Content Category: Choice Literacy
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September 2, 2022: Choice in Book Selection
Each new beginning comes from some other beginning's end. —Seneca Beginning Again On the last day of school our student body planned to meet outside on our field, circling the...
August 26, 2022: Intentional Inclusivity
People do not reconsider what they mindlessly accepted as true. —Ellen Langer Reshape Your Story Matt Renwick wrote an article that has been sticking with me. Matt, in his no-nonsense...
Using Video to Launch Hands-Down Conversations
Typically, when I launch whole-class hands-down conversation with students, I choose a beloved picture book—perhaps All Are Welcome by Alexandra Penfold or You Matter by Christian Robinson. I love these...
Reading Threads
I have a confession. I have never read Kimberly Brubaker Bradley’s The War that Saved My Life. Despite the fact that I am certain I would love it, it has...
Opportunities Offered in Book Shopping
There are so many routines that are necessary to make reading workshop run smoothly. We teach students how to gather on the carpet for the minilesson, how to physically turn...
August 19, 2022: Tailored Reading Instruction
Organizing is what you do before you do something so that when you do it, it is not all mixed up. —A. A. Milne Get Organized When I was a...
Holidays: Where Do They Fit in the Classroom?
“I’ve never had someone acknowledge and recognize the Moon Festival," a parent said to me at parent pickup during one of the first weeks of school. "I didn’t know that...
Making Queer Inclusivity Less Complicated
A couple of summers ago, I had a lovely surprise. One of my former high school students, Brendan, reached out to me through social media to tell me that he...
The Tale of Two Boys
Ryan, a little red-haired boy with a shocking resemblance to Dennis the Menace, bounced around the classroom. He skipped to the cubbies and grabbed a handful of markers, then dropped...
QuickTake: Chronicling Learning All Year
Tammy Mulligan shares a beginning-of-the-year routine where second graders create an identity frame. This becomes a place to highlight photographs of their learning each week throughout the school year.
August 12, 2022: Getting to Know Students
Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all. —Aristotle Imagining Students Outside of Our Classrooms When people hear that I’ve volunteered to be one of the...
QuickTake: Leave Space for Personalization
Melissa Quimby advises leaving space for students to personalize the classroom when they arrive to start the new school year.
August 5, 2022: Texts to Start the Year
Don't be pushed around by the fears in your mind. Be led by the dreams in your heart. —Roy T. Bennett Inspired to Dream This winter when I broke my...
The Best Advice for Keeping Students at the Heart of Lesson Plans
Bitsy Parks shares her best advice for lesson planning in a way that keeps the focus on students. She encourages finding joy in the planning process by observing them.
July 29, 2022: Create a Sense of Belonging
To see and be seen. That is the truest nature of love. —Brené Brown Have the Courage to Show Up Recently I read Brené Brown’s Atlas of the Heart: Mapping...
Quick Take: Listen to Create a Sense of Belonging
Stella Villalba encourages all educators to listen to students to understand how to create a culture of belonging.
Reading Specialists Can Change the Narrative
When I started working with Trevor in reading support during his first year, he was significantly behind his peers. Though most of his classmates were on the path to learning...
Setting Up the Intervention Room
It was the end of the school year, and we had just received an email from our principal containing next year’s school map. Changes in teaching positions and class sizes...
What Matters More
We have a Little Free Library in our front yard that I received as a gift from my husband many years ago. We love it and our neighbors love it....
Using Daily Attendance Questions to Build Community and Communication Skills
A typical beginning to one of my high school class periods might go as follows: "Do you prefer pancakes, waffles, or french toast? I’m definitely a pancake person; the fluffier...
What I Am Reading the First Week of School
Literature transforms human experience and reflects it back to us, and in that reflection we can see our own lives and experiences as part of the larger human experience. —Dr....
