Watching this webinar from PaTTAN, you will learn why summarizing has been identified through research as highly effective for developing comprehension and writing. It defines a quality summary and how it differs from retelling or paraphrasing. Practical suggestions for explicitly teaching summary writing based on text and non-text sources will be shared, including scaffolds. The…
This book is an excellent, reader-friendly resource for kindergarten teachers and Early Childhood Educators. While infant and toddler development takes place before the Ontario curriculum kicks in, the authors are American. Their recommendations for preschoolers generally align with the age of our Year 1 kindergarten students. Much of the research and advice in the book…
When it comes to choosing texts for the classroom, educators have a lot of questions. Should we be looking at levels, lexiles or other readability criteria? Do we limit kids to “just-right” books? How can we scaffold instruction to help struggling readers access age- and grade-appropriate material? This book has answers! The authors cover quantitative…
Kate chats with Clara Fiorentini this week. Tune in to explore novels in the classroom: how class novel studies fit into structured literacy, how complex text can be scaffolded, using “read-alikes” to choose texts, and avoiding the perils of “extractitis” – don’t miss this thoughtful conversation about chapter books!
This title is a must-read for any educators working with multilingual learners (MLLs) of all ages, referred to in the book as English Learners (ELs). It affirms the necessity of a structured literacy approach for these students, while adding in the extra layers of support that may also be beneficial (e.g., comparing English and home…
This resource has been compiled by a group of Canadian language and literacy experts. It is organized into three primary segments. First, it highlights the essential information educators should possess about various research types, enabling them to stay well-informed and knowledgeable about the connection between language, reading, and writing instruction. The next section focuses on…
Dr Timothy Shanahan discusses the features that make a text complex, including background knowledge, organization, and text cohesion.
In this Reading Universe document, Reid Lyon summarizes, in plain language, what research has learned about reading development in the last 50 years. This resource will support Educators in professional development with a concise list that includes selective of studies that underlie each maxim.
In this International Dyslexia Association Perspectives article, Dr. Mary Schleppegrell has described three strategies educators can use to help students explore the language of complex texts. Educators can explicitly discuss the connections between the form and meaning of texts to help students read for deeper understanding.
In this Reading Rockets article, you will learn how to implement a research-based strategy to improve reading comprehension by focusing on text structures. The authors use the Text Structure Strategy (TSS) to explore the text structures of comparison, cause and effect, problem and solution, sequence, and description and how hierarchical text structures are usually a…
In this 2-page handout from Achieve the Core, you will learn all about text sets: what they are, why they are important, where to source some, and how to build your own.
In this overview from Reading Rockets on teaching text structure, you’ll learn about the 5 most common text structures (narrative, descriptive, expository, procedural/instructional, and argumentative/persuasive) and their features and how to help students learn to identify and use text structures in their reading and writing. The article also provides downloadable printables that can be used…
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