Teachers First - Thinking Teachers Teaching Thinkers

If you are a new teacher or brushing up on your teaching of beginner reading skills, Read Write Think has put this lesson together for you! When you reach the page, you will be in the preview; just above that, find tabs for Standards, Resources & Preparation, Instructional Plan, Related Resources, and Comments. In this lesson, students use Jack & Jill to identify words that belong to the -ill family using analogy onset-rime and substitute consonant sounds to form new words. In addition, there are several links to use like "Copy Change" worksheets, a computer-assisted program, "Construct a Word," which focuses on onset-rime analogies, and others.

Are you looking for professional development or wondering how to teach reading better? At Reading 101 by Reading Rockets, you will find both. Extend your knowledge of how students learn to read and how best to teach them. Start on the left menu with the introduction, and then work at your own pace through the nine-course modules, which include phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, spelling, vocabulary, writing, and assessment. You will also find video clips, assignments & quizzes (for you), classroom strategies, and additional resources. All of these are designed to help you become the best literacy teacher you can be. You can also get a letter of completion for your administrator and goals. There is no log-in for this program, so be sure to save your work if you are using this as the year's goal for professional development.

Find various resources for emergent readers and teachers provided by PBS Learning Media. Select content by topics that include fluency, phonics and word recognition, phonological awareness, and print concepts. Use filters to narrow information by grade, resource type, or relevance, including the newest additions or most popular items. Choose from various resources, including lesson plans, interactives, videos, and much more.

This blog post shares easy to implement ideas to share nonfiction text features with students. Each of the suggestions also includes pictures of each of the elements in use in a classroom setting. Use the links at the top of the home page to find additional tips for incorporating reading and writing activities into classroom lessons.
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Improve reading and comprehension skills for all students and adults with this BeeLine Reader Collection on Literacy Central. Find over 100 books and stories as downloadable PDFs, all using BeeLine Reader technology to highlight and wrap text to improve focusing and tracking while reading. Use the leveled reading passages within Reading is Fundamental for multiple grade levels and books. Find additional support materials for each book, including author interviews, lesson plans, crosswords, and word searches all as downloadable PDFs. Though Beeline Reader is not usually a free tool, Literacy Central is providing it to its members for free through these PDFs. You do not need to create a free membership to use these materials, only to save them as a favorite. Learn more about the Beeline Reader tool and how it improves reading comprehension by watching the YouTube video introduction on this page.
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Classroom Strategies contains a vast library of resources for teaching reading skills. Choose from six different literacy strategies to find instructions on using the strategy, templates, examples, children's books to teach the strategy, and much more. The interactive chart also includes information on when and how to use each strategy. Many strategies include a video showing how to use these ideas in the classroom. If your district blocks YouTube, then they may not be viewable. This site is a must-have for any reading teacher!

The scientific research behind WriterReader is that one develops and improves reading skills by writing. With WriteReader, kids create their books, including text, pictures, and voice recordings. Adults/Teachers have space on the page to write comments and make corrections. The interface is so simple that even a young child can use it successfully after some adult guidance. Open the Features tab on the top menu to see an index to all features categorized by Literacy Development, Easy Book Creation, Publishing and Sharing, and Teacher & Student Management, all with several links to explore. Click the Resources Center tab on the top menu to select Lesson Plans, Templates, Writing Prompts, Videos, and more. The basic plan offers 60 books and all the essential features. Register by email or your Google account. After logging in, use the menu bars in the upper right corner and find Guides, which has a Parent Letter, a Quick Start Guide, a Template, and a few other get-started items. For creating student accounts, you can enter students manually, or students can join the class with a class code. WriteReader has upgraded its page templates to support older students. US English, UK English, Dansk (Danish), and Svenska (Swedish) are available. There is also an introductory video on the landing page that will help everyone get started. This video resides on YouTube. If your district blocks YouTube, the video may not be viewable. WriteReader has added new premium features such as Read Aloud, Voice Search, Book Templates, and several others. For these, you must pay.

Read, annotate, bookmark, and share literature, poetry, and nonfiction with Owl Eyes. Read any available selection without registration; however, free registration (with email) opens up a world of options. Add any book to your library to add your own highlights or annotations. View analysis available on the site broken down by chapters and literary context. Options for annotating include adding highlights, questions, tags, and correlation to Common Core Standards. Create a classroom to assign books. Video tutorials reside on YouTube. If your district blocks YouTube, the videos may not be viewable.

TextProject's YouTube Channel has many videos to provide support in reading instruction for beginning and struggling readers. Choose from playlists with subjects including Beginning Reading, Texts That Teach, Literacy Leaders Answer CCSS Questions, Vocabulary Matters, Teaching English Learners Vocabulary, and much more. Click Playlist on the menu to see them all. Be sure to subscribe to this YouTube Channel to receive notification of new additions. If your district blocks YouTube, then they may not be viewable.

Find many strategies and techniques to keep your class engaged and interested! Many of the strategies are also helpful in adult meetings. View the short video on the home page to get a good overview of what to find and how to navigate this site. Click the View Our Tools button next to the video to see all the tools offered. Not only will all the tools be displayed, but on the left, find a menu with categories to make it easier to find what you are looking for. Most tools now have a video to see the tool in action. There are Opening and Closing Activities, Checks for Understanding, Reading Strategies, and more. There is no sign in to see all the activities. However, by joining the site, you will be able to take and save notes for the different tools of interest. Each tool has an overview of how and when to use it, variations of the tool, and templates (downloaded in Word) for participants to use. Some tools have accompanying videos to show the tool in action. The videos are hosted on YouTube. If your district blocks YouTube, then they may not be viewable; be sure to look at alternatives for sharing the videos on classroom computers.

TeachThought stretches teachers to think beyond the norm, and try new exciting ideas such as learning in a digital world, flipped classrooms, project based learning, and simulations. A few examples of the articles include: 10 Team Building Games that Promote Critical Thinking, 25 Reading Strategies That Work In Every Content Area, 55 Free Apps For iPads, 249 Bloom's Taxonomy Verbs for Critical Thinking, 14 Brilliant Bloom's Taxonomy Posters For Teachers, and 20 Things You Can Do in 10 Minutes For A Smoother Running Classroom. Join in the conversation, add your opinion, or ask a question. Sign up for TeachThought's newsletter.
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The Reading Like a Historian curriculum engages you in historical inquiry. Each of the 130 lessons revolves around a central historical question. Each lesson features sets of primary documents modified for groups of students with diverse reading skills and abilities. This curriculum teaches students how to investigate historical questions employing reading strategies such as sourcing, contextualizing, corroborating, and more. Instead of memorizing historical facts, students evaluate the trustworthiness of multiple perspectives on issues from King Philip's War to the Montgomery Bus Boycott (and more). Next, they make historical claims backed by documentary evidence. Choose from the units menu to find lessons divided into 12 units: introduction through the Cold War Culture/Civil Rights. Read a short overview, then choose from the list of included lessons. Most lessons are in PDF format and may include PowerPoint presentations with additional images and/or maps to use with the lesson.