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Leadership Shifts
Every year about this time, I spend several hours finalizing supplemental contracts. In my district, teachers who take on leadership roles in specific curricular areas are paid a small stipend...
One Teaching Point at a Time
Whenever we are learning a new skill, regardless of the content, regardless of our age, it helps when we break it down into steps. No one can jump on a...
An Editing Strategy for Run-On Sentences
Yesterday, we pulled up next to Teddy to confer about the memoir he was writing. Teddy struggles with expressing himself in writing. He typically uses simple sentence structure and has...
To Celebrate or Not
February and March are two important months for learners. Except they’re all important, aren’t they? Which pretty much sums up my conflict with Black History Month and Women’s History Month,...
A Third Way
“Matt, would you have a minute to come to our next PLC meeting to discuss something on our minds?” My principal radar immediately registered a ping: something is not going...
Bulletin Board of Independence
One of my favorite questions to ask students when I am working with them in their classrooms is about the tools they use. They often tell me bulletin boards with...
Writing Workshop Bingo
On a warm afternoon, with windows open and a refreshing breeze circulating through the room, Jared raised his hand in the middle of our minilesson on how to craft a...
Students Watching Teachers
Every few weeks, we have a teachers' meeting or professional development before school starts. I do everything I can to make sure teachers are out of the meeting and back...
One Text, Many Lessons
During our prep for state testing, Alex wrote lead after lead in her on-demand narrative pieces that mimicked the structure and phrasing of Owl Moon. She knew the lead to...
Keeping Minilessons Short
Ten minutes go by fast when I’m doing a minilesson. Therefore, I’m always excited when I come up with a strategy that gets students off the rug and to their...
Using Padlet in Coaching
As I sat in my office one morning planning for an upcoming professional development session on sketchnoting, I was struck by how technology has changed the way I work and...
Using Digital Tools for Instructional Walks
For a while, I avoided technology when visiting classrooms for instructional walks. I thought these tools evoked anxiety in the teachers, who might associate digital tools with formal observations. My...
Science and Literacy Units
The best way to learn about anything is by doing. Richard Branson As the second-grade teachers walked into their professional development session that afternoon, they each grabbed a container...
Revising Thinking Through Multiple Readings
Sara’s hand flies into the air, waving frantically as she calls out, “Oh, I know! Maybe everyone in Miss Strangeworth’s family wrote mean letters, so she has to carry on...
Questions for Rereaders
When I was a young reader and first discovered Laura Ingalls Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie, I loved it so much that I read it again. And again. And...
Fostering More Rereading in Classrooms
Do you ever find yourself reading an email quickly to capture the gist of it and then putting it away in a folder, only to find yourself pulling it out...
Bin of the Week
“These books are actually dusty!” exclaimed Bob. Bob and I were putting some newly acquired books in the appropriate bins in his classroom library. During our work, we discovered that...
Why Bother? Practical Answers to Questions About Close Reading
It’s no secret that most language arts teachers tend to approach their work with a sense of urgency. They can’t help it. It’s just that there is a finite amount...
Stop and Inquire
“Did Washington really chop down a cherry tree?” In the middle of a minilesson about the French and Indian War, I introduced George Washington as a young soldier in his...
The Intersection of Social Studies and Language Arts
I was part of a team that worked on new social studies content frameworks in my state, and we talked to many teachers throughout the state. We heard the refrain...
Better Team Meetings
In my first few years as a middle school language arts teacher, our principal required our teaching team to meet once a week. So new, so eager to please, and...
