Tag: Best Practices
The Power of Daily Routines in Reading Classrooms
Having a daily routine can be beneficial for elementary students in many ways. For example, incorporating a daily independent reading routine can help build reading stamina that helps students persevere through complex texts. Experts agree that 10 to 30 minutes of reading every day, depending on age, exposes children to millions of words and helps…
Forced Fluency, The One Strategy for Increasing Reading Fluency
If I could only have one strategy for increasing reading fluency, it would be Forced Fluency. The videos, research, and examples in this post should convince you why this is. Plus, by the end, you’ll see how to use forced fluency in guided reading groups in 5 simple steps (I use this exact strategy in…
Reading Skills for the Future – The Digital Brain
Reading is fundamental skill for life, and that’s a fact few can deny. But how has the digital age, and the digital brain, changed the way we view reading? The answer is quite simple. The digital age has brought many changes. Do you remember your high school math teacher telling you, “Learn how to do…
Making Inferences: New Warm-Ups!
In our recent August survey, 200+ teachers overwhelming requested more making inferences task card projectables, so we just uploaded a new week of warm-ups for our Awesome Members! These are not basic inferences! You can find four weeks of basic inferences starting here, which are perfect for grades 2 and 3. These new warm-ups are…
Scaffolding Students During Open-Ended Questions
This is the second post for scaffolding students during open-ended questions. And you can read part 1 here: 3 Ways to Use Open-Ended Questions. You know very well that scaffolding is not about giving students answers. But what is it? How can it be done in ways that promote thinking and comprehension? Scaffolding is coaching…
Open-Ended Questions: 3 Ways to Get Results
Open-Ended Questions: 3 Ways to Get Results is part 1 in a three-part series on Open-Ended Questions. You can read part 2 here: Scaffolding Students in Open-Ended Questions. In the reading comprehension warm-ups, you’ll find a variety of tasks, and one of the most beneficial tasks for learning is open-ended questions. In this post, I’ll…
Five Techniques for Daily Spiral Review (Get 233% Growth)
Achieving 233% Growth with Daily Spiral ReviewToday, I’d like to share 5 techniques that are needed for successful spiral review – and I’m talking about getting more than twice the growth compared to classrooms that don’t use daily spiral review in reading comprehension instruction! But first, a big thank you for all of the comments and…
Brain Quiz Teaching Strategies
This 6 Question Quiz will test your knowledge of teaching strategies? Do you know which strategies result in better learning and retention? Possible Results from Quiz:Brainiac, Masterful TeacherBrain Aware, Great TeacherLearning About the BrainWe know the brain requires experience that activate working memory and long-term memory. Do you know which teaching strategies do this? Spiral Review…
Spiral Review Research: 3 Memory Processes
Memory is made from three processes: encoding, retention, and recall. In this quick spiral review research, we look at these brain processes and see how they relate to learning in your classroom. Your choice of instructional activities in the classroom may or may not have an impact on student learning. Have you ever heard, “We taught that, but…
Phoneme-Grapheme Mapping
Phoneme-grapheme mapping is a research-based activity that helps early and transitional readers build word recognition skills. Phonemes are the sounds we hear in words. Graphemes are the letters that represent the sounds. This activity can be challenging for 3rd and 4th-grade students – even your strong readers! With a little bit of practice, it will…
Research-Based Word Study
How to drastically increase reading levels with word study! Did you know research-based word study is not just about spelling? Did you know word study is not just for primary grades? Are you prepared to use word study to transform your students’ reading level growth and reading comprehension growth using daily spiral review? Yes, word study can do that! In…