As the future arrives faster and faster one must ask continually, what do kids actually need from their formal education today and tomorrow? Continuous innovation of method and strategy must be integral to the practice of all teaching professionals. Equitable educators must take a look at the learners in front of them, when and where they stand,…

The Common State Standards require that students master increasingly complex informational text. But how can we enable students to meet this challenging goal? "We don't simply expect our students to hurtle themselves headlong into a piece of complex informational text alone," write Nancy Frey and Douglas Fisher. Instead, teachers…

In high school students get tied up in extracurricular activities and have little time for pleasure reading. It is true that with rigorous academic schedules they have little time for pleasure reading. Thus began a conversation with a sophomore English teacher at the author's high school. As they were discussing the plight of free reading he was…

Audiobooks are excellent tools to help students build literacy skills as well as improve listening, writing, and vocabulary competencies. In many shared or independent reading situations, audiobooks offer support to reluctant and struggling readers, special-needs students, and English-language learners. They are also embraced by voracious readers.…