Today’s That Thing You Do! segment is authored by Ali Capasso. Ali teaches 2nd grade on our Title I campus. I’m excited for Ali to share her wisdom about facilitating an environment where readers talk about the books they’re reading. You can follow Ali on Twitter @MrsCapasso Every day, Timothy stops by my door. We …
They sit on the floor in front of me eagerly waiting for me to turn the page. They’ve made predictions, shared ideas they’re inferring, made connections to the poetry and informational texts we’ve read this week. They ask if the author has written other books. There’ve been so many questions. Questions that led us to …
Just this weekend I listened to Cornelius Minor’s interview at Heinemann and I can’t stop thinking about the power of advocating for our students. If you have not yet listened to the podcast or at least read the transcript, do that ASAP. It’s a game changer. The personal work that Mr. Minor is intentionally doing …
Let’s pretend for a minute that next year your campus will no longer provide pull out services for students with unique instructional needs. Neither the SPED teacher nor the ELL teacher will be taking students from your room to provide “special” services. How in the world is that going to work? Meetings are scheduled with …
It’s been months since I read Kelly Gallagher’s book, In the Best Interest of Students: Staying True to What Works in the ELA Classroom, but something he wrote there has hounded me ever since. I want students to take the wisdom they encounter in the books they are reading and apply that wisdom to the …
My good friend, Melissa Hassell is writing today for That Thing You Do! Melissa has been in the elementary classroom from first to fifth grade and is now an instructional coach on a PreK-6 campus. A couple of years ago, Melissa experimented with a family book club on her campus. I got a chance to …
You’ve seen it. The slack-jawed expression from two dozen (plus a few more) tweens staring back at you. It’s terrifying and in my role as instructional coach on our campus there’s nothing that ties my stomach in knots more than that look of indifference. When I accept an invitation to co-teach or model a lesson …
This post generated a lot of interest when it first went live back in December. I’m re-posting this week in an effort to continue this very important conversation. Intervention must be thoughtfully designed for our most fragile readers. Much has been written about RtI. We have protocols and models, research-based practices and progress monitoring tools, …
On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal published an article, The ‘Rock Star’ Librarians Who Choose What Your Kids Read. I was elated to see a large photograph of John Schumacher with a gaggle of elementary kids strategically placed behind the headline. I’m a huge Mr. Schu fan. I read with great interest: “Schumacher is an …
It’s a proud day indeed on today’s That Thing You Do! segment. Proud because I’ve seen Katie Webb start her teaching career and in a few short years look every bit the master teacher. Katie coaches me today through a systematic protocol for supporting ELL students with meaningful and rigorous language and content learning in …
