Choice Lit Topic: Minilessons
Keeping it short, relevant, and meaningful is the challenge when it comes to designing lessons. Here is where you’ll find practical advice and dozens of video examples of master teachers in action.
Results
Four Ways to Use Anchor Charts in the Classroom
Why are anchor charts disappearing from the walls of the classroom? Is it the shift away from the workshop model? Or perhaps, state-mandated curriculum? Have anchor charts become the proverbial...
Reclaiming Our Time
I recently worked with some incredibly thoughtful fifth-grade teachers who were studying their reading instruction. They knew they wanted students to have more time to read, and, more specifically, read...
Minilessons and Writing Instruction
“Writers, it's time to set yourselves up for writing workshop!” As the children bustled around the room, I voiced-over the routines I was noticing writers engaging in or hoping they...
Anchor Charts: A Tool for Every Classroom
I gather students in our meeting area and begin our minilesson on character development. I remind students that today we are looking at how authors reveal characters to us and...
Developing and Listening to Your Inner Voice During Minilessons
Twenty-five five-year-old kids sit on the multicolored rug staring up at me…ME! I stare back and can’t help but let my mind wander to the thoughts swirling around in my...
The Power of an Anchor Chart in a Digital World
I have noticed a trend lately that anchor charts seem to be disappearing in classrooms. I see commercially printed posters on the walls outlining character traits or phonetic rules. Or...
Whale Talk: An Asynchronous Minilesson
Gwen Blumberg teaches an asynchronous lesson for a spelling strategy. View the companion article for instructional coaches.
Student-Centered Learning Through Video Lessons
When we first started hearing the terms synchronous and asynchronous being thrown around casually as if we’d been using them forever in education, we thought about synchronized swimming. When we...
Interactive Read Aloud in Second Grade
Jen Court completes an interactive read aloud in a second-grade classroom.
Planning Writing in Kindergarten
Hayley Whitaker leads a minilesson in kindergarten on how to plan a narrative writing draft.
First Grade Minilesson: Connections
Melissa Atwood leads her first-grade class with a minilesson early in the school year on making connections to text.
Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Accountability for Young Writers
“I don’t remember how to do that!” "We talked about this before. How we can make our characters come alive by adding conversations in our writing? Or using speech bubbles...
Kids Teaching Kids: Student-Led Lessons
We’re in a fourth-grade classroom, and the teacher, Mrs. P, has just finished her minilesson. She’s wearing moon-patterned tights reminiscent of Mrs. Frizzle. As the kids move into independent reading...
Comparing Authors Minilesson
Jen Court helps second graders compare favorite author styles in this minilesson.
Field Notes: Preserving Minilesson Time
In a first-grade classroom at Haverhill Elementary, the sweet smell of efficiency wraps around me as I observe literacy stations. The minilesson is finished, and kids are settling into their...
Introducing Social Studies Concepts with Picture Books
“Are you going to read to us today?” Anise asked when she walked into my classroom and saw a picture book on my desk. “I am, Anise.” “So, are we...
A Minilesson on Minilessons
Franki Sibberson leads a minilesson in her fifth-grade classroom to help students design their own lessons. Students also assess what goes into a high-quality minilesson.
Thoughtful Read Aloud Structures
Franki Sibberson shares how she integrates student choice and collaboration into reading response during daily read alouds in her fifth-grade classroom. The book she is reading is The Girl Who...
Reset
I am spoiled by my DVR. I can sit down and watch my favorite shows whenever I want. I can even skip over commercial breaks. However, every now and then,...
Student-Led Minilessons in Fifth Grade
At the end of the year, each student in my classroom taught a minilesson to the class. There were no formal rules or templates. My only directions were “Think of...
Planning a Student-Led Minilesson
Franki Sibberson helps Lucas plan his minilesson for his fifth-grade classmates on how to connect words and facts from two different sources.
