Teaching Unscripted

Here are a few ways literacy leaders can help support classroom teachers at the beginning of the school year.

There is a pervasive belief in our culture that being good at math is an innate ability. As teachers, we need to reinforce a growth mindset in our students. Here's where you can start...

Understanding Texts & Readers works in conjunction with The Reading Strategies Book, and helps you connect comprehension goals to text levels and reading responses.

In their new book, Developing Numerical Fluency, Patsy and Steve present what they call pivotal understandings, and put an emphasis on a school-wide culture that values and nurtures numerical fluency.

At the start of a new school year, it is important to take clear and intentional actions that put kids first from day one. Below are four simple and fun activities that build community, encourage engagement, and value student voices.

Choice within routines and environment is essential for instilling agency. Without choice, children are blindly following our rules and expectations.

When we want nothing from a text but what it might have to offer our minds and spirits on its own terms, we read with presence.

When mathematics lessons are systematically planned and implemented with these six processes at the forefront, teachers maximize the chances of all students becoming numerically fluent.

Have you ever stopped and asked yourself, 'what’s the best that could happen?' By turning that old phrase on its head, author Debbie Miller says she’s asked herself a more beautiful question.

The goal of a writing conference is to teach students something about writing that they can use in the future. If you add to students' writing repertoires in every conference, they become better writers over time.

Show and Tell is designed to come directly after kindergarten unit one, Launching the Writing Workshop. It extends the work started in unit one, and supports young writers in taking risks with invented spelling.

As you make plans for a new year with your students, you might be thinking about your classroom library. How can you make your library more engaging for your students? What should you consider as you think about giving your classroom library a reboot?

Sometimes it can be hard to imagine how you might infuse deeper comprehension work into your district- mandated curriculum or instructional framework. If this sounds familiar...

In many ways, we still structure our classrooms and speak with students as if we value compliance and the look of engagement more than true engagement.

When Kelly Gallagher and Penny Kittle set out to plan a year of teaching together, they knew they were going to have to take some risks, but that it would ultimately help them write a better book for teachers

This week on the podcast we’re wondering, what’s the best that could happen? In her newest book; “What’s the Best That Could happen?” Debbie encourages us to tune into that “thing” that doesn’t feel right and then investigate it and see what kind of questions it leads us to.

In What’s the Best That Could Happen?, Debbie Miller confronts a challenge all teachers face: the feeling of being stuck and the fear of trying something new. She explores how questions help us look beyond the limitations of what we’ve done and discover powerful new opportunities for teaching.

Writing in particular can be challenging for students early in the year. Quickwrites can be incorporated into your writing instruction at any time to spark students' creativity and energy, making them an accessible and readily available tool.