January 14, 2019 · curriculum
From A Fire In My Hands, by Gary Soto Happy Snow Day to any other teachers who are at home like me today! Since I actually had time to read books that were not for school today, I was reminded of a poetry unit we taught with our fifth graders. There were so many great sessions, examples, ideas, and books for teaching poetry at NCTE (which I attended in November) that it made me miss teaching a full poetry unit! For those of you who have a poetry unit or are just looking for new ways to teach, introduce, or incorporate poetry, here are some of my favorite lesson ideas: Start by asking students what is poetry? How can you tell if something is a poem? What makes something a poem? We asked our students to think about these questions and then looked at a lot of different poems together. This is a great way of dispelling misconception (poems must rhyme, anything can be a poem, etc). Our
poetryliteracymentoread aloudNCTE
September 5, 2018 · Uncategorized
Hi everyone-- Gabby here writing to you from Oregon! While one of us gearing up for another great year leading the classroom, the other one of us is actually getting ready to be a student again... (cue the student-esque excitement annnd cue the whining about homework... well, hopefully I’ve outgrown that!). When I wasn’t packing or convincing cats that it’s fun to fly on planes to their new home, I have been doing my best read some soon to be released middle grade and YA lit. I have been loving the ARC (advanced reader copy) life. Here are a few of the recently released or soon to be released (!!) notable reads from the summer. Hopefully, you haven’t spent your whole classroom budget (like we did last year!) and you’ve got room to add a few of these to your shiny classroom library to kick off the year right! Picture books- This cover is so fabulous we won't even try to make it smaller!
literacybook reviewbooksread aloudnew books
June 11, 2018 · Uncategorized
We feel so hip, so cutting edge! It is no surprise to any of you who follow us here (or on Twitter) how much we love literature. We have seen on a daily basis how transformative it can be for us personally, but also for our students. As a result, we are now reading ARC's ( Advanced Reader's Copies) to continue our ongoing quest of excellent, thoughtful, diverse literature. If you are someone who is looking for a reader (or two! ) feel free to reach out to us! We have loved reading the ones we have received so far. We especially loved How to Love a Jamaican by Alexia Arthurs. The very first piece (Light Skinned Girls and Kelly Rowlands) in her short story collection blew our minds from the get go with its nuance, humanity, and the way it got at the depths of the many layers in our identities. Beautifully done-- we hope you can snag a copy this summer (It is officially out July 24th,
literacyread aloudsummer readingdiverse voicesdiscussion
July 28, 2017 · curriculum
Excerpt from a student's reflection about our storytelling unit. Storytelling is one of the best units I have ever taught. It seamlessly integrates our Reading and Writing instruction, encourages students to use their voices and consider other perspectives, develops communication, presentation, and persuasive skills, and both pushes and allows students to express themselves in a new way. One of the stories we have our students write and perform is inspired by Storycorps and based on an interview with someone close to them. The Storycorps inspired story is the 2nd writing project of our storytelling unit. Timing wise, it usually coincides with Grandparents and Special Friends Day (a tradition at our school), where grandparents/special friends come to school with students for a shortened schedule. We use the Homeroom time to watch Q & A , an animated Storycorps interview by a child named
storytellinginterviewliteracyfamily involvementpublic speaking