In this article, the author describes her experience in teaching, how she encouraged students not to see books as mere academic obstacles and thereby engaging them as literate learners in the process, and how she was intrigued by homework and how it plays into existing inequities in the classroom. The author also shares some tips on how to…

This article summarizes conclusions reached regarding the independent reading perspectives and practices of eight elementary teachers, acknowledging the significant role teacher understandings and practices play on the literacy learning process and specifically on classroom independent reading. The commonalities in beliefs and practices regarding…

In this article theoretical frameworks of genre theory, reading strategies and situated learning are used to show the complexity of the reading task for pupils in the English medium upper primary school in Singapore. An analysis of text genres from school textbooks of English, maths and science at primary three, shows how reading appropriately in…

This article proposes strategies and practices that create rich discursive spaces for learning science in French immersion contexts. These strategies and practices are drawn from a variety of scholarly sources; here we adapt them to reading in the French immersion science classroom. The strategies and practices are designed for use in a…

Reading is often thought of as a skill, something to be learned and practiced. But reading can also be considered a creative art, capturing the imagination of the reader in ways that result in creative thought and expression. School librarians have a unique opportunity not only to support classroom-based reading skill building but also to serve as…

Reading teachers, novice or experienced, face the hard task of having to teach students how to read by moving beyond the mere "surface level" of reading (finding meanings in the text) into a more critical perspective (assigning meaning to what is being read). Many teachers struggle in trying to reconcile these two perspectives as they…

When teachers and school librarians work together, student achievement increases. Librarians know this and have made sure their teachers and administrators know this as well. But it's a giant leap from knowing the value of collaboration and actually collaborating. The only way to convince teachers to take that step is to convince them that the…

As students make the transition from learning to read to reading to learn, they find themselves increasingly isolated (Fang 2008; Guthrie and Davis 2003). Gone are the picture books and read alouds of their elementary years; instead, they are faced with dense nonfiction texts and the direction to read and learn the facts. In addition, many science…

Many students with reading difficulties in grades 4 through 12 experience challenges in understanding and learning from text. Some of these learners have demonstrated reading challenges from the early grades and have not acquired successful reading skills. Others were adequate readers in the early grades when word reading was the focus and when…

Based on recent research in fluency instruction, the authors present a scenario in which a teacher focuses her fluency instruction on authentic fluency tasks based in performance. Beginning with establishing a student-friendly definition of fluency and culminating with student engagement in fun fluency activities, this article explores the…

Working with English language learners in mainstream ELA classrooms can provide rich rewards in terms of developing multiple perspectives, sharing diverse experiences, and developing understanding of different cultural practices. However, these students can also challenge mainstream teachers. Supporting ELLs throughout the reading process can…

Many students struggle to maintain the attention needed to comprehend while reading. One 4th-grade student and 5th-grade student, both with poor comprehension and attention-related disabilities, were taught to use a proven systematic reading comprehension strategy, TWA (Think Before Reading, Think While Reading, Think After Reading), when reading…

Storytelling can provide unique teachable moments. Mathematics content found in a good story can be seamlessly woven throughout a lesson. The technical vocabulary used in some stories occurs in a natural way, outside a textbook setting. A great story can also motivate students to actively engage in meaningful mathematics. With a wide range of…

There are three strategies for critically evaluating information on the Internet: (1) examining initial markers (superficial characteristics of a website that can help make an initial judgment); (2) corroborating information (looking to other trusted sources to verify information); and (3) determining author bias (analyzing the author's intent for…

The purpose of this article is to describe the changes in reading instruction that teachers made that contributed to students' growth in reading. Teachers made the transition from instruction that was primarily teacher-directed and focused on lower-level questions to instruction that supported students in their higher order talk and writing about…