Here they are! My go-to resources for building literacy in my classroom.
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Common Lit This site allows you filter by genre and grade. Additionally, it is well formatted, and offers paired text, higher-level and short answer questions.
The Best Class Dr. Chase Young is a leading professor at Sam Houston State whose passion is to empower teachers to teach struggling readers by implementing reading fluency practice. His site includes current research articles to inform educators, and reader’s theater scripts to make practicing fluency fun.
Read Write Think – Specifically, the classroom resource section is filled with ideas to supplement lesson plans.
My favorite poetry resources:
Poetry 180: – It provides a poem a day for high school level, but I often find it useful for middle school too!
Novels that teach poetry! See the images below for my favorites. Love That Dog by Sharon Creech is filled with wonderful poetry that can be used for writer’s workshop models.
The Poetry Friday Anthology (Common Core K-5 edition): Poems for the School Year with Connections to the Common Core
irreplaceable resource for incorporating poetry throughout every unit. It’s intended to provide one poem a week, but because they are also listed by theme, it lends itself to thematic use. The hands-down best feature of this book is that it provides a one-page directions page for each poem. For teachers who feel hesitant to dive into poetry, this book provides an excellent safety net.
My favorite professional development for teaching grammar and writing:
Acts of Teaching: How to Teach Writing by Joyce Armstrong Carroll and Edward Wilson – If you ever have the opportunity to attend an ABYDOS Training Institute, take it! This class gave me the confidence to both write personally, and teach writing. If your district doesn’t offer this training, but you’re committed to learning, this (weighty) book is filled with ideas for how to teach the writing process, and most importantly, how to implement writing groups.
Jeff Anderson: The self proclaimed “Write Guy,” Jeff Anderson’s books and conferences have revolutionized how I teach grammar. His main idea is that the first image you see imprints in your brain, so use quality mentor sentences to teach grammar patterns. His books are easy to use and implement, and if you get the chance, attend one of his workshops!
My favorite professional development for teaching reading:
Check out other resources for teachers