"It's not the tools-it's what we do with them that counts.Katie and Kristin start with our most important educational goals-literacy, independence, and critical thinking-and helps you connect them to the technology available in your classroom or school. You'll help students dig into texts, research their questions, and create powerful learning communities by using digital tools effectively, responsibly, and in combination with trusted artifacts and print resources.Amplify does exactly what the title implies. "When introducing technological tools, we often apply the same practices and strategies we use in our daily teaching, but amplify their power with technology," write Katie and Kristin. "We model what we want students to do with the technology, guide them to try it out with us, provide time for practice, then share as a class." They help amplify your literacy curriculum with lessons and guidance for:explicitly teaching kids how to be effective digital readers and thinkers giving students practice with closely reading images, infographics, and video emphasizing student ownership and creativity Whether you are in a 1:1 school, want to squeeze everything you can out of the one device in your classroom, or your school is encouraging you to use more digital tools, read Amplify. You'll discover how to gradually release responsibility to empower students as you-and your students-make the most of any technology.

    Real hard. In The Unstoppable Writing Teacher she takes on the common concerns, struggles, and roadblocks that we all face in writing instruction and helps us engage in the process of problem solving each one.From dealing with writing workshop skeptics to working with students both gifted and challenged, and of course combating that eternal barrier-lack of time-Colleen offers tried-and-true strategies to address and overcome obstacles.For the struggles unique to you, she includes a "Name Your Monster" section that helps you identify your own individual roadblocks and even offers sustainable support through her blog, colleencruz.com. "We can't solve all the problems we're faced with in writing instruction," Colleen promises, "but we can choose how to respond to them. And our responses will make all the difference."What makes you unstoppable, or what's stopping you? Connect with Colleen on her blog at www.colleencruz.com/blog.htm or on Twitter, #unstoppablewritingteacher.

    To help teachers acquire a fuller understanding of the complexity of response to intervention designs, literacy researcher and best-selling author Dick Allington offers clear recommendations to guide classroom teachers in designing response to instruction (RtI) programs such that struggling readers will develop their reading proficiencies to match those of their achieving peers. Unlike any other book on the topic, Dick Allington provides a research-base that supports closing the reading achievement gap along with implications this has for designing RTI programs. In addition, Dick provides a comprehensive discussion of the factors that inhibit poor, disabled, and second-language learners from achieving and offers a number of research-based instructional strategies and routines for turning struggling readers into achieving readers. Teachers will be inspired and confident to design response to instruction programs! Take a look inside... Provides a complete review of what is critical to accelerating the development of struggling readers.Presents educators with a framework for how we might design response to intervention (RTI) programs such that struggling readers will develop their reading proficiencies to match those of their achieving peers.Features a complete analysis of response to intervention design (RTI) and offers a detailed framework for evaluating existing and future intervention efforts.Includes numerous websites that provide teacher-friendly information, strategies, and tools for accelerating reading development.

    The book is rooted in Jennifer's belief that teachers know what they need when it comes to professional development in literacy, and the best literacy leaders are those who listen to and respect the educators in their midst. Grounded in research but thoroughly practical, Jennifer shares advice on:organizing a literacy room with resources for classroom teachers, including book lists, bins of children's books tied to craft and strategy lessons, bulletin board ideas, and files with instructional materials;developing intervention classrooms for struggling readers and writers built on collaboration between teachers and literacy specialists;setting up assessment notebooks for teachers, and preparing new and veteran teachers for student assessments across grades;creating model programs for dealing with schoolwide problems like reading fluency, and then moving from the pilot to implementation in many classrooms;coaching new and veteran teachers in the latest literacy practices, without taking on the role of expert;analyzing and using books, videos and journals in professional development programs;infusing routine staff meetings with discussions of new literacy curricula;leading teacher study groups using a variety of formats;finding and budgeting money for professional development programs in literacy;protecting time and scheduling priorities, to ensure the literacy specialist position doesn't become a “catch-all” for the random needs of teachers or administrators.At a time when all administrators are urged to be literacy leaders, this insider's view helps to define what leadership looks like and shows how to create an environment that fosters professional development. Jennifer Allen shares the balance leaders struggle with, as they strive to support and honor the fine practices of teachers, even as they nudge colleagues to improve their literacy instruction. Ultimately, Becoming a Literacy Leader is a hopeful book, an optimistic and realistic portrait of life in schools among teachers committed to doing their jobs well.

    If you are a high school teacher or a kindergarten teacher, the seven steps in The Wild Card will give you the knowledge and the confidence to bring creative teaching strategies into your classroom.You'll learn: Why the deck is not stacked against you, no matter what kind of hand you've been dealt Why you should never listen to the Joker How to identify the "Ace up your sleeve" and use it to create classroom magic How to apply the "Rules of Rigor" in order to fuse creativity with learning How to become the "Wild Card" that changes the game for your students

    . . frequently and across the grades! The biggest issue? Most of our grades 4-12 students continue to make the same old errors year after year. Grammar Keepers to the rescue, with 101 lessons that help students internalize the conventions of correctness once and for all. Bernabei’s key ingredients include Daily journal writing to increase practice and provide an authentic context Minilessons and Interactive Dialogues that model how to make grammatical choices A “Keepers 101” sheet to track teaching and “Parts of Speech Sheet” for student reference

    The field's leading authorities present accessible recommendations for best practices that can be tailored to fit specific classroom circumstances and student populations. Provided are strategies for helping all students succeed—including struggling readers and English language learners—and for teaching each of the major components of literacy. The book also addresses ways to organize instruction and innovative uses of technology. Chapters include concrete examples, Engagement Activities, and resources for further learning. New to This Edition*Incorporates the latest research findings and instructional practices.*Chapters on motivation, content-area teaching, new literacies, and family literacy.*Addresses timely topics such as response to intervention, the new common core standards, English language learning, and policy issues.

    Beck--an experienced educator who knows what works--this concise volume provides a wealth of practical ideas for building children's decoding skills by teaching letter-sound relationships, blending, word building, and multisyllable words. Straightforward and accessible, the strategies presented for explicit, systematic phonics instruction are ideal for use in primary-grade classrooms or with older students who are having difficulties. Many specific examples bring the instructional procedures to life while elucidating their underlying rationale; appendices include reproducible curriculum materials.

    The book includes numerous stories about the way circles have been used in many diverse situations, discussion on the use of proactive, responsive and staff circles, and an overview of restorative practices, with particular emphasis on its relationship to circle processes.

    This unique budgetary survival guide will enhance your instructional, technical, and managerial skills not only as the school′s leader but also as the school′s visionary, planning coordinator, and budgeting manager.

    This practical resource shows teachers how to be effective and have a life! Author and educator Maia Heyck-Merlin explores the key habits of Together Teachers—how they plan ahead, organize work and their classrooms, and how they spend their limited free time. The end goal is always strong outcomes for their students. So what does Together, or Together Enough, look like? To some teachers it might mean neat filing systems. To others it might mean using time efficiently to get more done in fewer minutes. Regardless, Together Teachers all rely on the same skills. In six parts, the book clearly lays out these essential skills. Heyck-Merlin walks the reader through how to establish simple yet successful organizational systems. There are concrete steps that every teacher can implement to achieve greater stability and success in their classrooms and in their lives. Contains templates and tutorials to create and customize a personal organizational system and includes a companion website: www.thetogetherteacher.com Recommends various electronic or online tools to make a teacher's school day (and life!) more efficient and productive Includes a Reader's Guide, a great professional development resource; teachers will answer reflection questions, make notes about habits, and select tools that best match individual needs and preferences Ebook customers can access CD contents online.  Refer to the section in the Table of Contents labeled, Download CD/DVD Content, for detailed instructions.

    It focuses on the specific things that great teachers do ... that others do not. Readers of author Todd Whitaker's best-selling WHAT GREAT PRINCIPALS DO DIFFERENTLY asked him for a companion volume focusing on great teachers and their classrooms. This book is his response to those requests.This book focuses on the specific things that great teachers do ... that others do not. It answers these essential questions: - Is it high expectations for students that matter?- How do great teachers respond when students misbehave?- Do great teachers filter differently than their peers?- How do the best teachers approach standardized testing? - How can your teachers gain the same advantages?

    Katie Wood RayKatie (beloved author of About the Authors and Already Ready) begins with a strong, classroom-based research foundation for this powerful, intuitive idea. She then suggests 50 ways you might use illustrations to help students internalize key aspects of craft through their love of picture books.In Pictures and in Words is filled with sample student work that documents how children's thinking deepens as they explore illustrations. Katie even includes full-color pages of published illustrations with examples of sticky-notes that show the kinds of links students can make between pictures and words.Give children an engaging way to make the qualities of good writing part of everything they write, for life. Find out how Katie Ray can help you do it when you read In Pictures and In Words.

    As a middle school teacher, Jeff Anderson also discovered that his students were not grasping the basics, and that it was preventing them from reaching their potential as writers. Jeff readily admits, “I am not a grammarian, nor am I punctilious about anything,” so he began researching and testing the ideas of scores of grammar experts in his classroom, gradually finding successful ways of integrating grammar instruction into writer's workshop.Mechanically Inclined is the culmination of years of experimentation that merges the best of writer's workshop elements with relevant theory about how and why skills should be taught. It connects theory about using grammar in context with practical instructional strategies, explains why kids often don't understand or apply grammar and mechanics correctly, focuses on attending to the “high payoff,” or most common errors in student writing, and shows how to carefully construct a workshop environment that can best support grammar and mechanics concepts. Jeff emphasizes four key elements in his teaching:short daily instruction in grammar and mechanics within writer's workshop;using high-quality mentor texts to teach grammar and mechanics in context;visual scaffolds, including wall charts, and visual cues that can be pasted into writer's notebooks;regular, short routines, like “express-lane edits,” that help students spot and correct errors automatically.Comprising an overview of the research-based context for grammar instruction, a series of over thirty detailed lessons, and an appendix of helpful forms and instructional tools, Mechanically Inclined is a boon to teachers regardless of their level of grammar-phobia. It shifts the negative, rule-plagued emphasis of much grammar instruction into one which celebrates the power and beauty these tools have in shaping all forms of writing.

    You want to make everything about reading or math. It's not always about that. At school, you guys do everything except listen to me. Y'all want to use your essays and vocabulary words to save my future, but none of y'all know anything about saving my now.In We Got This Cornelius Minor describes how this conversation moved him toward realizing that listening to children is one of the most powerful things a teacher can do. By listening carefully, Cornelius discovered something that kids find themselves having to communicate far too often. That my lessons were not, at all, linked to that student's reality.While challenging the teacher as hero trope, We Got This shows how authentically listening to kids is the closest thing to a superpower that we have. What we hear can spark action that allows us to make powerful moves toward equity by broadening access to learning for all children. A lone teacher can't eliminate inequity, but Cornelius demonstrates that a lone teacher can confront the scholastic manifestations of racism, sexism, ableism and classism by showing:exactly how he plans and revises lessons to ensure access and equity ways to look anew at explicit and tacit rules that consistently affect groups of students unequally suggestions for leaning into classroom community when it feels like the kids are against you ideas for using universal design that make curriculum relevant and accessible advocacy strategies for making classroom and schoolwide changes that expand access to opportunity to your students We cannot guarantee outcomes, but we can guarantee access Cornelius writes. We can ensure that everyone gets a shot. In this book we get to do that. Together. Consider this book a manual for how to begin that brilliantly messy work. We got this.