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First Rule of Reading: Keep Your Eyes on the Words

First Rule of Reading: Keep Your Eyes on the Words

All kindergarten, first-grade, and second-grade teachers — as well as reading interventionists — should teach students to keep their eyes on the words on the page so that they do not have to later struggle with breaking a habit that hampers effective, efficient reading.

Mother and daughter reading together outside in tent made of sheets

Five Easy Tips for Summer Learning

Research about how much children lose ground over the summer is well documented, but kids don’t have to lose ground over the summer. In fact, you can encourage your child to have a summer of fun and learning with these five free and easy things to do.

Five Key Principles for Effective Vocabulary Instruction

Five Key Principles for Effective Vocabulary Instruction

Much vocabulary is learned without formal teaching. We gain words from conversation, observation, television/media, and reading. However, research shows that explicitly teaching vocabulary can measurably improve reading comprehension — if we teach the right words well enough. Here are five key principles to effective vocabulary instruction.

Five Kinds of STEM-themed Nonfiction Books for Kids

Five Kinds of STEM-themed Nonfiction Books for Kids

It’s a great time for children’s nonfiction! In recent years, these books have evolved into five distinct categories. Learn more about the characteristics of traditional nonfiction, browse-able nonfiction, narrative nonfiction, expository literature, and active nonfiction.

multicultural group of teachers engaged in school-based discussion about teaching

Five Phases of Professional Development

Too often, teachers say that the professional development they receive provides limited application to their everyday world of teaching and learning. This five-phase framework that can help create comprehensive, ongoing, and — most importantly — meaningful professional development.

Young girl pointing at text as she reads aloud

Fluency: Instructional Guidelines and Student Activities

The best strategy for developing reading fluency is to provide your students with many opportunities to read the same passage orally several times. To do this, you should first know what to have your students read. Second, you should know how to have your students read aloud repeatedly.
Fluency: Activities for Your Second Grader

Fluency: An Introduction

Fluency develops gradually over time and through practice. At the earliest stage of reading development, students’ oral reading is slow and labored because students are just learning to “break the code” – to attach sounds to letters and to blend letter sounds into recognizable words.

Fluency Matters

Fluency Matters

If you’ve been around classrooms and teachers, you’ve probably heard the term “fluency.” Fluency is something worth knowing more about! Read on to find out what it is and how to develop it in your young learner.

Fluency Norms Chart (2017 Update)

Fluency Norms Chart (2017 Update)

View the results of the updated 2017 study on oral reading fluency (ORF) by Jan Hasbrouck and Gerald Tindal, with compiled ORF norms for grades 1-6. You’ll also find an analysis of how the 2017 norms differ from the 2006 norms.

Young girl pointing at text as she reads aloud

Fluent, Automatic Reading of Text

Being a fluent reader is an important part of being a successful reader. Here is an overview of considerations related to fluency, and techniques teachers can use for promoting fluency in the classroom.
Profile of elementary student listening in class

For a Boost of Optimism, Read (and Watch) This

Meet some elementary school educators who have worked under some very difficult conditions and have found ways to support academic achievement at their schools. They believe that every child has a right to learn and be successful.

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For School Improvement, Demographics Aren’t Destiny

“Unexpected schools” — high-performing and rapidly improving schools with large populations of children of color and children living in poverty — demonstrate that they can overcome barriers of poverty and discrimination by making improvement a shared task rather than a solitary one. Many of these schools have achieved academic success by systematically building caring relationships and tackling problems together — unpacking standards, mapping out the curriculum, and developing lessons and common assessments together. 

For Students Who Are Not Yet Fluent, Silent Reading Is Not the Best Use of Classroom Time

For Students Who Are Not Yet Fluent, Silent Reading Is Not the Best Use of Classroom Time

Teachers do their best to improve students’ fluency, but sometimes the information they have to work with is incomplete and, therefore, leads them down the wrong path. For example, silent reading or ‘Round Robin’ reading seem like good ways to improve fluency. But, in fact, increasing fluency requires more practice, more support, and more guided oral reading than either of these strategies can deliver.

Four Practical Principles for Enhancing Vocabulary Instruction

Four Practical Principles for Enhancing Vocabulary Instruction

Drawing on instructional materials, classroom images, and observational data from research, the authors illustrate these principles: establishing efficient, rich routines for introducing target word meanings; providing review activities that promote deep processing of word meanings; responding directly to student confusion; and fostering universal participation in and accountability for vocabulary instruction.

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