Content Category: Choice Literacy
Results
January 17, 2025: More Engaged Students
Whether you’re keeping a journal or writing as a meditation, it’s the same thing. What’s important is you’re having a relationship with your mind. —Natalie Goldberg A Personal Story from...
December 20, 2024: Graphic Novels and Novels in Verse
A little candy now and then is relished by the wisest men. —Roald Dahl Sweet Reads & Treats We're heading into the end of the calendar year, and many of...
December 13, 2024: Literacy in All Subjects
What does this space encourage? —James Clear The Beauty of Literacy in All Subjects I was a biology major and I write books about teaching writers, so it shouldn't be...
December 6, 2024: Gratitude
When we accept the fact that we can't do everything, we are more willing to ask for and accept help when we do anything. —Simon Sinek I'm Good? I noticed...
Delving Deeper Through Inquiry-Based Learning
One March 14, a day affectionately known by many math teachers as Pi Day, Brooke strode into the classroom and proudly announced, “I can name the first 100 digits of...
Girls’ Sports Books
I stare at the shelves of my classroom library, considering my next book talk, and run my finger across the spines, scanning the titles. I stop at The Crossover by...
Literacy Skills in All Content Areas
Literacy is inherent in all content areas, but sometimes we feel most comfortable relegating it to the domain of language arts classes. After all, there are so many standards to...
November 22, 2024: Vulnerability
Vulnerability sounds like truth and feels like courage. Truth and courage aren't always comfortable, but they're never weakness. —Brené Brown Vulnerability Is Not Weakness Many years ago I accepted an...
November 15, 2024: Supporting Learners
It's our roots that really give us our identity. ―Rosalia We're the Kind of People Who... "Becca, we’re the kind of people who help.” I looked my nine-year-old foster daughter...
Leading with Empathy in the Classroom
They were right where I’d expected to see them. For several workshop periods, they’d set themselves up on the rug. At a glance, they were set up for success. They...
November 8, 2024: Growing Writers
Just as Michelangelo thought there was an angel locked inside every piece of marble, I think there is a brilliant child locked inside every student. ―Marva Collins Rid Your Mind...
November 1, 2024: A Community of Secondary Readers
One good conversation can shift the direction of change forever. ―Linda Lam Hope Matters We are living in tumultuous times in education and as a society, and now more than...
October 25, 2024: Talking Politics?
One good conversation can shift the direction of change forever. ―Linda Lam Talking Politics? The Pew Research Center found that over half of American adults refrain from talking politics. I...
I’m an Everything Person!
“Mrs. Parks, look what I did last night!” Finley said before she even got to the classroom door. I looked at the scratch piece of paper that she presented. The...
Love Poetry: Take It or Leave It, but Tell Me Why
If you work with adolescents, you know that they are prone to quick, extreme judgments, throwing out proclamations of love and hate left and right. At the beginning of the...
Considerations for AI in the Classroom
In a PLC meeting this spring, a principal suggested showing seniors how to use AI for help with their senior portfolios, which immediately sparked a debate among all the teachers...
Unleashing Writers
Writing workshop had a hamster wheel feel for me, and I’m sure it did for my students too. We had been working through narrative writing standards and goals and then...
Reframing Writers
“You can’t read his handwriting, and he misspells so many words,” his teacher said. “He doesn’t use punctuation correctly, and his writing is all over the page. He ignores the...
Literary Salons: Book Clubs, Elevated
I usually do a round of book clubs with my students, but this year so many of them were in a good groove with their independent reading that I was...
How to Promote Civil Discourse in Your Classroom
It is not our differences that divide us. It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences. —Audre Lorde, quoted in Civil Discourse: Classroom Conversations for Stronger Communities...
Navigating the Election Season Booklist
I am someone who does little talking about politics. There have been years of teaching when I’ve been surprised by things my students know and talk about related to an...
