Want to differentiate instruction while assuring rigor? Create a 3-D portrait of each of your students using a mix of formal and informal strategies. Teaching expert Barbara Blackburn has tips for gathering insights about background knowledge, culture, and growth mindset.
MiddleWeb has published about 1100 reviews of professional books for teachers and school leaders since 2012 – each written by a K-12 educator. In this article we’ve curated our 23 most-read reviews posted during 2021. Click on a headline to read our reviewer’s take on the book.
This year Katie Durkin and her fellow ELA teachers will add a Question of the Day – built from state assessment stems – to their whole-class novel unit. As 7th graders discuss best answers they’ll learn to think collaboratively AND prep for mandated tests. See how it works!
Using formative assessment effectively is key to becoming a reflective practitioner who can adjust literacy instruction to meet students’ needs and interests, write Lynne Dorfman and Brenda Krupp, who share their ideas for “breathing life into reading and writing lessons.”
Pull-Out Models / The Unstoppable ML Teacher
by Tan Huynh · Published 01/17/2022 · Last modified 01/24/2022
Co-teaching is the preferred way to serve multilinguals, but it’s not the only way to collaborate with colleagues. Language specialist Tan Huynh shows how we can make pull-out services more impactful with co-planning that emphasizes both grade-level content and language skills.
Short-term projects with specific techniques and ample examples fill Shelley Harwayne’s book, Above and Beyond the Writing Workshop. Helene Alalouf recommends the book’s authentic and interesting writing assignments complete with scaffolds and templates.
A former English teacher, Megan Kelly is eager to discover how she can incorporate the learning power of storytelling into history units. As a first step she created a transmedia storytelling experience that had summer camp students exploring where ‘history’ comes from.
Middle grades teacher Mona Iehl wants students to be able to “see themselves in math” and be represented in the work they do together. Learn how she uses the images and words of Black Mathematicians to empower and inspire her classes to welcome and master math challenges.
Close Reading the Media / New Vocabulary
by Frank Baker · Published 01/09/2022 · Last modified 01/10/2022
Metaverse? Prebunking? Zombie claims? The rapid evolution of digital technology and methods of persuasion has unleashed a flood of words and phrases that need to be in students’ vocabularies. Media literacy expert Frank Baker offers examples from across current culture.
Bouncing off a family session of Scattergories gone wrong, Curtis Chandler considers how to tap into multilingual learners’ interest in games and competition – including challenging tasks – by offering opportunities to play with and practice new skills in collaborative settings.
