"Louisiana Believes" embraces the principle that all children can achieve at high levels, as evidenced in Louisiana's recent adoption of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). "Louisiana Believes" also promotes the idea that Louisiana's educators should be empowered to make decisions to support the success of their students.…

This article provides the syllabus for the course "WRA 125--Writing: The Ethnic and Racial Experience: An Afrocentric Approach." This course will examine writing the American, ethnic and racial experience, using an Afrocentric framework to explore the field of Composition Studies. Students will be introduced to Ebonics/African American Language…

Where would we be without conversation? Throughout history, conversations have allowed us to see different perspectives, build ideas, and solve problems. Conversations, particularly those referred to in this book as academic conversations, push students to think and learn in lasting ways. Academic conversations are back-and-forth dialogues in…

If you're tired of repeating yourself to students who aren't listening, try a little less talk and a lot more action. The authors follow the best-selling "Teaching the Male Brain and Teaching the Female Brain" with this ready-to-use collection of mathematics, language arts, science, and classroom management strategies. Designed for active,…

This article details the many benefits of educators' use of digital camera technology and provides an activity in which students practice taking portrait shots of classmates, manipulate the resulting images, and add language arts practice by interviewing their subjects to produce a photo-illustrated Word document. This activity gives…

Understanding ambiguous words, phrases, and sentences is an important part of reading well, communicating skillfully, and enjoying humor based on word play. With this seven-unit activity book--filled with creative, ready-to-use activities based on jokes and puns--students will learn how to decipher the language ambiguities they encounter inside…

An innovative, practical guide for middle and high school teachers, this book is packed with specific ways that technology can help serve the goals of effective writing instruction. It provides ready-to-implement strategies for teaching students to compose and edit written work electronically; conduct Internet inquiry; create blogs, websites, and…

"Teaching Middle School Language Arts" is the first book on teaching middle school language arts for multiple intelligences and related twenty-first-century literacies in technologically and ethnically diverse communities. More than 670,000 middle school teachers (grades six through eight) are responsible for educating nearly 13 million students…

This book demonstrates how formative assessments, unlike standardized tests, provide the kind of communication between teachers and students that help teachers make instructional decisions to improve student performance. Included are fully developed examples of standards-based formative assessments in reading comprehension, writing, notetaking,…

The newly updated "Content-Based Curriculum for High-Ability Learners" provides a solid introduction to curriculum development in gifted and talented education. Written by experts in the field of gifted education, this text uses cutting-edge design techniques and aligns the core content with national and state standards. In addition to a revision…

This book shows teachers how to bring students' Do-It-Yourself media practices into the classroom (Grades 6-12). In one accessible resource, the authors explain DIY media, identify their appealing features for content area instruction, and describe the literacy skills and strategies they promote. Chapters address: Adolescents' DIY Media as New…

Many K-6 teachers and students still think of mathematics as a totally separate subject from literacy. Yet incorporating math content into the language arts block helps students gain skills for reading many kinds of texts. Bringing reading, writing, and talking into the math classroom supports the development of conceptual knowledge and problem…

Explores the issue of integration of drama into language arts. Presents the major objections to this process and proposes ways to overcome them. Suggests a pragmatic resolution to the controversy. (MS)

This article presents four Idea-Sparkers that were submitted by Jason McKinney, a graduate student at Southern Mississippi University and a 1st-grade teacher at Pisgah Elementary in Hattiesburg, Mississippi. First is entitled, "Raceway in the Classroom." This activity can help increase children's fluency and ability to identify numerous…

This textbook provides the foundation for a course in English. This volume is the first in a series of five. It aims to teach children not only to use the English language correctly and effectively, and to enjoy it with constantly growing appreciation, but also to become independent and self-reliant in their efforts to reach the goal.