and this leads to creating a new basket for the fall on cars and trucks. She shares a booklist of fun titles in the basket.
There’s Been a Misblunderstanding
We're teachers and we have a tendency to talk too much. Heather Rader explains how she coaches a teacher through the problem.
The DIBELS Divide (LITERACY COACH CONFIDENTIAL)
A curriculum coordinator loves DIBELS; a first-grade teacher doesn't. We provide a range of suggestions from our contributors on dealing with disagreements over assessment. This article is useful for teachers and literacy leaders who are working together with assessment data early in the year, no matter what evaluative system your school or district has in place.
Mentoring from the Real to the Ideal: Mental Images of Teaching
We know the power of mental images as a strategy for helping readers comprehend difficult text. Suzy Kaback uses a similar technique to help novice teachers envision success. Thisl is an activity you might want to try with a new teacher group.
Learning from Coaching Mistakes
Inventors understand that early prototypes inform them best about what doesn't work rather than what does. But what about when prototypes are people? Heather Rader reflects on risk-taking, failure, and learning as a literacy coach.
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