I read an interesting blog post by Dan Brown, a teacher and author of The Great Expectations School: A Rookie Year in the New Blackboard Jungle. He is the also the author of an education blog called Get in the Fracas. Here is an excerpt: “I have a clutch of students who read for pleasure, yet [...]

This list from an article in the July 2009 ASCD Educational Leadership magazine includes books by age level that are good for teaching social responsibility. If anyone has used any of these or done any specific activities with their kids to encourage social responsibility, I’d love to hear about it! – Heather

Parents, we hope you take a moment to check out our free summer mini e-course, and send us some feedback! We’d love to hear your opinions! Happy Fourth of July everyone! – Heather

I just stumbled across a set of videos to support Language Arts Education from Discovery Education. Downside: they are not interactive. Upside: they are free, short, and interesting. – Heather

PBS has launched PBS Read – a site where kids, parents, caregivers can work together on reading! PBS already has some great reading and writing resources available for kids and adults, and it was great to see that they merged the two audiences with this website. In my mind it encourages families to take a [...]

I just finished reading a book by Judy Willis entitled Teaching the Brain to Read: Strategies for Improving Fluency, Vocabulary, and Comprehension. I highly recommend it for teachers and parents interested in how reading is learned and how we build meaning and gain comprehension. Find out more at ASCD.org.

Do you happen to have an auditory / musically inclined learner who is learning to read? (I do.) If so, try using books with a lot of rhyme, rhythm, and alliteration in them. Auditory learners are ‘tuned in’ (literally) to sounds and patterns in sound. Plugging into this strength in their learning style can enhance [...]

With today’s innundation of available information, parents and students must understand how to navigate their way through the ‘rough’ to get to the ‘diamonds’ AND to know the ‘diamonds’ when they see them. So how is literacy changing in the 21st century? It is no longer sufficient to learn to read and learn to write well. Now we [...]

There have been recent developments in the application of neuroscience to education. However, they have been less than comprehensive as far as reaching the front lines of teaching and learning. The Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development has many wonderful resources for educators (and parents who see education as one of their primary roles) on [...]

OK. So your child is past the ‘decoding’ phase of learning to read. He can sound out words and get through some books. What comes next? We’re creating a resource for parents of 2nd – 6th graders. The goal is to help them assist their children in the less obvious but important processes of reading comprehension – [...]