Lead Lit Topic: Getting Organized
Getting Organized
Results
Revising Bookrooms to Support Engagement and Instruction
When we think about the school bookroom, the first word that comes to mind is options. Bookrooms can include texts for all aspects of reading and writing workshop so we as...
Reflections on the First Six Weeks Coaching
Samantha Munnecke chats with Heather Rader about learning and surprises from her first six weeks as a literacy coach.
Math, Literacy, and RTI
For several years, I’ve been lucky enough to work with the brilliant Amy Simmons, an instructional support teacher and “administrative intern” (a fancy name to describe an assistant principal). Part...
Assessment and Response to Intervention
Lisa is a third grader who has been in intervention for two years. She was placed in intervention based on the results of a universal screener. This screener determined her...
Creating Flash Continuums
It is part of my work to guide teams of teachers to create standards-based learning continuums. A continuum is a way to generate a common understanding of a selected standard...
Advocating for English Language Learners
I recently worked with a team of teachers on a committee to interview candidates for an open position working with English language learners. We all gathered around a large conference...
Hiring Teachers for English Language Learners
As our schools become more and more diverse, educators have had to prioritize the needs of students who have limited skills with speaking, reading, and writing in English. As a...
Coaching Minute: Working with New Coaches
In this brief video, Amanda Adrian talks about the importance of considering how to integrate new coaches into ongoing study groups and teams that have worked together for years.
Coaching New Teachers
Coaching is an opportunity to be a "thought partner" in a challenging and rewarding profession. The majority of educators with whom I connect on a daily basis understand my role...
Back-to-School PowerPoints
I remember my husband gently grabbing my arm as I started to raise my hand to ask a question at my daughter’s Back-to-School Night. We had clearly been instructed that...
Coaching Minute: Supporting New Coaches
Kathy Provost and Heather Fisher share tips for how veteran coaches can support new colleagues in this short video.
Developing Coaching Skills Together
We have a small group of literacy coaches in my district. There are four of us, and we have become a rather tight-knit group. We meet together monthly to discuss...
Rethinking End-of-Year Assessments
If an assessment is not lifting the quality of our instruction or helping us understand the needs of readers, we believe we need to question why we are giving it....
Coaching Minute: Personalizing Assessment Binders
Kathy Provost and Heather Fisher chat about the challenges of getting teachers to use assessment binders, and the importance of helping teachers tailor the binders to their needs.
Changing Two Words
Teachers can position children as competitors or collaborators, and themselves as referees, resources, or judges, or in many other arrangements. A teacher's choice of words, phrases, metaphors, and interaction sequences...
Empowering the Reading Team
One of our district goals this year is to give our paraprofessionals more in-depth training in some of the work we are asking them to do with our learners who...
Grade Three Writing Checklist
Tammy Mulligan uses a checklist with third-grade writers in this demonstration lesson. The lesson includes a planning session and debrief with the teacher.
Poetry for Notetaking
On most days when I enter Katie Czerwinski’s sixth-grade classroom, I take out my trusty notebook and pen and pull up a chair beside a student or settle into a...
Hiring for Literacy: The Big Picture
Spring is an exciting time. The playgrounds are once again full of gleeful shouts from children, the promise of summer is in the air, and we, as educators, are seeing...
Hiring for Literacy: The Interview
When given the opportunity to interview candidates for a teacher or literacy support opening, it is easy for an interviewer or interview team to fall back on standard teacher interview...
Wild Reading: A Coach’s Perspective
I just finished reading Donalyn Miller's book Reading in the Wild. I know her path to creating wild readers is an important one. She believes that reading should be a regular part...
