This innovative resource describes how teachers can help students employ "literacy tools" across the curriculum to foster learning. The authors demonstrate how literacy tools such as narratives, question-asking, spoken-word poetry, drama, writing, digital communication, images, and video encourage critical inquiry in the 5-12 classroom. The book provides many examples and adaptable lessons from diverse classrooms and connects to an active Website where readers can join a growing professional community, share ideas, and get frequent updates: http://literacytooluses.pbworks.com

"In Tools for Teaching Content Literacy Janet Allen put a wealth of research-based instructional tools at teachers' fingertips to help students make connections with information resources and to read critically. More Tools for Teaching Content Literacy extends this treasure trove with twenty-five new instructional strategies - from Expert Groups to Point-of-View Guides to Wordstorming - using the same compact tabbed flipchart format. More Tools is a handy reference that provides instant access to succinct description, practical strategies, and manageable assessments, allowing teachers to save time and be more flexible and confident in meeting students' needs."--BOOK JACKET.

"We have never seen teachers work harder than we do now. These tools inspire kids to work as hard as we are." -Kate Roberts and Maggie Beattie Roberts What's DIY Literacy? It's making your own visual teaching tools instead of buying them. It's using your teaching smarts to get the most from those tools. And it's helping kids think strategically so they can be DIY learners. "Teaching tools create an impact on students' learning," write Kate Roberts and Maggie Beattie Roberts. "They help students hold onto our teaching and become changed by the work in the classroom." Of course, you and your students need the right tools for the job, so first Kate and Maggie share four simple, visual tools that you can make. Then they show how to maximize your instructional know-how with suggestions for using the tools to: make your reading and writing strategies stick motivate students to reach for their next learning goal differentiate instruction simply and quickly. Kate and Maggie are like a friendly, handy neighbor. They offer experience-honed advice for using the four tools for assessment, small-group instruction, conferring, setting learning goals, and, most important, helping students learn to apply strategies and make progress without prompting from you. In other words, to do it themselves. "It is our greatest hope," write Kate and Maggie, "that the tools we offer here will help your students to work hard, to hold onto what they know, and to see themselves in the curriculum you teach." Try DIY Literacy and help your readers and writers take learning into their own hands.

Winner: Association of Educational Publishers 2009 Distinguished Achievement Award Finalist: Association of Educational Publishers 2009 Golden Lamp Award Are there students in your classroom who have hit the reading wall? Studies indicate comprehension regresses in many students once they reach middle school. Teachers need the right resources in their classrooms for engaging students in reading. This book is a veritable encyclopedia of literacy strategies secondary teachers can apply to all content areas immediately. It integrates key strategies, research from top literacy experts, and proven intervention practices. Benefits: Gain access to the most relevant research on literacy and its application in the classroom. Employ powerful tools to aid reflection and the implementation of new strategies. Discover over 50 strategies for engaging adolescent learners, empowering strategic learning, building comprehension, developing vocabulary, and writing to learn. Access over two dozen reproducibles for teachers and students.

This accessible book will help elementary school teachers improve literacy instruction inside or outside the Common Core environment. The authors address teachers' instructional needs by introducing key concepts from current trends in literacy education--from high-level standards to the use of 21st-century literacies. Readers then follow teachers as they successfully implement the curriculum they developed to promote high-level thinking and engagement with disciplinary content. The text focuses on three disciplinary literacy units of instruction: a science unit in a 2nd-grade classroom, a social studies (history) unit in a 4th-grade classroom, and a mathematics unit in a 6th-grade classroom. Each unit revolves around a central inquiry question and includes research-based strategies for using reading, writing, and classroom talk as tools to foster disciplinary understandings. This unique, insider's look at how real teachers build and implement a Common Core-aligned curriculum will be an invaluable resource for teachers, schools, and districts as they move forward to align their own curricula.

Fourth grade is a momentous year for literacy learning. Having left the primary grades behind, students must grapple with more demanding texts and content material--and effective, motivating instruction can help them succeed. This book helps teachers vanquish the dreaded "fourth-grade slump" by creating an energized and organized learning environment in which all students can improve their reading and writing strategies. Taking readers into the classroom of an exemplary fourth-grade teacher, the book includes useful assessment tools, differentiation techniques, mini lessons, unit plans, reproducibles, and examples of student work. Special attention is given to meeting the challenges of high-stakes testing without sacrificing instructional quality.

This book provides 3rd through 12th grade teachers with more than 50 teacher-tested tools and techniques for helping their students read independently and critically. Authors Pérsida and William Himmele and National Board Certified teacher Keely Potter present literacy as an interconnected process that involves emotions, cognition, and multiple opportunities for developing higher-order thinking. With this in mind, they present tools for helping students develop academic language, become avid and analytical readers, engage with literature and informational texts, discuss texts, and write about texts in clear and cogent ways. Each chapter includes reflections from real teachers and students who share their own literary practices and journeys, bringing the practices to life. With a focus on engaging students as thinkers, readers and writers, Total Literacy Techniques provides practical and effective ways for teachers to help students develop the critical reading habits that open up new ways of understanding and contributing to their worlds. Pérsida Himmele and William Himmele are the authors of the best-selling ASCD book Total Participation Techniques: Making Every Student an Active Learner.