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In teaching reading, don’t miss the forest for the trees

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Listen to the interview with Melanie Meehan and Maggie Roberts (transcript):
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Literacy has always been a hot topic in education, and the intensity surrounding it has really ramped up in the last few years. But in most of those conversations, we rarely bring up writing. There's no shortage of debate about phonics, fluency, and reading comprehension, but writing instruction is almost never mentioned, even though reading and writing are so deeply intertwined.

This glaring omission was something Melanie Meehan and Maggie Roberts wanted to address. Meehan is a former curriculum coordinator who recently opened her own in-person writing center. Roberts is a literacy consultant and former middle school teacher who spent nearly two decades supporting teachers in classrooms. Earlier this month, they published a new book together called Foundational Skills for Writing: A Brain-Based Guide to Strengthen Executive Functions, Language, and Other Cornerstones for Writers. In the book, they explore what the brain actually has to do when we ask kids to write, and what gets in the way.

The book breaks the larger task of writing into smaller skill categories, including transcription skills like handwriting, keyboarding, spelling, and large and small motor development, oral language - the speaking and listening skills that are a precursor to writing and include sentence construction, and executive functioning, which includes working memory, cognitive flexibility, and inhibitory control. To be a proficient writer, a person needs to develop and practice all of these skills, and in the book, Meehan and Roberts show teachers how to develop them in students.

On the podcast, they shared eight of the strategies from the book. Each strategy is from a collection they call "Minute Moves," short, flexible activities that take just a couple of minutes and can be dropped into transitions, used as warm-ups, or slipped in on the walk to lunch. They're designed to help students automatize the foundational skills that, when underdeveloped, eat up the cognitive energy they need for the real work of writing. You can listen to the interview in the player above, read the transcript, or browse the summary below.

Spelling Minute Moves

1. Word Family Brainstorm

This one comes from spelling researcher Rebecca Treiman, whom Meehan describes as someone who genuinely believes that words are cool. The idea is simple: take a word and start uncovering its relatives.

Take the often confused homophones two, to, and too. Instead of teaching all three together as a cluster, have students consider the connection between two (the number) and words like twin, twine, and twenty. Suddenly there's a pattern: the TW combination has a relationship with the concept of twoness.

Meehan gave another example from her own tutoring work. A student was struggling with the word decision, and she pointed out its connection to decide. That led to incision, concise, and a surprising one: scissors. All of them trace back to a Latin root meaning "to cut." Once you see that all those words belong to the same family, the spelling for decision makes more sense.

"The more that you can get kids curious and thinking words are cool," Meehan says, "the better."

2. Word Family Stretch

This one is closely related but has its own distinctive shape. Give students a root like struct, meaning "to build." Set a timer for 60 to 90 seconds, and challenge them to brainstorm as many related words as they can: structure, destruction, construct, structural, instruct, instruction ...

The key move that comes after the brainstorm is the debrief: What stayed the same? What changed? How did the meaning shift when you added a prefix or suffix? Through these discussions, students start to internalize that word parts carry meaning, and that patterns show up across academic vocabulary.

Roberts noted that some roots are "bound" (like struct, which can't stand alone) while others are "free" (like form, which works on its own and also becomes reform, transform, inform, deform). Helping students understand that distinction deepens their feel for how words work.

3. Prefix Swap

This one builds directly on the previous two, and Meehan is quick to point out that all three spelling minute moves are essentially doing the same underlying work: building neurological pathways, one quick activity at a time.

The focus here is specifically on prefixes and what happens when you swap them out. Give students a base word and have them generate as many variations as they can by changing the prefix: form becomes reform, transform, inform, deform. The meaning shifts each time, and that's the discovery students are after.

This turns out to be especially powerful for multilingual learners. Meehan mentioned working with students who immediately understood benevolent and malevolent because they recognized bene and mal from their other languages.

Taken together, Meehan observes, these three activities "are really building the neurological pathways" that helps students lock words in rather than constantly struggling to retrieve them.

Sentence Construction Minute Moves

4. Sentence Scramble

Take a sentence and break it into its component words or phrases, written on index cards (one word per card). Scramble them, then ask students to put the sentence back together.

Using physical cards allows students to move them around and experiment. Once students have settled on a sentence, ask them questions about their process, like How did you figure out the order? What clues did you use? Which words had to stay together, and why?

You can raise the stakes by removing punctuation, adding a distractor word that doesn't belong, or asking students to extend the sentence with words and phrases of their own. The goal, Roberts says, is for students to build "an internalized understanding of sentence patterns and sentence construction" that they can carry into their own writing.

5. Sentence Expander

Start with a kernel sentence; something like The cat purrs. Then build on it together by asking students a series of questions: Which cat? What color? Where? When? Why?

Meehan's favorite way to frame this is to use the terms "doer" and "doing" rather than subject and predicate, which she finds too abstract for most kids. Once they can reliably identify who's doing what in a sentence, they can begin to understand why it's so hard to follow a sentence when those two elements get separated by more detail.

Once the sentence is fully expanded ( The orange cat is sleeping on the couch in the afternoon because he is tired), experiment with rearranging the words to make new variations. Giving students a chance to play with that helps them learn to develop richer, more complex sentences.

6. Sentence Combining

"Sentence combining is a really high-impact, quick way for kids to graduate from writing a series of simple sentences to ones that are more syntactically complex, interesting, and precise," Roberts says.

With this activity, you give students two short, bare-bones sentences and ask them to combine them into one. For example, My cat is orange. and My cat is big. becomes My big orange cat... You can scaffold this for beginners by underlining the word to be "harvested" from one sentence and inserted into the other. As students grow more confident, they can move to combining three sentences and adding different conjunctions ( because, and, but...) to change the meaning.

When students get practice like this, they then naturally transfer it to their own writing, merging short, choppy sentences into more sophisticated ones.

Executive Functioning Minute Moves

7. What's Another Way?

One of the executive functions the book places at the center of the writing process is cognitive flexibility, the ability to shift approaches, consider alternatives, and revise your thinking. This minute move practices it directly at the sentence level.

Give students a sentence and ask them to rewrite it a different way. What if you started with the dependent clause instead of the independent one? What if you replaced the noun with a pronoun? What if you made it shorter?

Meehan points out that writing is not only about learning to write longer, more complex sentences. Sometimes the most powerful move is to write a very short one. "The whole art and the craft of writing is varying them and having that skill set to be able to intentionally go from long and complex sentences when they're impactful to short sentences when they're impactful and have the wherewithal to vary that."

She adds that giving students the vocabulary to describe this skill has a big impact. "When you start naming that as cognitive flexibility for kids," she says, "that's exciting to them." There's something genuinely empowering about being told you're practicing a sophisticated cognitive skill - especially for students who have struggled to see themselves as capable writers.

8. New Angle

This one also targets cognitive flexibility, but zooms out from the sentence to the story level. Ask students to retell a familiar scene from a book they're reading, a shared class text, or a short film, from a different character's perspective.

Roberts illustrated it with a real memory: the cafeteria food fight she witnessed as a ninth grader looks very different when you retell it through the eyes of the teacher who had applesauce poured in her hair. Taking on a different perspective requires holding multiple viewpoints in mind simultaneously, and making real choices about voice, detail, and interpretation.

Meehan uses short videos for this with the students she tutors. One of her favorites is Snack Attack, a three-minute Pixar short that tells the same event from two very different points of view. In one session, she and a student each wrote one character's perspective in scenes, then they swapped documents and continued writing from the other character's point of view. The student got competitive about keeping up with Meehan's pace, which was an unintended bonus. But more than that, he was genuinely practicing something that matters far beyond the writing classroom: the ability to understand how other people think.

"It's not just about writing and it's not just about watching this show," Meehan said, "but it's also about democracy and thinking about how other people think and what their perspectives are."

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8 Ways to Squeeze Writing Instruction Into a Few Minutes

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These short, flexible activities take just a few minutes and help students automate the foundational skills they need for the complex work of writing.

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California's approach to literacy instruction is grounded in the science of reading, learning, and development, including decades of research applicable to our diverse and multilingual learners. As a dynamic state with extraordinary global influence and unsurpassed cultural and linguistic resources, California is committed to ensuring that students are reading by third grade and are fully literate when they graduate from high school. Reading by Third Grade and Beyond is a key part of State Superintendent Tony Thurmond's Transforming School Initiatives.
Explore below to learn more about California's literacy policy, initiatives, and resources that include evidence-based practices aimed at achieving reading by third grade and beyond.
Announcements

Re-Centering California's English Language Arts/English Language Development Framework Webinar Series

Join the California Department of Education (CDE) for an exciting nine-part webinar series designed to re-center the English Language Arts/English Language Development Framework for California Public Schools as the primary guidance for teaching California students from transitional kindergarten through grade twelve to read, write, speak, listen, and use language. Through presentations and interactions with the Framework, the series will also highlight the promotion of multilingualism and biliteracy, culturally and linguistically affirming and sustaining instruction, and developmentally appropriate instruction for early learners.

California Literacy and Policy Guidance

Standards

Preschool and Transitional Kindergarten (TK) Learning Foundations
The California Preschool/Transitional Kindergarten Learning Foundations (PTKLF) outline the key knowledge and skills that most children ages three to five and a half years old can achieve when provided with the kinds of interactions, instruction, and environments that research has shown to promote early learning and development. They provide preschool/TK educators, parents, and the public with a clear understanding of the wide range of knowledge and skills that children typically attain when given the benefits of a high-quality preschool program, whether it be in center-based, home-based, or TK settings. The new PTKLF will be released in the summer of 2024.

Guidance

English Language Arts (ELA)/English Language Development (ELD) Framework
Approved by the State Board of Education (SBE) in 2014, the ELA/ELD Framework provides a blueprint for the implementation of two sets of interrelated standards: the California Common Core State Standards: ELA/Literacy in History/Social Studies, Science, and Technical Subjects and the California ELD Standards. The debate about how to teach literacy has gained much attention in the nation and the state in recent years. The ELA/ELD Framework, however, has long advocated for a comprehensive and integrated model of literacy that offers evidence-based literacy instruction in the classroom, including explicit instruction in phonics, phonemic awareness, and other decoding skills, as well as the development of vocabulary, comprehension, writing, speaking, and listening skills.

California Literacy Roadmap
The California Department of Education, in consultation with the SBE, is currently developing the California Literacy Roadmap per Section 117 of the Education Omnibus Budget Trailer Bill 114. The Literacy Roadmap will help educators apply the ELA/ELD Framework to classroom instruction, navigate the resources and professional development opportunities available to implement effective literacy instruction, and improve literacy outcomes for all pupils with a focus on equity.

California English Learner Roadmap
California English Learner policy including a focus on literacy and biliteracy for English learners, as well as the importance of home language. It is a guide to assist local educational agencies to implement California's 21st century college-and-career-ready standards, curriculum, instruction programs, and assessments.

Legislation

Screening for Risk of Reading Difficulties
The Screening for Risk of Reading Difficulties allows for early identification and intervention of reading difficulties, including dyslexia, for students in kindergarten to grade two. Education Code 53008 requires all California local education agencies (LEAs) to adopt a screening instrument by June 30, 2025, and implement screening beginning no later than the 2025-2026 school year. The LEAs select their screening instrument from the list approved by the Reading Difficulties Risk Screener Selection Panel (RDRSSP) appointed by the SBE. Learn more about the RDRSSP.

Initiatives

Current Grant Work

Comprehensive Literacy State Development Grant (2019-2024)

Educator Workforce Investment Grant (EWIG): Effective Language Acquisition Programs (2023-2025)

California Dyslexia Initiative (2019-2024)

Early Literacy Support Block Grant (2020-2024)

Reading Instruction and Intervention Grant (2021-2026)

Literacy Coaches and Reading Specialists Program and Literacy Coaches and Reading Specialists Educator Training Grant (2022-2027 and 2023-2028)

Summary: The 2022-2027 program provides $250 million to LEAs to develop school literacy programs, employ and train literacy coaches and reading and literacy specialists, and develop and implement interventions for students in need of targeted literacy support. $225 million funds eligible LEAs, and $25 million funds the Sacramento COE through the Literacy Coaches and Reading Specialists Educator Training Grant to support those LEAs and to develop and provide professional learning for educators to become literacy coaches and reading and literacy specialists. The 2023-2028 program provides an additional $250 million to LEAs for the same purposes. $248 million will fund eligible LEAs, and $2 million will be allocated to the Sacramento COE.

Literacy Campaign Support: Provides funding to elementary school sites to increase the number of literacy coaches and specialists and to develop and implement school literacy programs.

Prior Grant Work

EWIG: EL Roadmap Policy Implementation (2019-2023)

EWIG: Special Education (2019-2022)

Summary: This $5 million state grant funds the California Coalition for Inclusive Literacy to build the capacity of California local educational agencies to create, design, and deliver professional learning opportunities for teachers and paraprofessionals in literacy development and Universal Design for Learning to provide access for students with disabilities to their grade-level content.

Literacy Campaign Support: Provides training to teachers in Universal Design for Learning, which supports all students, including those struggling to read.

Webinars

English Language Arts (ELA)/English Language Development (ELD) Framework Webinar Series Playlist

This 9-part series is designed for all school, district, county, state, and higher education educators who want to learn more about California's recommended literacy policies and practices, as well as why the English Language Arts/English Language Development (ELA/ELD) Framework is as relevant today as it was in 2014. The series will explore how it is organized, what it offers, how it can be used, and how it supports Superintendent Thurmond's Literacy Campaign of "Reading by Third Grade and Beyond."

Register via Zoom to attend an upcoming webinar .

Session 1: Overview Comprehensive Literacy

Session 2: Foundational Skills

Session 3: English Language Development

Session 4: Language Development

Session 5: Meaning Making

Session 6: Effective Expression
Access the complete webinar series playlist
Resources

Literacy Newsletter

A primary objective of California's federally funded Comprehensive Literacy State Development (CLSD) grant program is to bring coherence to California's system of literacy supports to improve student outcomes, birth through grade twelve. This newsletter supports this objective by providing information on literacy-focused activities happening within the California Department of Education (CDE), the Statewide System of Support, and at local educational agencies (LEAs) to help achieve the goal of aligning state and local literacy initiatives.

Subscribe to this newsletter by sending a blank email to join-cde-literacy@mlist.cde.ca.gov. If you have a literacy-focused event or resource that you would like to see highlighted in this newsletter, reach out to the CLSD team at CLSDP@cde.ca.gov.

Related Documents

CDE Biliteracy Pathway Recognition
The Biliteracy Pathway Recognitions may be awarded to preschool through grade eight students on the path to the State Seal of Biliteracy. You will find optional criteria and guidance for recognition.

CDE State Seal of Biliteracy
The State Seal of Biliteracy is a recognition awarded to graduating high school students who have achieved a high level of proficiency in one or more languages in addition to English. The requirements for earning the State Seal of Biliteracy are established in California Education Code Section 51461.

Digital Learning Integration and Standards Guidance
Guidance to support schools to effectively implement technology to support learning and to address critical areas of instructional focus.

Executive Summary (PDF)
This executive summary provides highlights from the framework and directs readers to resources in the document. It begins with a broad overview of the standards and California's vision for their implementation, features important grade-level guidance, and highlights selected topics crucial for effective implementation.

Universal Prekindergarten (UPK) Curriculum Checklist
Details elements to consider when choosing and implementing a curriculum for Transitional Kindergarten (TK) and preschool programs serving majority four-year-old children. Specific sections are devoted to language and literacy instruction including development of key skills, importance of book read-alouds, literacy small-group instruction, and literacy centers.

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Guidance and resources for teachers and families in Preschool through twelfth (P-12) grade schools regarding evidence-based literacy instruction.

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Accelerate Learning by Prioritizing Outcomes and Providing Just-in-Time Support- AVID Open Access

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Explore a three-step process that includes identifying priority grade-level standards, determining gaps in prerequisite learning, and providing just-in-time support for unlearned prerequisite skills.

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Whether you're a designer wanting to show off work or have a request to create one for a client, a lookbook can be an effective way to showcase a variety of elements in a single design.

A lookbook is a portfolio of sorts and has wide application in a number of fields, including website design, graphic design, and development.

Here's a guide to what a lookbook is, what to include in one when you start designing it, and some examples that are sure to help you find a little lookbook inspiration.

Get unlimited downloads of 2 million+ design resources, themes, templates, photos, graphics and more. Envato Elements starts at $16 per month, and is the best creative subscription we've ever seen.
Explore Digital Assets
What is a Lookbook?

A lookbook is a design collection that started in fashion but has applications for designers and photographers as well. A lookbook is essentially a portfolio, that's formatted and updated in a diary-style with frequent changes and updates.

For designers, a lookbook can be a great way to show off projects as they evolve from start to finish or blog a day in the life of a designer.

For photographers, a lookbook can showcase a range of styles or help you stretch your creative muscles.

Generally, a lookbook is a collection of design change over time. Having a solid platform for this collection, whether printed or digitally, can help showcase your work to others and even potential clients.

Lookbooks can be printed or PDF books, presentation decks or slides, or websites. The format really depends on your needs and audience. Some may opt for a lookbook in multiple formats.

5 Things a Lookbooks Should Include

When it comes to building a lookbook, include many of the same key elements you would in a traditional portfolio. Every lookbook should include the following elements:

1. High quality images (or video)

2. Descriptions of projects and what makes them special; for projects that show an evolution over time, include dates or a brief history

3. Bio of the person who the lookbook showcases

4. Clear examples and explanations of what the lookbook is for

5. Contact information and if you are available for work

Key Design Elements

The design and style of a lookbook is a lot like a traditional portfolio. Much of the design of the project is related to elements that the lookbook features and the personal style of the owner.

But there are a few common design themes to consider when it comes to lookbooks. Primarily, you want to create an aesthetic that gives room to the content. Design elements are not the primary visual here, individual content elements are. Therefore, a lookbook design probably has a simple feel so that projects are better featured.

A simple feel and style can also help create a consistent lookbook design even when different projects have varying and unique designs. It's a lot easier to mix a retro-styled project against a clean and modern style if the overall framework of the design doesn't get in the way.

Think of it this way: You don't want the lookbook design to compete with the projects featured therein.

Key design elements for lookbooks include:

White space

Simple typography, often sans serif

Design accents and elements in a limited color palette

Consistent design hierarchy for images and text elements

One project per page/screen/slide

10 Stunning Examples

Ready to get started with a lookbook project? Here are 10 examples of lookbook designs - in print, presentation, and online - that you can use. (Every one is a design template, courtesy of Envato Elements.) https://elements.envato.com/all-items/lookbook

1. Lookbook

Lookbook is what comes to mind when you think of design in this category. The clean booklet design features plenty of room for large elements with a simple design outline.

2. Mono Lookbook Powerpoint Template

Mono Lookbook Powerpoint Template is made to create a lookbook in a presentation format. The slides use a sleek monochrome color palette to give more room to your work. It can be used with black and white images (as featured), but works equally well with full color.

3. Olive Fashion Ecommerce Email Newsletter

Olive Fashion Ecommerce Email Newsletter provides one more avenue to showcase a lookbook - via email. While this design is a little busier than you might expect, bright color choices can work well against photography and serve as a disruptive element in inboxes. This can be just the thing that helps your design get seen.

4. Marzia Lookbook

Marzia Lookbook is a minimal printed lookbook style that also makes a beautiful PDF. The style is somewhat trendy with a wider font palette and text elements that overlap images.

5. Antive

Antive is a WordPress theme that mixes the great design of a simple lookbook with ecommerce. (A popular option for fashion or photographers who want to sell images.) Streamlined ecommerce themes are a good place to go for lookbook inspiration because they often showcase projects (products) in an easy to see and simplified manner.

6. Graffiti Pop Art Lookbook Magazine

Graffiti Pop Art Lookbook Magazine has a bold look that's fun and interesting. The magazine style works for printed lookbooks or PDFs. The contrast between colored pages, images, and white pages with descriptive text here keep visual impact high page after page.

7. Rosely

Rosely is a presentation template made for lookbooks. The use of whitespace here is fantastic and provides ample showcase space for images with limited text.

8. Amely

Amely is a clean web theme (Magento) with plenty of whitespace and slides that make it easy to show the evolution of projects. N=The single line navigation style provides a nice space to group projects by type or timeline for your digital lookbook design.

9. Persona

Persona is a lookbook presentation design with plenty of room for heavy descriptions. This design is heavier with color and typography treatments and might be best suited for a simple lookbook that doesn't include a large number of elements or a single-project portfolio evolution piece.

10. Lookbook

Lookbook is for printed or PDF books. The design is super modern with a two-hue color palette that mixes white space that's actually white with white space in color blocks. The design has a creative flair that can help projects stand out, and can be particularly useful for designer lookbooks.

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What Is a Lookbook? (+ 10 Stunning Examples)

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Whether you're a designer wanting to show off work or have a request to create one for a client, a lookbook can be an effective way to showcase a variety of elements in a single design. A lookbook is a portfolio of sorts and has wide application in a number of fields, including websi...

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Learning Network: The 10 most commented-on writing prompts of 2025

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Check for Understanding Resources - DistillED

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Check for Understanding Resources - DistillED

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Checking for Understanding | ⚗️DistillED

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⚗️ The 5-minute email that makes evidence-informed teaching crystal clear

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Log in to explore The Achievery, a digital platform designed by experts for educators, parents, and families to engage K-12 students.

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Ereading Worksheets provides teachers, parents, and motivated students with high-quality reading worksheets, activities, and resources aligned with Common Core State Standards. This website uses a skill focused approach where each activity targets a specific skill set, but you can also browse the reading worksheets by grade level.

The resources on this website cover a broad range of reading, writing, and language arts skills. And this site has a growing collection of online reading activities. Everything on here is free for home and classroom use. I am committed to expanding and improving the content on this site and making it easy to access for learners around the world. Subscribe now to receive emails about new content and big updates to this site.

Some Useful Pages

Reading Resources

Figurative Language Resources

Language Arts Resources

Writing Resources

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Send comments, questions, corrections, or feedback to mortonteaches@gmail.com or post in the comments below. I'm just one person, but I try my best to reply to vistors, meet requests, and offer help when I can. Thanks for visiting!

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Search here.

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Click here for the best FREE reading worksheets on the internet. These worksheets are skill focused, great for differentiated instruction.

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ReadTheory | Reading Comprehension Exercises

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Reading comprehension exercises — online, free, & adaptive. Fits K-12, ESL and adult students. Easily track progress for the entire class.

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Search Results for "math" - Project GLAD®

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​The Orange County Department of Education (OCDE) is the official National Training Center (NTC) for the Project GLAD ® (Guided Language Acquisition Design) model. As a government non-profit organization, the NTC creates positive social impact through high-quality, rigorous, research-based professional learning.

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10 Writing Prompts for Talking and Writing about Halloween

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10 Writing Prompts for Talking and Writing about Halloween

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175 Writing Prompts to Inspire Discussion and Reflection

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175 Writing Prompts to Inspire Discussion and Reflection

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Developed by the Right Question Institute, the Question Formulation Technique, or QFT, is a structured method for generating and improving questions. It distills sophisticated forms of divergent, convergent, and metacognitive thinking into a deceptively simple, accessible, and reproducible technique.

The QFT builds the skill of asking questions, an essential - yet often overlooked - lifelong learning skill that allows people to think critically, feel greater power and self-efficacy, and become more confident and ready to participate in civic life.

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Building the Bones to Effective Literacy Instruction Guide to Professional Learning

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Principles of Instruction: Strategies that All Teachers Should Know

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Assessment

This message is sponsored by WeWillWrite

Have you ever seen a line out the door for a restaurant - or a group of people crowded around someone (or something)?

It makes you wonder ... what is going on? What are they all talking about?

I had a few moments like this about WeWillWrite.

I noticed a buzz on social media about teachers playing this social writing game with their students. They kept saying that students begged for it and didn't want to leave class because they were enjoying it.

I had a friend introduce me to WeWillWrite founder Daniel Senn and got to see it firsthand ... and I got a glimpse of what they were all excited about.

And at the FETC Conference, I led an expo hall tour and stopped at the WeWillWrite booth. When we explained what it's all about, the raised eyebrows and curiosity were evident.

So what made WeWillWrite so different?

In a nutshell? It made students WANT to write. They weren't just begrudgingly writing - you know, because the teacher forced them to or incentivized it with candy for participation.

No, they were getting tons of repetitions with low-stakes writing - and they wanted to do it. Over and over and over again.

I've seen a LOT in more than a decade writing about edtech and using its products.

I haven't seen anything quite like WeWillWrite.

How does WeWillWrite work?

I'd like to walk you through an example WeWillWrite challenge - a social writing game, if you will - so you can get a clear picture. I'll share what I like and appreciate under each.

Step 1: Create an account - Sign up for WeWillWrite with just an email and password. Once logged in, educators are taken to a landing page where they can begin setting up writing challenges for their students.

❤️ What Matt loves: The library of pre-made writing challenges is a HUGE value. You can find something great that's ready to use - or find some inspiration for making your own activity based on something you see in the library.

Why I think teachers (and students!) are buzzing about WeWillWrite

Like I said earlier. I saw it on social media. In those people's reactions at FETC. Even in my own mind. There's a buzz.

For me, if students are excited about something that promotes serious learning, then it's easy for ME to get excited about it.

Why are students and teachers buzzing about WeWillWrite?

Wait ... are these writing activities really all that fun?!?!

Judge for yourself! Here are a few example prompts that I love - that really resonate with students:

How to THRIVE with WeWillWrite from Day 1

Here are some practical tips I picked up along the way:

Start with short, fun prompts: Begin with light-hearted, fun prompts to get students excited. For example, ask students to write a persuasive pitch to sell a pencil or create a fictional story from the perspective of a toothbrush. These prompts are simple but effective in getting students engaged. There are also Jumpstart Writing prompts available to get those creative juices flowing.

Incorporate writing across subjects: WeWillWrite isn't limited to creative writing. Use it for expository writing, persuasive essays, or even scientific reports. For example, after a science experiment, have students write a claim, evidence, and reasoning (CER) statement to explain their findings. You can also use it to reinforce key themes in literature by prompting students to find supporting quotes.

About WeWillWrite pricing plans

I know you're going to want to know about pricing! Earlier, I told you that the free version was an actually good, actually usable free version, right?

Here are the details on the pricing plans ...

So with the free plan, you can show up to the WeWillWrite platform any time, assign it to all of your students, and play a social writing game (with the features and content that are available to you at the time).

Turn writing into a social game with WeWillWrite

Honestly, seeing students engaged and excited about writing was a revelation.

It wasn't about the grade; it was about the process, the creativity, and the collaboration. It was about ditching the worksheet and embracing dynamic learning.

If you're looking for a way to reignite a passion for writing with your students, I highly recommend giving it a try.

Give WeWillWrite a try in your classroom and watch your students develop into confident, creative writers who are eager to share their ideas. Let's get them writing!

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Fun, low-stakes, gamified student writing with WeWillWrite

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This message is sponsored by WeWillWriteHave you ever seen a line out the door for a restaurant - or a group of people crowded around someone (or

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AJ Juliani Podcast Notes - Meaningful and Relevant Engaged Learning

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AJ Juliani Podcast Notes - Meaningful and Relevant Engaged Learning

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AJ Juliani podcast Truth For Teachers - Meaningful and relevant_ engaging learners in the age of distraction

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If we want to empower students to own the assessment process, we need to incorporate meaningful self-assessment and peer assessment into our lessons. However, students still need guidance from their teachers. This is why I

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Students submit their own writing for feedback and suggestions.

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AI to help teachers give instant, personalized feedback on written assignments. Engaged practice for students, time savings and insights for teachers. Use built-in assignments or add your own. Supported subjects include Social Studies, English, Science, and World Languages.

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Teaching AI like it is just a set of tools is a mistake. It's not just outdated - it's risky and potentially dangerous.
Institutions are rushing to teach learners how to use generative AI tools as if those tools themselves are the point of education. Spoiler alert: they are not. These tools will be obsolete in a year or change so quickly they will be unrecognizable, replaced by something faster, more powerful, and probably named after a Greek letter or forgotten mythological hero. Yet here we are, tying our teaching to tools destined for obsolescence instead of focusing on the skills that matter - curiosity, adaptability, and ethical awareness. Ah, education, we will never learn.

If we keep fixating on tools, we're not just failing learners; we're setting them up for irrelevance. AI education isn't about training button-pushers, passive operators, or cog-turners even if it's under the guise of operational efficiency. It's about preparing thinkers and creators to thrive in a world defined by constant change. They need to learn how to adapt, how to question, and how to innovate in the face of ambiguity.

Some questions I have been pondering this week include: What happens when institutions churn out AI "button-pushers" without critical thinking skills? Who takes responsibility when tools built by well-intentioned yet uncritical learners amplify bias and harm? Are we preparing learners to shape the future of AI - or to be shaped by it? What are we risking by prioritizing convenience and conformity over curiosity and critical thinking?

This post is a challenge to educators, departmental leaders, and decision-makers on how we approach teaching and learning around AI. It's time we stop clinging to traditional frameworks. It's time to dig deeper, teaching the processes and mindsets that will help learners lead, not just survive, in the ever-changing age of AI.

The truth is, we're drowning in AI literacy frameworks. I built my first one two years ago, a newbie to this space. Every organization and academic institution seems to have its own version - a neatly packaged list of competencies, often built on Bloom's Taxonomy, marching predictably from "understand" to "create." Yet, in practice, these frameworks feel like they're designed for an era where innovation moved at the speed of committee meetings, not generative models cranking out paradigm shifts weekly.

The problem isn't the lack or even the abundance of frameworks; it's that many of them start from a traditional place for a new, non-traditional setting. When faced with the reality of education changing, the frameworks tend toward a focus on static knowledge or mechanical skill-building, assuming that what students, staff, or faculty learn today will still be relevant tomorrow. This is not just short-sighted - it's risky in a world where tools update faster than your favorite app can push a patch.

So where do you start? I would suggest we need to invert the traditional approaches, starting not with passive understanding but with active creation. Let learners experiment, fail, refine, and innovate. Anchor learning not in mastery of the ephemeral but in cultivating skills that endure: critical inquiry, ethical reflection, and adaptability. This mindset-first approach doesn't just prepare students, staff, faculty, any learner to use AI; it equips them to question it, reshape it, and lead in a world transformed by it.

If your AI curriculum centers only on today's tools, you are teaching learners to survive the present, not lead the future. A mindset-driven approach prepares them to question, adapt, and innovate as AI reshapes every field it touches. Learners must think critically, act ethically, and stay curious. No amount of understanding a specific tool interface will drive sustainable change. While mindset and process are essential, some educators might argue that learners also need practical, tool-specific training to function effectively in the immediate workforce. Employers may expect graduates to have hands-on proficiency with current tools. I agree, I just do not think it is the starting or the ending point.

Technical skills are important, but they are not enough on their own. Teaching the underlying principles of tools, of collaboration, of reflective practice, ensures that learners can adapt quickly to new technologies as they emerge. Mindset and process complement technical skills, equipping learners to apply their knowledge flexibly, evaluate outputs critically, and refine solutions effectively. Together, these approaches prepare learners to meet both immediate workforce demands and long-term challenges in a rapidly evolving AI landscape.

So, here are some considerations for a mindset versus toolset approach:

Ethics and Responsibility Are Non-Negotiables

AI is never neutral. It shapes outputs and lives, drives decisions, and magnifies power. That makes ethical foresight a requirement, not a footnote. Learners need to see past the slick interfaces and ask the hard questions: Who benefits? Who's excluded? What biases lurk in the data? And most critically, what will they do when they uncover an uncomfortable truth or discovery?

Take facial recognition, for example - tools trained on skewed datasets disproportionately fail to recognize darker-skinned faces, leading to harmful, real-world consequences. Learners must not only grapple with these failures but take responsibility for designing systems that challenge, rather than reinforce, inequity. Teaching ethical foresight prepares technologists, humanists, and creatives to address challenges directly, shaping AI with accountability and purpose.

Adaptability Over Dependency

Clinging to specific tools is like trying to navigate rough seas with only one oar. You are limited, stuck reacting to the waves instead of steering through them. A mindset-first approach teaches learners to evaluate the whole vessel: the sails, the rudder, and even the currents themselves. It gives them the ability to adapt, pivot, and find new ways forward when tools change, as they always will. Rather than seeing change as a setback, they use it to explore fresh strategies, rethink their approach, and keep moving ahead.

Consider how learners engage with Large Language Models. Those who rely on memorized prompt tricks risk falling behind as newer versions emerge or entirely different systems take their place. These systems are increasingly complex and will continue to evolve in their reasoning structures. In contrast, learners trained in process - those who know how to evaluate outputs, question data sources, and iterate - are not shaken by change. They embrace it, using each evolution as an opportunity to test, refine, and rethink how they approach challenges.

Curiosity as a Driver

AI education thrives on curiosity. Learners need the freedom to tinker, test, fail, and try again. In many cases, it has even leveled the roles of instructor and student, transforming learning into a process of co-investigation. Instead of teaching learners to color inside the lines, we should hand them the tools and ask, "What will you create? What can we create together? This is what I learned in this process, how about you?" The focus shifts from achieving perfect results to exploring possibilities, uncovering patterns, and learning through iteration.

Curiosity is more than play. It is the engine for asking hard questions: Why did the model behave this way? What shaped this output? How can it be pushed further? When learners adopt a mindset of questioning everything, they move from passive engagement to active innovation. Recently in my life, someone scoffed at the idea of teaching curiosity and creative thinking. They dismissed play as a frivolous distraction, irrelevant to "serious" learning. Their reaction wasn't surprising - it reflected an educational system that too often crushes curiosity instead of cultivating it.

But AI demands curiosity. Without it, we risk producing learners who can follow instructions but fail to question the systems they use. Curiosity isn't a luxury. It's a necessity.

A Case for Process Over Product

Process builds expertise that endures, focusing on critical skills that integrate knowledge and drive iterative creation. Reflection, iteration, and adaptation form the foundation of a process-driven approach. Learners refine their understanding with each cycle, integrating what they discover into new solutions and creative possibilities.

Generative AI thrives on this iterative cycle, where creating, testing, questioning, and refining for understanding are essential. Learning AI should mirror this approach, emphasizing the adaptability to troubleshoot unexpected outcomes, evaluate results critically, and apply knowledge in innovative ways. By engaging deeply in the process, learners build habits that last: they ask better questions, uncover patterns, and connect ideas across contexts. These habits not only prepare them for changing tools but also give them the confidence to innovate, adapt, and lead in any environment.
And now, I am fully prepared for the educational theorists to come for me with pitchforks.
Traditional Bloom's Taxonomy is a climb - learners start at the bottom, remembering and understanding concepts, before advancing to applying, analyzing, evaluating, and eventually creating. This made sense in a world where knowledge was considered more static or even a smidge more linear, but AI disrupts this model.

The gateway of learning in the age of AI is creation.

Starting with creation encourages learners to experiment, build, and test real-world ideas, sparking curiosity and uncovering the questions that drive deeper understanding. By engaging in creation, learners explore how tools work through hands-on experimentation and real-world application.

Learners begin by evaluating their outcomes, asking: What needs to change to improve this result? They then move to analyzing the problem: Why did this approach lead to this outcome? Next, they apply their insights to adjust and refine their work: What can I do differently next time? Through this process, learners build understanding by connecting their discoveries to broader concepts and systems. Finally, they remember key lessons and integrate them into future iterations.

Create is the entry point, not the pinnacle. It drives learners to evaluate the outcomes of their work, analyze what worked (and what did not), and apply what they've learned in new ways. This isn't about skipping foundational knowledge - it's about embedding that knowledge in meaningful action.

A flexible model to be adapted to different contexts, it might go something like this:

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Process Over Product, Mindset Over Toolset: Inverting Bloom's Taxonomy for Teaching AI

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Teaching AI like it is just a set of tools is a mistake. It's not just outdated - it's risky and potentially dangerous. Institutions are rushing to teach learners how to use generative AI tools as if...

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Teacher Shelley Wright is on leave from her classroom, working with teachers in a half-dozen high schools to promote inquiry and connected learning.
I think the revised Bloom's Taxonomy is wrong.

Hear me out. I know this statement sounds heretical in the realms of education, but I think this is something we should rethink, especially since it is so widely taught to pre-service teachers. I agree that the taxonomy accurately classifies various types of cognitive thinking skills. It certainly identifies the different levels of complexity. But its organizing framework is dead wrong. Here's why.

Old-school Blooms: Arduous climb for learners

Conceived in 1956 by a group of educators chaired by Benjamin Bloom, the taxonomy classifies skills from least to most complex. The presentation of the Taxonomy (in both the original and revised versions) as a pyramid suggests that one cannot effectively begin to address higher levels of thinking until those below them have been thoroughly addressed. Consequently (at least in the view of many teachers who learned the taxonomy as part of their college training) Blooms becomes a "step pyramid" that one must arduously try to climb with your learners. Only the most academically adept are likely to reach the pinnacle. That's the way I was taught it.

Many teachers in many classrooms spend the majority of their time in the basement of the taxonomy, never really addressing or developing the higher order thinking skills that kids need to develop. We end up with rote and boring classrooms. Rote and boring curriculum. Much of today's standardized testing rigorously tests the basement, further anchoring the focus of learning at the bottom steps, which is not beneficial for our students.

I dislike the pyramid because it creates the impression that there is a scarcity of creativity - only those who can traverse the bottom levels and reach the summit can be creative. And while this may be how it plays out in many schools, it's not due to any shortage of creative potential on the part of our students.

I think the narrowing pyramid also posits that our students need a lot more focus on factual knowledge than creativity, or analyzing, or evaluating and applying what they've learned. And in a Google-world, it's just not true.

Here's what I propose. In the 21st century, we flip Bloom's taxonomy. Rather than starting with knowledge, we start with creating, and eventually discern the knowledge that we need from it.

Blooms 21: Let's put Creating at the forefront

In media studies we often look at the creation of print and digital advertisements. Traditionally, students learn many of the foundational principles for creating a layout through a lecture or text book reading, and then eventually create their own.

What if we started with creativity rather than principles? My students start with the standard elements of an advertisement (product photo, copy, logo etc.) and create a mockup. Then students evaluate their mock-up by comparing their ads to a few professional examples and discuss what they did right and wrong in comparison to what they've seen.

As students are pointing out design elements that work, we begin to analyze for similarities and divide them accordingly into groups. Most will likely fall into the four design principles of contrast, repetition, alignment, and proximity. At this point, students compile their findings as a class, and only then are the four design principles formally introduced.

Now students can apply what they've learned as they return to their own mock-up and fix elements based on the design principles they've begun to absorb.

Finally, students research the four design principles to flesh out their understanding where needed, and possibly correct any misconceptions. From this research, students create their own graphic organizer of the four design principles for future reference and to help them remember. We started with creativity and ended with the knowledge my students have curated. They've been engaged with the entire process from start to finish, and my students have make some significant decisions about the essential knowledge they need.

Blooms 21 works great in science

Not only does flipping Blooms work for classes like media studies, it also blends beautifully with my inquiry-based Chemistry class.

As we study science, I've come to realize that it's very important for my students to encounter a concept before fully understanding what's going on. It makes their brain try to fill in the gaps, and the more churn a brain experiences, the more likely it's going to retain information.

When we study ionic compounds, we start with a lab. My students begin by creating conductivity testers out of tin foil, batteries, and mini Christmas lights. Students then create their own lab and test 10-12 different substances, from salt water, to HCL, to sugar water, to check which substances conduct electricity. Usually, about half of the solutions provided do.

I have them compare their findings to how scientists usually categorize these solutions. Sometimes, solutions that are supposed to conduct electricity, don't. So providing the results of experts helps them to have more confidence in their own results.

However, it's not enough to discover which substances conduct electricity. I want them to try to figure out why. With the results my students have obtained, they analyze their findings. By dividing the solutions into appropriate categories, students often discern that the solutions that conduct electricity are made up of two elements and the elements combined are found on opposite sides of the periodic table, such as NaCl. They also realize that solutions that don't conduct, such as sugar, are usually made of elements found on the same side of the table.

Once they begin to analyze each solution's makeup more closely, they tend to realize that conductive solutions are, for the most part, made up of a metal and non-metal, whereas solutions that don't conduct usually don't contain any metals. Once they've exhausted this activity, I introduce the concepts of ionic and covalent bonds to label each category.

Then students re-evaluate their own findings and apply their learning by fixing elements in their categorization system.

At this point, my students research ionic and covalent bonds, either through cooperative research, or by using the flipped classroom model, to fill out their findings with information about the characteristics of each type of bond, such as malleability, boiling and melting points, etc. They're essentially creating their own notes.

And in English class . . .

Flipping Blooms - putting Creating, Evaluating, Analyzing and Applying first - also works in English. From what I can tell, it's likely the easiest route to creating a flipped English classroom. In the past, I've struggled to teach my students concepts such as grammar rules and abstract ideas like voice. Flipping Blooms makes this much easier.

I begin with having my students write a paragraph, either in response to a prompt or their own free writing. Next, students, working in small groups or pairs, evaluate several master texts for the criteria we're working on. How does the writer use punctuation or voice in a particular text? What similarities are there between texts? Students then compare their own writing with each text. What did they do correctly or well? How does their writing differ and to what effect?

As a class, or in their groups, we analyze the pieces for similarities and differences and group them accordingly. Only then do I introduce the concept of run-on sentences, comma splices, and fragments. Essentially, through this process, my students identify the criteria for good writing. From this, we're able to co-construct criteria and rubrics for summative assessments.

Students then apply what they've learned by returning to their own writing. They change elements based on the ideas they've encountered.

Students further their understanding by either listening to a podcast, or engaging in their own research of grammar rules. Finally, as the knowledge piece, students create a graphic organizer/infographic or a screencast that identifies the language rules they've learned.

I think the best flipped classrooms work because they spend most of their time creating, evaluating and analyzing. In a sense we're creating the churn, the friction for the brain, rather than solely focusing on acquiring rote knowledge. The flipped classroom approach is not about watching videos. It's about students being actively involved in their own learning and creating content in the structure that is most meaningful for them.

Blooms 21 actively places learning where it should be, in the hands of the learner.
Photo: Lecates, Creative Commons Art: Chris Davis, Powerful Learning Practice LLC

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I think the revised Bloomâ€™s Taxonomy is wrong. I agree that the taxonomy accurately classifies various types of cognitive thinking skills. It certainly identifies the different levels of complexity. But its organizing framework is dead wrong. Here's what I propose. In the 21st century, we flip Bloom's taxonomy.

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Whether you're new to rubrics, or you just don't know their formal names, it may be time for a primer on rubric terminology.
So let's talk about rubrics for a few minutes. What we're going to do here is describe two frequently used kinds of rubrics, holistic and analytic, plus a less common one called the single-point rubric (my favorite, for the record). For each one, we'll look at an example and explore its pros and cons.

Off we go!

A holistic rubric is the most general kind. It lists three to five levels of performance, along with a broad description of the characteristics that define each level. The levels can be labeled with numbers (such as 1 through 4), letters (such as A through F) or words (such as Beginning through Exemplary). What each level is called isn't what makes the rubric holistic - it's the way the characteristics are all lumped together.

Suppose you're an unusually demanding person. You want your loved ones to know what you expect if they should ever make you breakfast in bed. So you give them this holistic rubric:

When your breakfast is done, you simply gather your loved ones and say, "I'm sorry my darlings, but that breakfast was just a 2. Try harder next time."

The main advantage of a holistic rubric is that it's easy on the teacher - in the short run, anyway. Creating a holistic rubric takes less time than the others, and grading with one is faster, too. You just look over an assignment and give one holistic score to the whole thing.

The main disadvantage of a holistic rubric is that it doesn't provide targeted feedback to students, which means they're unlikely to learn much from the assignment. Although many holistic rubrics list specific characteristics for each level, the teacher gives only one score, without breaking it down into separate qualities. This often leads the student to approach the teacher and ask, "Why did you give me a 2?" If the teacher is the explaining kind, he will spend a few minutes breaking down the score. If not, he'll say something like, "Read the rubric." Then the student has to guess which factors had the biggest influence on her score. For a student who really tries hard, it can be heartbreaking to have no idea what she's doing wrong.

Holistic rubrics are most useful in cases when there's no time (or need, though that's hard to imagine) for specific feedback. You see them in standardized testing - the essay portion of the SAT is scored with a 0-6 holistic rubric. When hundreds of thousands of essays have to be graded quickly, and by total strangers who have no time to provide feedback, a holistic rubric comes in handy.

An analytic rubric breaks down the characteristics of an assignment into parts, allowing the scorer to itemize and define exactly what aspects are strong, and which ones need improvement.

So for the breakfast in bed example, an analytic rubric would look like this:

In this case, you'd give your loved ones a separate score for each category. They might get a 3 on Presentation, but a 2 on Food and just a 1 on Comfort. To make feedback even more targeted, you could also highlight specific phrases in the rubric, like, "the recipient is crowded during the meal" to indicate exactly what went wrong.

This is where we see the main advantage of the analytic rubric: It gives students a clearer picture of why they got the score they got. It is also good for the teacher, because it gives her the ability to justify a score on paper, without having to explain everything in a later conversation.

Analytic rubrics have two significant disadvantages, however: (1) Creating them takes a lot of time. Writing up descriptors of satisfactory work - completing the "3" column in this rubric, for example - is enough of a challenge on its own. But to have to define all the ways the work could go wrong, and all the ways it could exceed expectations, is a big, big task. And once all that work is done, (2) students won't necessarily read the whole thing. Facing a 36-cell table crammed with 8-point font is enough to send most students straight into a nap. And that means they won't clearly understand what's expected of them.

Still, analytic rubrics are useful when you want to cover all your bases, and you're willing to put in the time to really get clear on exactly what every level of performance looks like.

A single-point rubric is a lot like an analytic rubric, because it breaks down the components of an assignment into different criteria. What makes it different is that it only describes the criteria for proficiency; it does not attempt to list all the ways a student could fall short, nor does it specify how a student could exceed expectations.

A single-point rubric for breakfast in bed would look like this:

Notice that the language in the "Criteria" column is exactly the same as the "3" column in the analytic rubric. When your loved ones receive this rubric, it will include your written comments on one or both sides of each category, telling them exactly how they fell short ("runny eggs," for example) and how they excelled ("vase of flowers"). Just like with the analytic rubric, if a target was simply met, you can just highlight the appropriate phrase in the center column.

If you've never used a single-point rubric, it's worth a try. In 2010, Jarene Fluckiger studied a collection of teacher action research studies on the use of single-point rubrics. She found that student achievement increased with the use of these rubrics, especially when students helped create them and used them to self-assess their work.

The single-point rubric has several advantages: (1) It contains far less language than the analytic rubric, which means students are more likely to read it and it will take less time to create, while still providing rich detail about what's expected. (2) Areas of concern and excellence are open-ended. When using full analytic rubrics, I often find that students do things that are not described on the rubric, but still depart from expectations. Because I can't find the right language to highlight, I find myself hand-writing justifications for a score in whatever space I can find. This is frustrating, time-consuming and messy. With a single-point rubric, there's no attempt to predict all the ways a student might go wrong. Similarly, the undefined "Advanced" column places no limits on how students might stretch themselves. "If the highest level is already prescribed then creativity may be limited to that pre-determined level," says Fluckiger. "Students may surprise us if we leave quality open-ended."

The main disadvantage of single-point rubrics is that using them requires more writing on the teacher's part. If a student has fallen short in many areas, completing that left-hand column will take more time than simply highlighting a pre-written analytic rubric.

Need Ready-Made Rubrics?

My Rubric Pack gives you four different designs in Microsoft Word and Google Docs formats. It also comes with video tutorials to show you how to customize them for any need, plus a Teacher's Manual to help you understand the pros and cons of each style. Check it out here:

Sources:

Fluckiger, J. (2010). Single point rubric: A tool for responsible student self-assessment. Teacher Education Faculty Publications. Paper 5. Retrieved April 25, 2014 from http://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/tedfacpub/5.

Mertler, C. A. (2001). Designing scoring rubrics for your classroom. Practical Assessment, Research & Evaluation, 7(25). Retrieved April 30, 2014 from http://PAREonline.net/getvn.asp?v=7&n=25.
Know Your Terms is my effort to build a user-friendly knowledge base of terms every educator should know. New items will be added on an ongoing basis. If you heard some term at a PD and didn't want to admit you didn't know what it meant, send it to me via the contact form and I'll research it for you.

Keep in touch.
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Know Your Terms: Holistic, Analytic, and Single-Point Rubrics

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Whether you're new to rubrics, or you've used them for years without knowing their formal names, it may be time for a primer on rubric terminology.

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UDL for Educator Empowerment

Description
This learning path's goal is to empower California educators with the needed knowledge and skills to apply Universal Design for Learning (UDL) holistically to their practices as professionals. Designed in partnership with teachers, for teachers, this path contains 6 modules of multimedia content, opportunities for reflection and community, and links to resources to deepen your learning and practice.
DEVELOPED IN COLLABORATION WITH California Teachers
Launch

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Description This learning path's goal is to empower California [...]

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Are We Teaching Reading Comprehension? Part I | Shanahan on Literacy

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Recent research has explored how much reading comprehension instruction is being provided in America’s classrooms. This blog entry explores what counts as teaching reading comprehension. This is the first of two parts on this subject.

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Open-Educational Resources (OER) by Discipline

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Open-Educational Resources (OER) by Discipline

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ASCCC Open Educational Resources Initiative

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Open Educational Resources by Discipline - ASCCC Open Educational Resources Initiative

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Unpacking the “Science of Reading” with Dr. Tim Shanahan | IES

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The “science of reading “is all over the news, but some educators are still unclear about what to do in their classrooms. In this blog post, literacy expert Dr. Timothy Shanahan answers questions about evidence-based literacy instruction or the “science of reading.”

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Explore what close reading looks like for teachers, with their students, and with the complex texts they already use in their classrooms.

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Hexagonal thinking: Creating connections in the classroom

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If you’re looking for a way to get your students to make meaningful connections and have deep, thoughtful discussions, then hexagonal thinking might just

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Back to Basics: A Review of Mike Schmoker’s “Focus” - Cult of Pedagogy

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If you don't have time to prep in advance, or you're just not feeling up for teaching a full-scale lesson you've planned, try a brain dump. Seriously. It's been a game changer for me and my students. Here's how to do it:

Prep before class (1 to 5 minutes)

Bring blank paper and writing utensils to class (so students aren't digging around in their backpacks)

Instead of paper, you could also create a simple Google Form with just one open form field (but beware of students using ChatGPT)

You could take a minute to embed a radial timer on YouTube into your slides (mute the audio)

Decide how long you'd like to give students for the brain dump. With my college students, I start with 3 minutes. If they're still writing, I give them another 3 minutes. During professional development with teachers, I allot 6 to 10 minutes.

Explain the activity (2 minutes)

Start by saying you're doing to do something called a brain dump (I have alternate phrases in my book Powerful Teaching).

Tell students why you're doing this: because research shows that retrieval practice boosts long-term learning

Explain that they will be writing down everything they can remember. It can be at least one sentence per concept, but bullet points and concept maps are also okay. Spelling doesn't matter.

Explain that a brain dump is not a test. It is anonymous and not graded.

Explain that this activity is silent for approximately 3 to 5 minutes. No talking.

Hand out the paper or give students access to the Google Form.

Brain dump (3 to 10 minutes)

Ask students to write down everything they can remember (about a lesson, a unit or reading, from the semester, etc.)

Play the radial timer on the projector (if using)

Give students a gentle heads up when they have 1 minute remaining (this is not a race and students should not feel pressured by the time limit)

If students seem stuck, encourage them to keep trying

Gently tell them when time has concluded

If students are still writing, give them another few minutes

Discussion options (5 to 20 minutes)

Whole class: How did it go? Did you remember more or less than you expected? (I recommend starting with this to get the conversation going)

Think-pair-share: Talk to a buddy about what you wrote down. With the whole class, share what someone else put on their paper that you thought was cool.

Second round: Challenge students to continue. Give them retrieval cues with the name of a concept, textbook chapter, or unit.

Third round: Turn the brain dump into Leave One Add One. Collect papers (they "leave" it), hand them out to different students, and have students write down something not already on the paper (they "add" to it).

Try this out a few times throughout the school year and students will actually enjoy it. Keep in mind that the silence during a brain dump will feel awkward. Even though students aren't engaging socially, they are engaging their learning - and that's a good thing.

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No time to prep? Use a brain dump (not a movie) | Pooja K. Agarwal, Ph.D.

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If you're behind on prep, you might revisit a past lesson or play a movie (sad, but true). If you need a lesson fast, use a brain dump. It can be stretched into a 30-minute activity and students actually learn - no filler movie needed.

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White boards: Flexible, fun, and effective

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Smart Teaching Stronger Learning - 10 Tips

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Smart Teaching Stronger Learning - 10 Tips

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Smart Teaching Stronger Learning - 10 Tips

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predictability, consistency, organization and tidiness, allows both the teacher and students to simply focus

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I was recently told by one of my students that my class "isn't necessarily easy, but it's simple." And, I've got to be honest with you...it made my day. I take that as a huge compliment. The simple classroom is something I strive for and is constantly on my mind when I consider both the physical environment and instruction provided during class. The fact that a student noticed this is immense. And that she could differentiate between simple and easy? I'm not sure that many students have the wherewithal to do that. I was impressed. : )
So, what does a simple classroom look and feel like?
There are a few words that come to mind when I consider the simple classroom:

The first is predictable. Rules and expectations are known. Everyone generally knows how the classroom works. They know what to expect and they understand the procedures for how to behave in the classroom as well as how to correctly complete certain activities that will be frequently administered during lessons.

A secondary term that works hand in hand with the predictability of the simple classroom is consistency. It's not enough to have appropriate rules, procedures, and expectations...they have to be applied equally and routinely. If that isn't the case, the classroom loses its predictability. My students know the first activity we will complete just about every day in my classroom is a short review of content from the previous day's lesson. This only takes about 5 minutes, but it helps to demonstrate the importance of retrieval practice via spaced practice and helps to focus students' attention from the beginning bell. They know to expect this review because it is consistently administered.

In addition, the simple classroom presents itself to be organized and . Visuals on the wall or on the board need to serve an instructional purpose and add to the lessons. Otherwise, they may serve as distractions to learning.

"The visual perception system in the brain can process a limited number of outside stimuli,
which can compete for visual attention. The more stimuli present, the harder it is for the brain to focus on one object. The clutter in disorganized workspaces can impact focus on the task at hand. Distractions such as objects and perceptions can slow down a person's ability to process information, causing mistakes." (1)

While it may seem obvious to the teacher what learners should attend to visually in the classroom, we shouldn't assume it is as clear to the students what is important and what is not. For the simple classroom, less (visual distraction) is more (attention to content). This need for tidiness also applies to the auditory elements of the simple classroom. A classroom cluttered with needless noise...idle chatter, earbuds in ears playing music, et cetera...also only serves to distract students.

All of this leads to a last word that describes the simple classroom - . The classroom's predictability, consistency, organization and , allows both the teacher and students to simply on what is important for learning; the presentation, the content, the questioning, the discussion, et cetera. Anything that takes away from this ability to focus also takes away from the simplicity of the classroom. And, when learning becomes more complicated...yikes...usually not good.

Keep it simple.

Once the simple environment is established, the next focus should be on the simplicity of the instruction. A large majority of the students I teach are novice learners when it comes to the curriculum of psychology. And novice learners learn best when the instruction is simpler. It comes back to students being able to focus on what's important without having to decide what to attend to while ignoring all other stimuli. If I am teaching new and complex information, the novice learner needs to focus more on the material to-be learned and less on potentially intricate instructions for how to successfully complete an activity.***

Keep it simple.
Why is a simple classroom not necessarily an easy classroom?
While sometimes viewed together, simple and easy are two totally different attributes. Lifting 500 pounds is simple. Just pick it up. But is it easy? For the vast majority of human beings, the answer is a resounding no. So, just because I create a simple, focused environment in the classroom and present material in a simple, straightforward manner (especially when initially introducing content), doesn't mean what is being taught or how students are meant to think about and use the content is easy. Of course, students need to be challenged in a way that assesses their level of understanding and makes known what they know and where the holes are in their learning. That isn't accomplished in an easy classroom, but is most validly and reliably achieved in the simple classroom filled with frequent assessment of learning. Students should be doing a lot of thinking; a lot of assessing and using their newly gained knowledge to answer questions, discuss problems, and think creatively.

Keep it simple. Keep them thinking.

In my upcoming book, I talk extensively about memory processing and learning strategies. These strategies have over a century of research demonstrating increased retention of material for all age levels and ability levels. This vastly expands on the simple classroom. If you are interested in finding out more, my book is currently available for preorder:

US - tinyurl.com/4jjsp7w5

UK - tinyurl.com/cw6m37df

Annes, C. K., Taylor, J. A., & Hallock, R. M. The effect of workspace tidiness on schoolwork performance of high school students. https://ipalab.princeton.edu/sites/g/files/toruqf2841/files/documents/Charlotte2023.pdf

***Please check out this article for more on novice vs. expert learners.

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The Simple Classroom - The Effortful Educator

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"Coach Harvard, your classroom isn't necessarily easy, but it's simple." Why did I see that as a wonderful compliment? What is the simple classroom?

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50 FREE graphic organizers — and how to make your own

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Graphic organizers can help students gather their thoughts and customize to their needs. They are easy to make (or find) online and can be adapted for

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Easy fun social writing challenge

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Engage students with the collaborative writing game that boosts creativity and critical thinking. We help middle school ELA teachers enhance literacy.

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ELPAC Starting Smarter – English Language Proficiency Assessments for California

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CAASPP and ELPAC Interim Assessments include interim assessments for ELA, mathematics, science (CAST), and ELPAC and are designed to support teaching and learning throughout the year.

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Project Zero (PZ) Visible Thinking Resources

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Project Zero (PZ) Visible Thinking Resources

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Project Zero (PZ) Thinking Routines Toolbox

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Project Zero (PZ) Thinking Routines Toolbox

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Californians Together Resources (EL Roadmap)

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This post is co-authored by Ditch That Textbook's Matt Miller and Cori Orlando, a teacher on special assignment (TOSA) from Simi Valley, California. Find her blog, Leading in Limbo, at leadinginlimbo.weebly.com.
We (Cori and Matt) are betting that comics are a memorable part of your childhood, whether they were the color comic strips in the Sunday newspaper or comic books.

If not, then it was probably animated comics - cartoons!

They're visual. They're colorful. Adults and children alike flock to animated movies at theaters when they're released.

There's a draw that comics have on our lives. Graphic novels and comics draw in reluctant readers, and making comics taps into our students' creative side.

Quinn Rollins writes this about comics in his book, Play Like a PIRATE:

It's funny that we endorse combining pictures with words as a good way to tell stories to young children, but as they get older, we want children to abandon their picture books. I'd argue the things we valued as children still have value for us as adults - and at every age in between.

Comics in the classroom

There is power in students having to go through the creative process. They need to synthesize their thinking in order to produce. Higher level thinking occurs when students create a non-linguistic representation of their ideas.

Plus, it lets students tap into their inner creativity - which is a fun and even effective practice in the classroom. Letting students pursue their creativity not only increases students' engagement in class but also empowers them to take ownership of their learning.
Here's an example of what a comic strip in Google Slides or Drawings could look like! Click here to see the original Google Drawing file. (Feel free to File > Make a copy ... but please don't ask for editing rights!)
Google + comics = greatness!

Google Drawings and Slides is a great medium for giving students this creative outlet. It lets them create a framework with shapes, add speech/thought bubbles, and insert images in one place.

Use Google Drawings if you want your comics to be on a single image. (Think of it like a digital sheet of paper or a poster board.)

Use Google Slides if you want multiple pages. (Think of the slides like the pages of a comic book.) I (Cori) LOVE using Google Slides with students because they have access to the "explore button". It is a quick way for students to find images (rather than having to open a new tab).

Here's a quick walk-through of how we'd get started making comic strips in Drawings or Slides ...

Step 1: Set up the framework of the comic

You can create a four-panel comic strip as simply as with two lines (horizontal and vertical) to divide it into four equal sections. Here's a template so you can see it.

PRO TIP: Hold in the "shift" key while drawing lines to make them perfectly horizontal or vertical.

You can resize your Google Drawings or Slides to make them wide like traditional newspaper comic strips. Go to File > Page setup > Custom. Choose the size you'd like. In this template, I made it 8 inches wide and 3 inches tall.

PRO TIP: Draw a rectangle. Copy/paste it as many times as you need it. Arrange them next to each other with equal spacing in between. Then highlight all four rectangles and resize them at the same time to fit the page! (See image at right.)

If you're feeling brave, really mix it up! Here's one I (Cori) created where the panels aren't anywhere near the same size! The first slide has drag and drop speech bubbles and callouts that might assist your students in getting started.

Step 2: Add images

You have SO MANY options for adding images to your comics! Here are some of our favorites:

Take your own pictures and let students be the stars of the comics! This is one of my (Matt) favorite ways to personalize comics with students. Use the Alice Keeler Webcam Snapshot Chrome extension to take a webcam picture. When it saves to Drive, just insert it into your comic from Drive. They can pose, dress up in character, bring in props, etc.

Find your favorite of these Creative Commons or public domain image sources: Unsplash, Creative Commons search, Pixabay and more. (If you have a favorite that didn't make the list, add it in a comment at the bottom of this post!)

Use Bitmojis! They're these fun cartoon versions of yourself. Go to bitmoji.com and set yours up. Add the Chrome extension to your Google Chrome web browser and drag them right on the page.
NOTE: Some Bitmojis images aren't appropriate for younger students. An alternative: create some Bitmoji images ahead of time and save them to a folder in Google Drive (open the folder in your web browser and drag the Bitmoji images there ... or save them to your device and upload them to the folder). Then share the folder with students.

Add icons from The Noun Project (thenounproject.com). These icons can add to what you're creating in your comic - or serve as props or extras for your characters! If you're using the free Creative Commons version, be sure to put a little attribution text box somewhere in your work.

Step 3: Polish it off

Add a background behind the panels to make it pop. Use images as the background (can use Creative Commons images through Google search inside of Drawings) or just use a color or a texture ... whatever! Choosing a background gives students another opportunity to decide and justify that decision.

Add speech bubbles, thought bubbles and narration using the shapes tools. Speaking or thinking for a character is also higher-level thinking. Students must know a lot about their topic to be able to put themselves in another person's shoes and think for them!

Create one page with Drawings. Create multiple pages with Drawings. Or create a whole comic book by designing them on separate slides in a Google Slides presentation! Then download as a PDF (digital comic book) or embed in a webpage.

Extra: Add a layer of deeper thinking with collaboration

Many teachers think that a classroom with less than one device for one student is a disadvantage.

In fact, it can bring out a learning environment that wouldn't exist if each student was working 1:1.

Here are some of the benefits of pairing students up with a partner on just one device:

Have students work on a comic strip in pairs. In addition to the product they create (the comic strip), the conversations they have and decisions they make together can be more productive than if they did it by themselves.

Paired work on comic strips has great benefits for the teacher, too. It frees you up to circulate around the room and eavesdrop on student discussions. It gives you the chance to see into their thinking (which is a form of assessment!). Plus, you can always stop and redirect and ask leading questions if necessary.

This set-up also promotes the student-centered classroom. Students can get started right away and work independently, letting them really own the learning.

By giving students a chance to explain their thinking, it kicks the level of critical thinking up a notch. Justifying your thinking is a higher level on Webb's Depth of Knowledge. Students can explain their creative decision making, from the background, to the expression on their faces in the selfies they took and the dialogue that they chose. This promotes metacognition, where students are thinking about their thinking.

You can add an additional layer of deeper thinking by letting students create a screencast video to explain their comic. Using a free screen recording tool like Screencastify ( screencastify.com), students can display their comic and justify what's in it and its significance. This lets them practice their skills in video creation and amplifies their voice.
How could comic strips fit what you do in the classroom? If you've used them before, what suggestions do you have? Please share them in a comment below!

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Crash! Bang! Boom! How to add Google Drawings comic strips to your class

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Comic strips captivated us as children. Tap into that energy in the classroom with Google Drawings comic strips! Here's how. (Icons via TheNounProject.com

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Reasons to Converse in School - Ch 1 Academic Conversations

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Reasons to Converse in School - Ch 1 Academic Conversations

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How to Start Academic Conversations (hand signals/icons)

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How to Start Academic Conversations (hand signals/icons)

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Jeff Zwiers Tools - Academic Conversations

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Jeff Zwiers Tools - Academic Conversations

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Jeff Zwiers Tools - Academic Conversations

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Jeff Zwiers Tools - Academic Conversations

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Would you rather...? - Download as a PDF or view online for free

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Hattie Visible Learning Influences on Student Achievement

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Hattie Visible Learning Influences on Student Achievement

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Key Principles for Text Selection - Facing History & Ourselves

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Key Principles for Text Selection - Facing History & Ourselves

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ELA Unit Planning Guide - Facing History

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ELA Unit Planning Guide - Facing History

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Caption This! A fun, deep-thinking Google Drawings activity

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This post is co-authored by Ditch That Textbook’s Matt Miller and Laura Steinbrink. Laura is a high school English teacher and tech coach from Plato,

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Championing the Success of English Learners

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Free Education Resources for Parents in California

No one knows your child or their needs more than you. With Starting Smarter, you now have access to information about your child's education that goes beyond just grades. You can use our test score reports to see the areas your child is excelling and where they can improve. All of this can begin a conversation with your child's teacher about offering better learning support at home and all year long.

Check out the Test Questions

Enter your child's grade and select a subject and area to see descriptions of the skills and sample test questions in each performance area.

It's natural for every student to have academic strengths as well as areas where they may need more support and improvement. The tests your child takes are meant to measure the most important skills in each subject. For all tests, we break down the score reports into different performance areas-like reading and problem solving-to identify where your child is excelling or needs more support.

Families will also receive more information on their child's reading and math performance with the new Lexile and Quantile report. A Lexile measure shows the level of text your child can read and understand. A Quantile measure shows what math skills your child knows and is ready to learn next. Learn how to use the scores to support reading and math.

Use this information to have a meaningful conversation with your child's teacher about the skills and content in the grade level and to support your child's learning at home.

Be a Learning Hero!

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Plan for your Parent-Teacher Conversations

Use this tool to have a meaningful conversation about your child's test results and to co-create a learning plan with the teacher.

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Visit the CAASPP practice test to try out live, interactive questions and the testing features students can use.

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Free Education Resources | Starting Smarter California - CAASPP Starting Smarter

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No one knows your child or their needs more than you. With Starting Smarter, you now have access to information about your child's education that goes beyond just grades. You can use our test score reports to see the areas your child is excelling and where they can improve.

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ELPAC Starting Smarter – English Language Proficiency Assessments for California

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National Center on Intensive Intervention at AIM

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Explore all Find tools and resources to support general and special education teachers, interventionists, school psychologists, school counselors, and other school-based personnel working with students with intensive academic and behavioral needs.

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Bigger Words Decodable Words List and Sentences

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Bigger Words Decodable Words List and Sentences

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Bigger Words with Closed Syllables Decodable Word Lists and Sentences .pdf

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Foundations of Reading Instruction - Florida Ctr for Reading Research

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Foundations of Reading Instruction - Florida Ctr for Reading Research

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Module 1 | Florida Center for Reading Research

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Foundations of reading instruction & Application of evidence-based instructional practices Sessions Hours Application Follow-Up Hours Introductory Session Introduction 1 1

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Word Knowledge: Semantic Feature Analysis

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Word Knowledge: Semantic Feature Analysis

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Intensifying Literacy Instruction - Essential Practices

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Intensifying Literacy Instruction - Essential Practices

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Learning Spoken English with Color Noun Chart

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Learning Spoken English with Color Noun Chart

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Learning Spoken English with Color Vowel chart.pptx - Download as a PDF or view online for free

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Reading Big Words Instructional Practices - Multisyllabic Word Fluency

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Reading Big Words Instructional Practices - Multisyllabic Word Fluency

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Discussion Strategies to Deepen Engagement

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Discussion Strategies to Deepen Engagement

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For teachers seeking to facilitate rather than lead discussions, these strategies empower students to share their ideas.

Sometimes, as teachers, we struggle to help our students connect what they know to what they are learning. When we face this challenge, it can be helpful to examine our practice under a different set of lenses to uncover ways to reinvigorate learning. One of the easiest ways to do this, especially if you're new to the profession, is to take a closer look at how you manage discussions.

When facilitating a discussion, do you direct your students toward specific outcomes, or is there room for them to take ownership of the conversations and make them their own? There are differences, however subtle, between leading and facilitating discussions. The following five strategies, which are particularly suited for middle and high school students, empower student agency and offer a fresh approach to discourse.

CoFounding Environments of Shared Inquiry

When you lead a discussion, you begin with the end in mind-that is, you determine exactly what you want your students to know and guide them with focused questions.

Rather than provide you with a list of strategies that you can use to increase student engagement, our intention is to demonstrate how combininggold standard discussion strategies, such as Turn and Talk or Think-Pair-Share, can energize your teaching practice and produce powerful results.

The following discussion sequences, or dialogic archetypes, can be applied to subjects across the curriculum. They can be disassembled, rearranged, and reconfigured to create new instructional arrangements that appeal to your students' strengths and needs and to your own teaching style.

1. Quick Write, Turn & Talk, Modified Jigsaw, Quick Draw

Here's a sequence that works well when discussing short texts such as case studies: Distribute a number of short texts (three or four should suffice) and blank note cards among your students, so that each student has one text. Ask students to read the texts and respond on the lined side of their note card; you might invite open responses or offer a prompt.

Once students have responded, pair them by text, and ask them to share what they wrote. You might also create discussion groups in which students have read different texts and invite them to explore similarities and differences in themes, characters, conflicts, or other relevant topics, moving from pair to small group work.

Finally, ask students to draw something they learned from their discussion group on the blank side of their note card to share with you, their group mates, or the class as a whole.

2. Four Corners, Think-Pair-Square, Sticky Chat, Gallery Walk

To integrate kinesthetic engagement into classroom discussion, post images related to what you are teaching in the corners of the room, and direct students to stand next to the image that they find most appealing.

Pair students by image, and ask them to conduct some independent research about their chosen picture. If your students do not have ready access to computers, you can provide them with books to explore, or simply ask them to record their thoughts on the images. Create discussion groups of four by combining pairs assigned to the same image. Finally, ask students to write what they learned on sticky notes, and post them on the images. The class might then engage in a gallery walk to learn from one another's findings.

3. Group Roles, Team Pack Discussion, Classroom Mingle, Classroom Poll

For a discussion sequence that connects students with multiple classmates, create groups of three, and provide each group with a different discussion prompt on a note card. Assign each member of the group a role: speaker, scribe, and timekeeper. Ask students to respond to the prompt on their note card before passing it to the next group.

Then, rotate speakers one group to the right and scribes two groups to the right. After the timekeepers have discussed all of the prompts, poll the class for their favorite.

4. Pick a Side, Snowball Discussion, Debate, Graffiti Wall

To lower the stakes and boost participation during classroom debates, ask students to pick a side on a given issue and to write their thoughts on a piece of paper. Direct half of the students to fold their papers lengthwise, the other half widthwise. Collect the papers, assign a side of the issue to each type of fold, and redistribute the papers randomly.

Facilitate debates of two, then four, then eight students, with each side evenly represented. Ask students to record their thoughts on the paper again, and then tape them on the wall to showcase students' engagement.

5. Stoplight Sticky Notes, Affinity Mapping, Gallery Run, Web Discussion

Make learning visible with an archetype that centers the use of maps: Provide students with a prompt connected to a short video or text. Ask them to write their thoughts on color-coded sticky notes: green might mean "interesting," red "challenging." Create small groups, and direct participants to identify similarities and differences between their notes. After small group discussion, arrange the class in a circle, and have them create a "web" by passing a ball of string when they connect with a fellow student's reflection.

Moving Beyond These Discussion Sequences

These instructional sequences can be followed by whole group discussions or some other kind of low-stakes assessment to measure student understanding. However you decide to progress, the point is that strategies that usually stand on their own, or that are simply framed as standing on their own, can be combined to create unforeseen opportunities for engagement. While it is important to have a plan, good teaching is about leaning into the unexpected. It's about taking risks and creating space for your students to actively participate in the meaning-making process.

Even if the archetypes presented here do not appeal to your particular style of teaching, we encourage you to experiment with the strategies that do. It doesn't matter if you've been teaching for three months or 30 years. Education is unmapped terrain, and there will always be something new to discover.

The strategies in this article were developed with Cayla Cosner, an elementary and special education specialist.

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5 Discussion Strategies to Deepen Student Engagement

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There's a difference between leading and facilitating discussions. These strategies de-center the teacher's voice so students' ideas soar.

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The Big List of Class Discussion Strategies

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The Big List of Class Discussion Strategies

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Listen to this post as a podcast:
When I worked with student teachers on developing effective lesson plans, one thing I always asked them to revise was the phrase "We will discuss."
We will discuss the video. We will discuss the story. We will discuss our results.
Every time I saw it in a lesson plan, I would add a note: "What format will you use? What questions will you ask? How will you ensure that all students participate?" I was pretty sure that We will discuss actually meant the teacher would do most of the talking; He would throw out a couple of questions like "So what did you think about the video?" or "What was the theme of the story?" and a few students would respond, resulting in something that looked like a discussion, but was ultimately just a conversation between the teacher and a handful of extroverted students; a classic case of Fisheye Teaching.

The problem wasn't them; in most of the classrooms where they'd sat as students, that's exactly what a class discussion looked like. They didn't know any other "formats." I have only ever been familiar with a few myself. But when teachers began contacting me recently asking for a more comprehensive list, I knew it was time to do some serious research.

So here they are: 15 formats for structuring a class discussion to make it more engaging, more organized, more equitable, and more academically challenging. If you've struggled to find effective ways to develop students' speaking and listening skills, this is your lucky day.

I've separated the strategies into three groups. The first batch contains the higher-prep strategies, formats that require teachers to do some planning or gathering of materials ahead of time. Next come the low-prep strategies, which can be used on the fly when you have a few extra minutes or just want your students to get more active. Note that these are not strict categories; it's certainly possible to simplify or add more meat to any of these structures and still make them work. The last group is the ongoing strategies. These are smaller techniques that can be integrated with other instructional strategies and don't really stand alone. For each strategy, you'll find a list of other names it sometimes goes by, a description of its basic structure, and an explanation of variations that exist, if any. To watch each strategy in action, click on its name and a new window will open with a video that demonstrates it.

Enjoy!
a.k.a. Chat Stations
Basic Structure: Stations or posters are set up around the classroom, on the walls or on tables. Small groups of students travel from station to station together, performing some kind of task or responding to a prompt, either of which will result in a conversation.

Variations: Some Gallery Walks stay true to the term gallery, where groups of students create informative posters, then act as tour guides or docents, giving other students a short presentation about their poster and conducting a Q&A about it. In Starr Sackstein's high school classroom, her stations consisted of video tutorials created by the students themselves. Before I knew the term Gallery Walk, I shared a strategy similar to it called Chat Stations, where the teacher prepares discussion prompts or content-related tasks and sets them up around the room for students to visit in small groups.
a.k.a. Values Continuum, Forced Debate, Physical Barometer, This or That
Basic Structure: A statement that has two possible responses-agree or disagree-is read out loud. Depending on whether they agree or disagree with this statement, students move to one side of the room or the other. From that spot, students take turns defending their positions.

Variations: Often a Philosophical Chairs debate will be based around a text or group of texts students have read ahead of time; students are required to cite textual evidence to support their claims and usually hold the texts in their hands during the discussion. Some teachers set up one hot seat to represent each side, and students must take turns in the seat. In less formal variations (which require less prep), a teacher may simply read provocative statements students are likely to disagree on, and a debate can occur spontaneously without a text to refer to (I call this variation This or That in my classroom icebreakers post). Teachers may also opt to offer a continuum of choices, ranging from "Strongly Agree" on one side of the room, all the way to "Strongly Disagree" on the other, and have students place themselves along that continuum based on the strength of their convictions.

Basic Structure: Students are divided into 4 groups. Three of these groups are assigned to represent specific points of view. Members of the fourth group are designated as "provocateurs," tasked with making sure the discussion keeps going and stays challenging. One person from each group (the "speaker") sits in a desk facing speakers from the other groups, so they form a square in the center of the room. Behind each speaker, the remaining group members are seated: two right behind the speaker, then three behind them, and so on, forming a kind of triangle. From above, this would look like a pinwheel. The four speakers introduce and discuss questions they prepared ahead of time (this preparation is done with their groups). After some time passes, new students rotate from the seats behind the speaker into the center seats and continue the conversation.

Variations: When high school English teacher Sarah Brown Wessling introduced this strategy in the featured video (click Pinwheel Discussion above), she used it as a device for talking about literature, where each group represented a different author, plus one provocateur group. But in the comments that follow the video, Wessling adds that she also uses the strategy with non-fiction, where students represent authors of different non-fiction texts or are assigned to take on different perspectives about an issue.
a.k.a. Socratic Circles
Basic Structure: Students prepare by reading a text or group of texts and writing some higher-order discussion questions about the text. On seminar day, students sit in a circle and an introductory, open-ended question is posed by the teacher or student discussion leader. From there, students continue the conversation, prompting one another to support their claims with textual evidence. There is no particular order to how students speak, but they are encouraged to respectfully share the floor with others. Discussion is meant to happen naturally and students do not need to raise their hands to speak. This overview of Socratic Seminar from the website Facing History and Ourselves provides a list of appropriate questions, plus more information about how to prepare for a seminar.

Variations: If students are beginners, the teacher may write the discussion questions, or the question creation can be a joint effort. For larger classes, teachers may need to set up seminars in more of a fishbowl-like arrangement, dividing students into one inner circle that will participate in the discussion, and one outer circle that silently observes, takes notes, and may eventually trade places with those in the inner circle, sometimes all at once, and sometimes by "tapping in" as the urge strikes them.
a.k.a. Affinity Diagramming
Basic Structure: Give students a broad question or problem that is likely to result in lots of different ideas, such as "What were the impacts of the Great Depression?" or "What literary works should every person read?" Have students generate responses by writing ideas on post-it notes (one idea per note) and placing them in no particular arrangement on a wall, whiteboard, or chart paper. Once lots of ideas have been generated, have students begin grouping them into similar categories, then label the categories and discuss why the ideas fit within them, how the categories relate to one another, and so on.

Variations: Some teachers have students do much of this exercise-recording their ideas and arranging them into categories- without talking at first. In other variations, participants are asked to re-combine the ideas into new, different categories after the first round of organization occurs. Often, this activity serves as a good pre-writing exercise, after which students will write some kind of analysis or position paper.
a.k.a. Speed Dating
Basic Structure: Students form two circles, one inside circle and one outside circle. Each student on the inside is paired with a student on the outside; they face each other. The teacher poses a question to the whole group and pairs discuss their responses with each other. Then the teacher signals students to rotate: Students on the outside circle move one space to the right so they are standing in front of a new person (or sitting, as they are in the video). Now the teacher poses a new question, and the process is repeated.

Variations: Instead of two circles, students could also form two straight lines facing one another. Instead of "rotating" to switch partners, one line just slides over one spot, and the leftover person on the end comes around to the beginning of the line. Some teachers use this strategy to have students teach one piece of content to their fellow students, making it less of a discussion strategy and more of a peer teaching format. In fact, many of these protocols could be used for peer teaching as well.

Basic Structure: Another great idea from Sarah Brown Wessling, this is a small-group discussion strategy that gives students exposure to more of their peers' ideas and prevents the stagnation that can happen when a group doesn't happen to have the right chemistry. Students are placed into a few groups of 4-6 students each and are given a discussion question to talk about. After sufficient time has passed for the discussion to develop, one or two students from each group rotate to a different group, while the other group members remain where they are. Once in their new group, they will discuss a different, but related question, and they may also share some of the key points from their last group's conversation. For the next rotation, students who have not rotated before may be chosen to move, resulting in groups that are continually evolving.

Basic Structure: Two students sit facing each other in the center of the room; the remaining students sit in a circle around them. The two central students have a conversation based on a pre-determined topic and often using specific skills the class is practicing (such as asking follow-up questions, paraphrasing, or elaborating on another person's point). Students on the outside observe, take notes, or perform some other discussion-related task assigned by the teacher.

Variations: One variation of this strategy allows students in the outer circle to trade places with those in the fishbowl, doing kind of a relay-style discussion, or they may periodically "coach" the fishbowl talkers from the sidelines. Teachers may also opt to have students in the outside circle grade the participants' conversation with a rubric, then give feedback on what they saw in a debriefing afterward, as mentioned in the featured video.

Basic Structure: One student assumes the role of a book character, significant figure in history, or concept (such as a tornado, an animal, or the Titanic). Sitting in front of the rest of the class, the student responds to classmates' questions while staying in character in that role.

Variations: Give more students the opportunity to be in the hot seat while increasing everyone's participation by having students do hot seat discussions in small groups, where one person per group acts as the "character" and three or four others ask them questions. In another variation, several students could form a panel of different characters, taking questions from the class all together and interacting with one another like guests on a TV talk show.
a.k.a. Pyramid Discussion
Basic Structure: Students begin in pairs, responding to a discussion question only with a single partner. After each person has had a chance to share their ideas, the pair joins another pair, creating a group of four. Pairs share their ideas with the pair they just joined. Next, groups of four join together to form groups of eight, and so on, until the whole class is joined up in one large discussion.

Variations: This structure could simply be used to share ideas on a topic, or students could be required to reach consensus every time they join up with a new group.

Whereas the other formats in this list have a distinct shape-specific activities you do with students-the strategies in this section are more like plug-ins, working discussion into other instructional activities and improving the quality and reach of existing conversations.

One of the limitations of discussion is that rich, face-to-face conversations can only happen when all parties are available, so we're limited to the time we have in class. With a tool like Voxer, those limitations disappear. Like a private voice mailbox that you set up with just one person or a group (but SOOOO much easier), Voxer allows users to have conversations at whatever time is most convenient for each participant. So a group of four students can "discuss" a topic from 3pm until bedtime-asynchronously-each member contributing whenever they have a moment, and if the teacher makes herself part of the group, she can listen in, offer feedback, or contribute her own discussion points. Voxer is also invaluable for collaborating on projects and for having one-on-one discussions with students, parents, and your own colleagues. Like many other educators, Peter DeWitt took a while to really understand the potential of Voxer, but in this EdWeek piece, he explains what turned him around.

A backchannel is a conversation that happens right alongside another activity. The first time I saw a backchannel in action was at my first unconference: While those of us in the audience listened to presenters and watched a few short video clips, a separate screen was up beside the main screen, projecting something called TodaysMeet (update: TodaysMeet has shut down. Use YoTeach! instead.) It looked a lot like those chat rooms from back in the day, basically a blank screen where people would contribute a few lines of text, the lines stacking up one after the other, no other bells or whistles. Anyone in the room could participate in this conversation on their phone, laptop, or tablet, asking questions, offering commentary, and sharing links to related resources without ever interrupting the flow of the presentations. This kind of tool allows for a completely silent discussion, one that doesn't have to move at a super-fast pace, and it gives students who may be reluctant to speak up or who process their thoughts more slowly a chance to fully contribute. For a deeper discussion of how this kind of tool can be used, read this thoughtful overview of using backchannel discussions in the classroom by Edutopia's Beth Holland.
a.k.a. Accountable Talk
Talk moves are sentence frames we supply to our students that help them express ideas and interact with one another in respectful, academically appropriate ways. From kindergarten all the way through college, students can benefit from explicit instruction in the skills of summarizing another person's argument before presenting an alternate view, asking clarifying questions, and expressing agreement or partial agreement with the stance of another participant. Talk moves can be incorporated into any of the other discussion formats listed here.

Whole Brain Teaching is a set of teaching and classroom management methods that has grown in popularity over the past 10 years. One of WBT's foundational techniques is Teach-OK, a peer teaching strategy that begins with the teacher spending a few minutes introducing a concept to the class. Next, the teacher says Teach!, the class responds with Okay!, and pairs of students take turns re-teaching the concept to each other. It's a bit like think-pair-share, but it's faster-paced, it focuses more on re-teaching than general sharing, and students are encouraged to use gestures to animate their discussion. Although WBT is most popular in elementary schools, this featured video shows the creator of WBT, Chris Biffle, using it quite successfully with college students. I have also used Teach-OK with college students, and most of my students said they were happy for a change from the sit-and-listen they were used to in college classrooms.

An oldie but a goodie, think-pair-share can be used any time you want to plug interactivity into a lesson: Simply have students think about their response to a question, form a pair with another person, discuss their response, then share it with the larger group. Because I feel this strategy has so many uses and can be way more powerful than we give it credit for, I devoted a whole post to think-pair-share; everything you need to know about it is right there.

TWO MORE YOU'LL LOVE

Since writing this post, I have learned about two more discussion strategies that teachers are finding to be incredibly effective and powerful for getting students to talk, especially about books and other texts:

This protocol has students come up with their own Thoughts, lingering Questions, and Epiphanies from an assigned reading. Teachers who have used this method say it has generated some of the richest conversations they have ever heard from students!

This strategy places students into one-on-one conversations, getting them to learn each others' names better and create a track record of what they talked about. Excellent for classes where you want to assess for discussion and help students get more comfortable with each other.

So what else do you have? I would like to think this is a pretty complete list, but I'm sure more strategies are out there. If you use a discussion strategy that's not mentioned here, please share it below.

Come back for more.
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The Big List of Class Discussion Strategies

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Here they are: 15 formats for structuring a class discussion to make it more engaging, more organized, more equitable, and more academically challenging.

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Talk #1 Here’s how: Talk #1 1-2 minutes Engage with content concept and set a purpose for reading (the “hook.”) Overview Strategies: Ask…

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Kagan’s FREE Articles - Research & Rationale - Research proves effectiveness of Kagan Structures.

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Kagan specializes in staff development and educational resources for teachers. Visit our online store, magazine and message board � the leading authority on cooperative learning, classroom discipline and multiple intelligences.

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Awesome ideas for Stand Up, Hand Up, Pair Up in 5th grade and 1st grade! Plus, a free classroom poster for this Kagan cooperative learning strategy! (The Brown Bag Teacher)

launch thebrownbagteacher.blogspot.com

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Stand Up - Hand Up - Pair Up - Kagan Structure by Sarah Dillard

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Chunking helps students approach challenging texts by breaking down content into manageable pieces.

English & Language Arts

History

Social Studies

Most teachers are willing to tackle the difficult topics, but we need the tools.

- Gabriela Calderon-Espinal, Bay Shore, NY

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Chunking helps students approach challenging texts by breaking down content into manageable pieces.

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These documents serve as a resource to educators at all grade levels looking to refine or develop a newcomer program.

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ELLMA has created quick and easy guides for teachers on how to use high impact language practices across classrooms to support the language acquisition of ELLs. The following strategies are designed to encourage academic discussion, reading, and writing across content areas. Each guide includes a short description of the strategy, the procedural steps, timing, materials needed, possible scaffolds, keys to success and ELD standards covered through use of the strategy.

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ELLMA has created quick and easy guides for teachers on how to use high impact language practices across classrooms to support the language acquisition of ELLs. The following strategies are designed to encourage academic discussion, reading, and writing across content areas. Each guide includes a

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Unpacking and Planning for Language Instruction RESOURCES

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Unpacking and Planning for Language Instruction RESOURCES

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Persuasion Across Time and Space - Understanding and Building Complex Text (ELs)

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Persuasion Across Time and Space - Understanding and Building Complex Text (ELs)

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This unit shows instructional approaches that are likely to help ELLs meet new standards in English Language Arts. The lessons address potent literacy goals and build on students' background knowledge and linguistic resources. Built around a set of famous persuasive speeches, the unit supports students in reading a range of complex texts. It invites them to write and speak in a variety of ways and for different audiences and purposes. To learn more, see the lessons below and read our Guidelines for ELA Instructional Materials Development and Frequently Asked Questions.
Download full unit Download supplementary files Guidelines for ELA Instructional Materials Development.pdf Printable Student Handouts.zip Frequently Asked Questions.pdf

Persuasion across time and space: analyzing and producing complex texts

The goal of this unit is to provide exemplars illustrating how English Language Arts Common Core Standards in Reading Informational Text and Writing Arguments can be used to deepen and accelerate the learning and instruction of English Language Learners (ELLs), especially at the middle school level. It is based on the notion that ELLs develop conceptual and academic understandings as well as the linguistic resources to express them simultaneously, through participation in rigorous activity that is well scaffolded. Practices focus student attention and activity on key concepts--which are presented and discussed in their interrelatedness--with invitations for students to engage in higher order thinking throughout. These practices, and the intentional support offered to students throughout the unit, are designed to constitute an apprenticeship for students that over time builds their agency and autonomy.

In planning this unit, then, our goal was not only to make a high-quality teaching resource, but to demonstrate practices of broader application in the education of ELLs. This introductory section provides an overview for the entire unit, discusses the rationale for the instructional approach, and provides a "pre-assessment" for students to complete before the unit begins. For more on how this unit was developed, as well as guidelines for developing other instructional materials for ELLs, see our Guidelines for ELA Instructional Material Development and Frequently Asked Questions. Additional documents will be posted in the weeks to come.
Unit introduction.pdf

In the first lesson in this unit, students are introduced to the use of persuasion in visual, print, and multimodal advertisements. Many advertisements, particularly video, embed persuasive techniques in the familiar genre of narrative first to inform, engage, and interest readers and viewers emotionally, and then to persuade them to take some form of action. This action may be to buy a product, sign a petition, attend an event, or change their behavior. Sometimes the purpose is to raise awareness of an issue -the action or response required is not always made explicit. This lesson explores how the use of persuasive techniques within the narrative of advertisements accomplishes these goals.

Students are introduced to a number of textual analysis standards and persuasive techniques that will be developed and deepened throughout the unit. As they analyze multimodal texts, students examine the author's point of view and purpose, and the intended effect on readers by analyzing modality, word meaning and nuances. They determine the central ideas of text and cite specific evidence to support their analysis. At the end of the lesson, students reflect on what they have learned about persuasive techniques before applying and deepening their understanding of persuasion as they read complex texts.
Lesson 1 pdf

In the second lesson students further their understanding and analysis of persuasive techniques as they engage in close reading of the Gettysburg Address. They first build their schema about the time, place, and political context of Lincoln's famous speech through the reading of informational text. As students read the Gettysburg Address, they have multiple opportunities to examine and interact with the text in a number of ways, from the macro understanding of Lincoln's message, to the micro word-level examination. Students examine the text to determine how cohesive and coherence ties work together to create meaning. The culminating Performance Task invites students to translate the Gettysburg Address into modern English, helping students to synthesize their understanding of what Lincoln's message was.
Lesson 2 pdf

The third lesson in the unit introduces students to Aristotle's Three Appeals, and helps students analyze how these rhetorical devices are used to persuade a reader or audience to take action or identify with a particular cause. Because rhetorical devices are an important element of speeches, the knowledge gained by students in this lesson is essential for them to critically analyze King's I Have a Dream, Kennedy's On the Assassination of Martin Luther King, and Wallace's The Civil Rights Movement: Fraud, Sham, and Hoax, the three speeches in this unit.
Lesson 3 pdf

Lesson Four invites students to examine how writers construct persuasive texts at the macro and micro level. Students work together collaboratively to analyze the structural, organizational, grammatical, and lexical choices made in one speech, Barbara Jordan's All Together Now. They communicate their understanding of these elements to a younger middle school audience in preparation for writing their own speeches as the culminating performance of the unit. At the end of the lesson students compare and contrast All Together Now to one of the speeches read in Lesson 3 using tools of analysis from this lesson and earlier lessons.
Lesson 4 pdf

In the final lesson of this unit, students appropriate what they have learned from their in-depth study of persuasive texts to independently analyze a persuasive speech and write their own persuasive texts. For this reason, the lesson only has extending understanding tasks. Students begin by consolidating their knowledge of how writers deliberately use persuasive devices by analyzing and assuming the role of one of the writers studied in the unit. Taking on the role of highly accomplished writers helps students to position themselves as writers of high quality persuasive texts. Students then examine a persuasive speech, written by someone close in age, which had a big effect on the world when it was delivered at a world conference. Finally, students apply the persuasive techniques learned in the unit as they construct their own persuasive texts.
Lesson 5 pdf

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Persuasion Across Time and Space Instructional Unit

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This unit shows instructional approaches that are likely to help ELLs meet new standards in English Language Arts. The lessons address potent literacy goals and build on students' background knowledge and linguistic resources. Built around a set of famous persuasive speeches, the unit supports students in reading a range of complex texts.