Lead Lit Topic: Getting Organized
Getting Organized
Results
Celebrate the Process
It’s time to celebrate. Excitement is buzzing through the air. First-grade writers are standing proudly by their informational chapter books, pointing out important information for their audience. Parents and other...
Parent Bulletin Board
At a recent meeting with one of the principals I work with, she described how she wants to use some of the bulletin board space in her front hallway to...
Assessing Our Impact
Our students have heaps of data about their learning progress: screener scores, benchmarks, quizzes and tests, teachers’ anecdotal records, grades, and portfolio assessments. These results offer a bevy of information...
Learning Targets
For me, one of the most frustrating things about teaching is when I give a great lesson, or one that I think is great, and then none of the work...
Creating a Strategy Tool Kit
During the years I have spent as a writing coordinator and coach of writing teachers, I have developed several instructional tools and strategies that work across grades and genres. I...
Engagement in Writing Workshops
Last week, I participated in instructional rounds with three second-grade teachers, and the hosting teacher was interested to know how much on-task writing behavior was exhibited when she was conferring...
Share, Learn, Grow: The PD Bulletin Board
A friend of mine opened a restaurant several years ago, and I remember him telling us how hard it was to wait for people to discover it. He knew he...
Getting Books into the Hands of Teachers
Schools are very busy places, and classroom teachers have exceptionally long “to-do” lists. With everything on their plates, they may not have enough time to search the book room or...
Building Effective Literacy Teams
When our kids were little, I don’t know where I would have been without my husband. I can’t imagine having to make tough parenting decisions alone. We both brought different...
Literacy Specialists and Case Studies
There are always a few students who puzzle even the most seasoned reading specialists. Even though these specialists carry a large bag of tricks, they don’t always know exactly what...
Learning Land
I swear it feels like I get an email every five minutes from someone trying to sell me something for our school. Assemblies, puppet shows, field trips, author visits, motivational...
Creating a Digital Footprint
Have you ever Googled yourself? You know, just to see what would come up? If you haven’t, I encourage you to do just that. Put your name in Google, put...
Where the Magic Happens
Jeff Wilhelm was a new faculty member at the University of Maine when I enrolled in his graduate course called Teacher Research many years ago. The signature assignment in this...
Six Ways to Empower Teachers to Write
If we want to teach students to write, then we must understand how writers work. The best way to understand how writers work is to write! When teachers write, their...
New Year Resolutions
Are you idealistic like me and pledge to do your job SO much better at the beginning of every year? Perhaps you’ve just finished an “off” year . . ....
Defining Your Role as a Coach
After eight years, my husband and I have settled into our marriage. Balancing the demands of our relationship, our full-time jobs, our two children, and everything else means we have...
Planning a Coaching Cycle
Kathy Provost works with a third-grade teacher to plan long-term and daily goals in a coaching cycle.
Getting PD Feedback
Theoretically, I knew feedback was important. But in reality, I struggled with feedback. How does a coach even begin planning professional development sessions based on feedback? How could I synthesize...
“Got a Minute?”: Rethinking My Schedule and Priorities
I was in a second-grade classroom, observing students and the teacher working on personal narratives, when I got a call from the office. “Matt, a parent is here and would...
Getting Out of the Tater Tot Office: The Importance of Visibility
In my role as a literacy coach, I’ve shared a lot of spaces with a lot of people and a lot of “stuff”: spaces with walls of computer equipment, stuffed...
Meeting Debrief: Coaching Literacy Coaches
Heather Sisson and Amanda Adrian debrief after leading a professional development session for literacy coaches on the Pause Paraphrase Probe strategy.
