Choice Lit Topic: Teaching Reading
Our contributors lead reading workshops in classrooms with creative flair. Over the past 12 years, we’ve filled our site with loads of suggestions, tools, and tips for using engaging books throughout the curriculum to hook kids on reading. Here is where you will find many stories of successful and not-so-successful workshop days, and what we learned from them. We bring these stories to life through hundreds of video examples.
Results
Worth a Thousand Words: Teaching with Wordless Picture Books
Wordless picture books are a wonderful instructional tool for teachers to use with students of any age. I remember some time ago when the American Library Association annouched their annual...
Where Have All the Picture Books Gone?
When my oldest daughter was in first grade, she was in the 20+ basket. This meant that during reading time, she could read books at level 20 and above. This...
Preparing Students for Summer Reading
I keep a reading log tracking the books I read each month. When I look at the log across the years, I notice that there are patterns to my reading....
More Than Listening Centers: Using Audio Books in Literacy Instruction
A lanky boy in a hooded sweatshirt was sprawled across a beanbag chair in the back of the classroom. He was staring intently at the book in his hands. "Uh-oh,"...
Quick Take: Advice from Katie Doherty on Starting a Middle School Reading Workshop
In this one-minute quick take video, Katie Doherty has advice for middle school teachers who are thinking of launching a reading workshop in their classrooms.
Teaching Rereading Strategies Through Read Aloud Day 2
I teach my 4th graders the power of rereading using the mentor text Goblins in the Castle by Bruce Coville. In this video, you can see how we build on...
5th Grade Sentence Observation
This past summer, I spent a lot of time thinking about all the components of my writing workshop. I intended to make it a focus of study for myself throughout...
Picture Reading in First Grade
In this read-aloud lesson from Katie DiCesare's first-grade classroom, Katie demonstrates the importance of picture reading using the wordless picture book The Zoo by Suzy Lee.
From Questions to Drafts
Aimee Buckner shares the mentor text Could You? Would You? with her 4th grade students. Aimee explains how questions are a springboard to interesting writing topics, and models connections she...
Talking About Synthesis: Metaphors from 2nd Graders
In this six-minute video, Lauren Scott's second graders brainstorm different metaphors for the synthesis process in reading while their principal, Karen Szymusiak, listens and responds. After the students leave, Lauren...
Writing Comics: Introducing the Activity
In this lesson from a 4th grade classroom, Sarah Thibault introduces students to a writing activity. Students will be creating their own comic books, after extensive preparation and experience with...
Old Elm Speaks: Connecting Poetry, Observation, and Reading
In this first installment of a three-part video series, Aimee Buckner shows how observation skills, poetry, and reading instruction come together with the mentor text Old Elm Speaks: Tree Poems...
Learning from Graphica: Conferring with Students
In this lesson from a 4th grade classroom, Sarah Thibault introduces students to a writing activity. Students will be creating their own comic books, after extensive preparation and experience with...
Old Elm Speaks Day 2: Connecting Poetry, Observation, and Reading
In this second installment of a three-part video series, Aimee Buckner shows how observation skills, poetry, and reading instruction come together with the mentor text Old Elm Speaks: Tree Poems...
Helping Young Readers Become Independent: The “Next-Read” Stack and Peer Groups
I find next-read book stacks to be critical for students in the transitional years of reading. Many young readers are just beginning to read books that take longer than one...
Helping Students Set Nonfiction Reading Goals
For years, no matter how hard I tried, fiction seemed to take over my students' reading workshop time. I realized that with only one block of time to read, students...
Managing Book Boxes
In this first video in our "Organizing Book Boxes" series, Joan Moser (of "The Sisters") explains three strategies she uses to help students pick books for their book boxes.
Book Choice and Planning Lesson
Book choice is something that we talk about all year long. Years ago, I did several minilessons on book choice early in the year and assumed that once my students...
Differentiating Book Boxes
In this second video in our "Organizing Book Boxes" series, Joan Moser (of "The Sisters") explains how she differentiates the content of book boxes for students with different skills and...
Nonfiction Word Hunt Part I
Nonfiction word hunts are a routine that I recently discovered. It immediately had an impact with my students' interest in words and their meanings. Knowing the meanings of words is...
Book Boxes Nuts and Bolts
In this final video in our "Organizing Book Boxes" series, Joan Moser (of "The Sisters") tackles the issue of what types of books and what levels are appropriate for student...
