Content Category: Choice Literacy
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A Just-Right Lesson for Just-Right Books
Choosing just-right books is a major focus during the first few weeks of school, but with readers continually growing, just-right book choices continually change. For years I have done the...
Prompting and Support: Understanding the Language of the Common Core in Kindergarten
Gradually releasing responsibility to children as they gain expertise, teaching a few strategies of great consequence in-depth over time, and giving children the gifts of time, choice, response, community, and...
Name Practice in Kindergarten
Max Brand's kindergarten class of mostly English language learners completes their daily routine of name practice, and in the process learns letters and sounds while building classroom community.
Organizing Materials to Support Literacy Learning (Classroom Design Series Part 3)
The organization of materials is crucial in a collaborative classroom. In this kind of classroom, there is no “mine,” but rather “ours” when speaking of materials and supplies, and organizing...
In Praise of Handwritten Notes
When asked what was the most important thing she wanted to teach her students, long-time kindergarten teacher Isabel Beaton replied, "The art of gracious living!" Whether you're five or fifty,...
Notetaking Series Part II: Honing Your Notetaking Skills, One Strategy at a Time
When we were learning how to take notes, becoming skilled at writing down observations seemed an almost mystical undertaking. We read accounts by anthropologists, war stories from their time in...
First Day of School Read-Alouds with Global and Multicultural Perspectives
Grades K-3 Ada, Alma Flor. 1993. My Name is María Isabel. Illustrated by K. Dyble Thompson. New York: Aladdin. María Isabel is the new girl in school and instead of being called...
A Hand to Hold: Crying and Community in Preschool
It was January, the time when I look forward to being able to do more extensive, focused, and creative lessons with my preschoolers. By January, early fall’s focus on developing...
Test: Weekly Poetry Response
Test Weekly Poetry Response for PD2Go with Gretchen Schroeder
Inside and Outside Views Minilesson
Ruth Ayres explains the importance of "inside" and "outside" views in writing using a student mentor text in this lesson with second graders.
Philanthropy and Literacy: Wrap-Up
In this second video in a two-part series, Beth Honeycutt and Rita Schaeffer help their eighth-grade students understand the concept of philanthropy.
Intentional Consolidation and Closure
You taught a minilesson on the area of rectangles. Students have spent the last 30 minutes building different rectangles out of square tiles with an area of 36 square units...
