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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.

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First-Grade Retelling Demonstration Lesson

Clare Landrigan leads this first-grade demonstration small group on retelling strategies. The demonstration includes prebrief and debrief meetings with the teacher.

In the Trenches: Reflection, Not Perfection

Gretchen Taylor finds it’s important to suppress her urge to manage students when coaching—and to be honest with teachers about those urges.

Meeting Snapshot: Defining the Essential Question

Jason DiCarlo leads a team of first-grade teachers and specialists as they work to define an essential question before a demonstration lesson to focus discussions and expectations.

Coaching Tool: Voice-Overs

Brian Sepe uses "voice-overs" (reflecting aloud during demonstration lessons) to help display his thinking to teachers who are observing the instruction.

Voice Notes

Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan use voice notes as a way to be more reflective and systematic in organizing materials after professional development sessions.

Problems and Solutions: Small-Group Demonstration Lesson

In this demonstration small group, Clare Landrigan works with a second-grade teacher to reflect on the needs of two students and, after the lesson, debriefs with her about the learning.

Better Meetings Through Reflection

Jennifer Allen ponders the importance of including a reflection component in meetings, and shares a reflection protocol she finds is effective.

Ending Coaching Cycles with Reflection

Melanie Meehan shares tools and tips for integrating more reflection into coaching cycles.

Taking a Literacy Temperature

The start of a new year is nearly the midpoint of the academic year, and it may be the perfect time to take the "literacy temperature" of your school. Jennifer Schwanke explains how to assess the health learning climate beyond test scores.

What’s in Your Bag?

Clare Landrigan and Tammy Mulligan open their coaching bag and share every item on their “must-have” list for traveling from classroom to classroom.

It’s All About Perception

Literacy coach Melanie Quinn works with teachers to help them move beyond deficit-based thinking in analyzing assessments.

A Coach’s Toolbox: Transcribing Talk

Dana Murphy finds one of the most important tools in her coaching arsenal is transcription. She explains when transcription is effective and gives tips for effective note taking.

Meeting Snapshot: Selecting a Standard for Lesson Study

In this short video excerpt, Jason DiCarlo works with a first-grade team to select a standard before designing a demonstration lesson. The group explores connections between reading and writing, and has an honest discussion of where children are in terms of understanding differences in fiction and nonfiction.

The Power of Sketchbooks for Coaches

Melanie Swider finds sketchbooks are a nifty tool for creating sample anchor charts as well as conferring with students and teachers.

Professional Development Planning

Melanie Meehan reflects upon what went well in a full-day professional development session early in the year as she plans for follow-up midyear.

Picture It: A Mentor Text Is Like . . .

Heather Fisher and Kathy Provost use an analogy exercise to provide a quick and creative brain break during professional development sessions.

Coaching Basics: Choice

Ruth Ayres explains how coaches can help teachers value choice in writing units through flexibility in genres and other structural supports.

Teaching Advanced Second-Grade Writers: Debrief

Literacy coach Kathy Provost and second-grade teacher Jen Volpicelli debrief after teaching a lesson for second graders who are moving beyond grade-level expectations in their writing. This is the third video in a three-part series.

Coaching Teachers to Support Gifted Learners

Gretchen Taylor has coaching advice for teachers who are working with a challenging population that is sometimes shortchanged: students who exceed grade-level expectations.

One Task Fits All

Melanie Quinn wonders if the "sit and get" agenda for a full-day inservice needs to be upended to acknowledge the struggles teachers are facing in meeting assessment demands in the district.

CoffeeEDU

Are the teachers you work with too overbooked for more professional development time? Literacy coach Brian Sepe finds that voluntary 15-minute sessions before school are wildly successful. He shares tips for implementing these lightning-fast workshops.

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