Use reader response strategies to achieve Common Core goals in reading and in writing! Response journals—brief, personal writing in response to reading—can significantly improve reading comprehension. What′s more, when scaffolded over the year, reader response strategies promote engagement, build understanding of complex literary and informational text, and even help students provide supporting evidence in their writing—all goals of the Common Core. For educators eager to use reader response strategies, veteran teacher Lesley Roessing presents a unique, step-by-step approach that inspires thoughtful reading and skillful writing in Grades 5–12. Based on research and her own classroom experience, Roessing′s innovative writing exercises encourage students to read more deeply, develop questions, and participate actively in class. Beginning with simple response tasks and moving toward more complex assignments, the book provides a scaffolded curriculum for the full academic year. Developed for language arts and content area teachers, as well as literacy specialists, this resource includes: Examples of response journals for a wide range of genres, including fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and students′ personal reading Strategies for using reader response to guide classroom discussions, group work, book clubs, and journal writing at home Adaptations for students with diverse abilities Numerous classroom-ready templates and samples of student work Discover a well-structured writing curriculum that promotes confident learning and the joy of reading.

In her entertaining and edifying New York Times bestseller, acclaimed author Francine Prose invites you to sit by her side and take a guided tour of the tools and tricks of the masters to discover why their work has endured. Written with passion, humour and wisdom, Reading Like a Writer will inspire readers to return to literature with a fresh eye and an eager heart – to take pleasure in the long and magnificent sentences of Philip Roth and the breathtaking paragraphs of Isaac Babel; to look to John le Carré for a lesson in how to advance plot through dialogue and to Flannery O’ Connor for the cunning use of the telling detail; to be inspired by Emily Brontë ’ s structural nuance and Charles Dickens’ s deceptively simple narrative techniques. Most importantly, Prose cautions readers to slow down and pay attention to words, the raw material out of which all literature is crafted, and reminds us that good writing comes out of good reading.

Talking Texts is a guide for teachers to the steps and strategies of implementing text clubs in many forms— fiction and nonfiction book clubs, textbook clubs, article clubs, and even poetry clubs—in the classroom. All strategies presented are applicable to any discipline so that text clubs can be employed across the curriculum in any grade level.

a practical routine for learning in all content areas (k-12)

In this practical handbook, Lesley J. Roessing presents a unique step-by-step model of response journaling which demonstrates how teachers can plan and implement response journaling using concepts that can be applied to all content areas.The Write to Read: Reading Journals That Increase Comprehension teaches students in Grades 5û12 how to respond to reading material in a variety of ways, encourages students to read self-selected books, and helps them develop skills for deeper and more meaningful responses. The book contains a combination of theory, practice, practical advice, anecdotes, and teacher models, along with samples of student work. Readers will also find an array of tools for adapting the program to learnersÆ needs and interests and for evaluating student progress.