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What Happens Next
Just when I despair for want of the phosphor- escence a bright idea could save, when stubborn riverlets refuse to budge, somehow sunlight, of its pure will, squeezes the bare-...
Rethinking Reading at Home
We struggle every year with the question of whether to have students fill out logs for the reading they do at home. On one hand, we want students to read...
Literacy Builds Community: The Jackdaw Project
To quote a former principal of mine, "School is not summer camp." This phrase kept playing over and over in my mind as I began thinking about the beginning of...
Student Independence and Ownership in the Library
When I think about my long-term goals as a K-5 school librarian, I have to think about the skills that I want my students to have when they leave fifth...
Community First: Using Read Alouds to Strengthen Classroom Connections
There's a lot to accomplish at the beginning of the school year: routines to teach, expectations to communicate, communities to build . . . but not necessarily in that order....
Letters in the Middle School Classroom
I began my first year of teaching at a middle school this year. However, although I was trained in a program that focused on secondary education, it was the words...
Read Our Walls: Bridging Professional Development and Student Achievement
How do we connect professional development to student learning? Does it really matter that teachers change instructional practices if we can't demonstrate these questions lead to increased student achievement? These...
Books for Phonics Instruction – Accomplishing More Than Just Sounding Out Words
"Do you want me to read you a book?" I looked up and found myself face-to-face with Lemekia, a first-grade girl with a big smile and a head full of...
From Congeniality to Collegiality: Protocols for Meetings and Observations
While we all want to assume that the friendly conversations in the lunchroom and the congenial planning of field trips and homework indicate that teaching teams work collaboratively, we know...
What My Son’s Reading Difficulties Taught Me About Teaching Struggling Readers
My eight-year-old son struggled while learning to read. The process of understanding how to figure out unfamiliar words on the page was painful. I felt that I had done everything...
From “Data Drowning” to “Data Wise”: What Are We Doing Now?
A few years ago we took a course that we loved based on the book Data Wise: A Step-by-Step Guide to Using Assessment Results to Improve Teaching And Learning by Kathryn Parker...
More Teaching Metaphors
Recently there have been a slew of articles published at Choice Literacy focused on teaching metaphors. Bread-baking, wood-working, and piano playing were all conversation starters, drawing out-of-school passions into our...
Getting the Most Out of Picture Books
If you haven't enjoyed a picture book by Mo Willems, you should! Mo happens to be a favorite in our room for a number of reasons. I think the pictures...
Bucking Broncs and Spitting Bulls
The opening moments of the local rodeo were familiar: cowgirls raced their well- trained horses all over the arena and sponsors flags waved in the wind. A local high school...
Using Poetry to Promote Reading Fluency
Poetry invites rereading. Because poems tend to be short and to the point, children enjoy poetry much more than we may think. Old Elm Speaks by Kristine O'Connell George is...
Building a Professional Library from Scratch
Almost everything about Emily's new coaching position was perfect. The school was one of those charming, old, traditional brick buildings with lots of character: high ceilings, hardwood floors, wide corridors,...
Step by Step: Integrating Nonfiction into Primary Classroom Instruction
Young readers are often fascinated by nonfiction. Have you ever watched a child browse a book filled with vivid photographs? I love how the images often invite conversation among children...
Rethinking a Study of Nonfiction Writing
I have always done a study of nonfiction as part of our year in writing workshop. This study of nonfiction writing seems critical for students in the upper elementary grades,...
Novels in Verse (BOOKLIST)
This year several of my students got hooked on novels in verse. A novel in verse is a short novel that is told in a series of poems or verses....
Questions and Answers about Home Reading Logs
It's so helpful when we can take the time to think about the work we do with children. It's even more helpful when people ask questions and probe. I recently...
Hallmarks of Reading Workshop
One of the many things we value at our school is ensuring that the experiences students have in workshops are authentic. Part of the process of coming to common understandings...
