Presents suggestions for bringing reading and writing to life in the classroom and helping students develop a lifelong love of both. Includes creating a refrigerator door for displaying student work, using digital notebooks, establishing a publishing center, holding lunch-bunch meetings, binding students' writing into class collections, reading…

Creative ways of teaching alphabetizing, spelling, identifying parts of speech, and using reference works are offered. (DF)

Mask-making with simple art materials can be used to reinforce elementary students' reading, writing, and interpersonal skills. The article describes a mask-making project that connected fourth graders with language, literature, and self-expression. (SM)

This poetry activity helps K-3 teachers increase students' enthusiasm for reading by highlighting personal interests. Students read a baseball poem, discuss the wording, examine how it conveys action, and look for key words. The next day, they read the poem again and write about favorite activities of their own. The baseball poem is attached. (SM)