Leaders Lounge

Lead Literacy Articles & Videos (formerly leadliteracy.com)

Our lounge is your home for exploring hundreds of articles and videos for literacy coaches and school leaders. Our contributors share their best advice for working one-on-one with teachers in coaching cycles, hosting professional development sessions, and designing demonstration lessons and study groups.

Search Leaders Lounge...
Latest Content
The Children Are Communicating. Are We Listening?

Melanie Quinn realizes our classrooms are filled with mini-coaches. The students in front of us are clearly communicating their needs; we just need to do a better job of paying attention.

Coaching Minute: Case Study Observation Form

Literacy coaches Heather Fisher and Kathy Provost talk about how their work with reading specialists has evolved by having the specialists focus on case studies of individual students, rather than spending much of their time focused solely on big data. They share a form they use to help reading specialists hone their observation skills.

Who Are “They”? Word Choice and Student Learning

Gretchen Taylor finds that these kids and everyone are key words to focus on in coaching, because they can signify sweeping assumptions in lieu of a close look at individual behaviors.

A Yearlong Coaching Calendar

Dana Murphy too often finds herself feeling like she's begging to go into classrooms. The solution? Create a yearlong schedule and put the onus on teachers to sign up for a coaching cycle.

When Teachers Design the Professional Development Calendar

Melanie Meehan finds that a simple process early in the year that gives teachers more control over the professional development plan builds excitement for new learning.

Coaching in Classrooms with English Language Learners

Many schools have seen an influx of English language learners recently. Coaches with little ELL experience may struggle to assist teachers with large ELL populations. Stella Villalba shares some tools and strategies for in-class coaching in classrooms with many English language learners.

Do or Die

Melanie Quinn deals with a panic-stricken young teacher near tears after a lousy evaluation. She explains what she did to move him past emotion and into a plan to improve his instruction.

Getting Emotional

It happens at least once a year for Jennifer Schwanke: she finds herself on the verge of crying in a professional setting. Here's her best advice for literacy leaders to keep the tears at bay.

Demonstration Small Group: Discussing a Common Text

In this demonstration small group, Clare Landrigan guides first graders as they practice discussion skills around a common text. The video includes prebrief and debrief sessions with the classroom teacher.

No Substitute for Owning the Learning

Karen Terlecky finds herself in a fitness class with a bunch of angry participants. The experience causes her to reflect on the disconnect between coach and teacher expectations when coaches think their role is to fix classroom issues.

Purposeful Post-Its

Many teachers have a love/hate relationship with sticky notes in their classrooms. They’re a wonderful tool, but it can feel like reading workshops are overrun with them. Melanie Swider coaches a teacher new to second grade with a series of collaborative lessons on using sticky notes purposefully.

First-Grade Small Group on Opinion Writing

In this demonstration small group, Clare Landrigan helps first graders craft opinion writing. The demo includes quick individual conferences, as well as a prebrief and debrief with the classroom teacher.

Conferring Matters: A Coach’s Perspective

Ruth Ayres shares strategies for building teachers' conferring skills. This article is part of a new occasional series, Expectations and Nudges, where Ruth Ayres and Lee Snider will explore the same topic from the perspectives of a literacy coach and a principal.

Conferring Matters: A Principal’s Perspective

Lee Snider explains how he builds interest and conferring skills in writing workshops.

Be Someone Who Writes

Melanie Meehan shares some practical suggestions for helping teachers (and literacy coaches) build a writing habit and get over their feelings of inadequacy as writers.

Reading Invasion

"Imagine roughly 400 people—staff and students—walking out into the green space on your school campus. Now imagine every one of them with a book in hand. Next, they all take up a space that feels comfortable. Then, they read." Brian Sepe explains how a "reading invasion" is a simple, fun, and powerful way to promote a reading community.

It’s the Little Things: Small Actions for Building a Healthy Literacy Culture

Matt Renwick explains how everything from symbols to basic cleanliness in schools affects the climate for literacy.

What We Lost

Brenda Power shares a simple activity to use in a teachers' writing workshop or professional development setting to get everyone writing and talking.

Making Cuts in Writing: Demonstration Conference

Is there anything more difficult than getting a student to trim their writing draft? Tammy Mulligan confers with fifth grader Noah and uses her own writing as a mentor text to show how she faced a similar challenge. The demonstration conference includes a prebrief and a debrief with Noah’s teacher.

Sketchnoting in Professional Development

Stephanie Affinito energizes a professional development session with sketchnoting, and teachers soon take the practice back to their classrooms.

The Evolution of a Coaching Tool Kit

Melanie Meehan moves from a cart to a bag to a small baggie . . . and then back to a cart again. She explains how the tools she brings to classrooms and the thinking behind them have changed over time.

Choice Literacy Membership

Become a member for full access to Articles & Videos plus member-only Product Discounts

Membership

Explore More
Getting Organized
Guiding Teachers
Working in Classrooms

Choice Literacy Membership

Articles

Get full access to all Choice Literacy article content

Videos

Get full access to all Choice Literacy video content

Courses

Access Choice Literacy course curriculum and training

Membership Options

About

Choice Literacy is a community of passionate educators who lead. Come join us!

Learn more

Contact
Subscribe

Get free articles and insights delivered to your inbox every week with the Choice Literacy "Big Fresh" Newsletter!

Learn more

© 2025 The Lead Learners. All rights reserved.   Privacy Policy   |   Terms and Conditions

Website built by MemberDev

Loading...