Choice Lit Topic: Community Building
It’s one of the big paradoxes of literacy instruction – students best learn how to read and write independently when they have a strong community of support in classrooms. How teachers build those thoughtful, kind, and challenging classroom communities is explained in these resources.
Results
Perfect Frosting and Workshop Routines
The grandkids were coming over for a Sunday meal. The meal would not be complete unless it ended with something chocolate. I wanted to keep the meal simple and child-pleasing...
Read Alouds as “Third Things”
Many things are unpredictable each day in our classroom, but one thing my students can count on is that they will be read to every single day. I read aloud...
The Beginnings of a Middle School Literacy Community
I already missed last year’s students as I led my first-hour class from the gymnasium to my classroom on the first day of school. I was nervous about facing a...
More Than Dr. Seuss Hats: Why Events Matter
I am not usually a fan of reading activities and events. I do not enjoy the days when everyone in the school wears a Dr. Seuss hat, and I do...
Potato the Crow: Blurring the Lines Between Reality, Fantasy, and Play with Young Learners
One fall day as I strolled through the aisles of the dollar store looking for classroom curriculum, I came across an artificial crow. It was realistic looking, with feathers over...
Anchoring Language
By learning you will teach, by teaching you will learn. Latin Proverb This spring I walked back into my classroom after being out the day before at a professional...
Worth the Investment
Building classroom community and supporting students as they work out their conflicts with each other is hard work. With today’s pressures in education, opting for quick, teacher-directed consequences and rewards...
Words with Friends
Walking quietly among my preschoolers, I pause to listen to their words flowing around me. I hear children using words they have learned to negotiate play (“Tony, now it is...
Setting Goals During Mini-Celebrations
Last week, I spent some time working in one of our second-grade classrooms. As part of a unit on writing about reading, they are developing opinions around the books that...
Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?
The other night, I watched the final episode of Mad Men, and even though the characters came out with mostly happy endings, I cried. I cried because I had been...
Closing Out the Year with “Where I’m From”
For nine of the ten years I’ve been teaching, I’ve been in a classroom with eighth graders. Part of what I love so much about this age group is that...
Closing the Year and Making Space to Remember
Last summer, Kim moved from Long Island to Wellington, Florida. Although the move was an exciting and celebrated adventure for her family, leaving her dear home where both of her...
Using Picture Books to Foster Resilience
Each year as we work to build a strong classroom community, my fourth graders and I read several picture books focused on learning and working with others. Many focus on...
Celebrating “The Voice” of Writers
I love writing workshop and the traditional, predictable structure that accompanies it. However, I also love when I hear about teachers incorporating play into their workshop instruction. Recently, one fourth-grade...
Group Composing
I was nervous when I stood before my class with nothing more than my wireless keyboard and a Word document opened up on the Smartboard. We were about to compose...
How to Speak “Friend”
In my morning pre-kindergarten class, we speak many languages, including Chinese, Vietnamese, Cambodian, and English. As we are considered an English language classroom, our focus is on building understanding and...
Releasing Responsibility
"I see children as kites ..." writes Erma Bombeck. "You spend a lifetime trying to get them off the ground. You run with them until you're both breathless ... they...
The Secret to Productivity: Hard Work or Play?
In our culture, we learn that when something needs doing—writing a report, reading the manual on how to administer a new assessment, creating a bulletin board, organizing the classroom library—it...
Three Classroom Games for Literacy Learning and Laughter
I know that time is precious in classrooms, so any time we can find or invent games that reinforce instruction or skills, I try to pass them along. The following...
The Secret to Magical Author Visits
School visits are usually great. The staff prepares. I present. The kids participate. The projector doesn't burst into flames. Success! But occasionally, magic happens. Word ripples through hallways: "The author...
Classroom Management and Student Responsibility
This year, my workshop time increased from 55 to 80 minutes, which still isn't long enough for all we want to accomplish. With the increase in time, however, came added...
