Literacy Is Not Enough

How to upgrade literacy instruction for digital learners Educating students to traditional literacy standards is no longer enough. If students are to thrive in their academic and 21st century careers, then independent and creative thinking hold the highest currency. The authors explain in detail how to add these new components of literacy: Solution Fluency Information Fluency Creativity Fluency Collaboration Fluency Students must master a completely different set of skills to succeed in a culture of technology-driven automation, abundance, and access to global labor markets. The authors present an effective framework for integrating comprehensive literacy or fluency into the traditional curriculum.

Modern fluencies provide a platform for authentic teaching, learning, and assessment While reading, writing, and arithmetic remain important, they are no longer enough. Learners must move beyond traditional literacies to modern fluencies--the unconscious mental processes that are learned, adapted, and applied in real-world problems and challenges.The authors unpack six core fluencies to better reflect social, cultural, and economic shifts of modern times. Practical resources are presented alongside · Fluency Unit Plan Exemplars · Assessment rubric examples · Discussion questions

The last two decades have witnessed a considerable reaction to the progressive utopianism of the 1960s. In education debates all over the English-speaking world, the talk is now of competition, back to basics, league tables, the demands of the market. This reaction has gone too far. Children need to be helped not only to achieve basic literacy but to read "critically," to discriminate, to evaluate, to enjoy great literature. It is not enough to help children to achieve literacy if this simply means they read only sufficiently well to be seduced by advertisers and tabloid newspapers. The essays in this book are by people engaged in the "promotion" of English, be they primary teachers or university lecturers, novelists or poets, publishers or social commentators, politicians or professors.

Modern fluencies provide a platform for authentic teaching, learning, and assessment While reading, writing, and arithmetic remain important, they are no longer enough. For learners to thrive, they must move beyond traditional literacies to modern fluencies—the unconscious mental processes that are learned, adapted, and applied in the context of real-world problems and challenges. In this book, the authors unpack the fluencies (solution, information, creativity, communication, collaboration, and global citizenship) to reflect the relentless social, cultural, and economic shifts of modern times. Practical resources are presented alongside: Authentic Unit Plan Exemplars for each fluency Assessment rubric examples Discussion questions Learners today must master an entirely different set of essential skills and knowledge needed to succeed than previous generations. This book provides a practical framework for integrating new fluencies into traditional curriculum.

Tens of thousands of K?3 teachers have relied on this book--now revised and expanded with more than 50% new material--to plan and deliver effective literacy instruction tailored to each student's needs. The authors provide a detailed framework for implementing differentiated small-group instruction over multiweek cycles. Each component of the beginning reading program is addressed--phonological awareness, word recognition, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. In a large-size format with lay-flat binding for easy photocopying, the book includes dozens of reproducible lesson plans, instructional activities, assessment forms, and other tools. Purchasers get access to a Web page where they can download and print the reproducible materials. New to This Edition *Differentiation 2.0: the approach has been fine-tuned based on field testing, new research findings, and current standards and response-to-intervention frameworks. *Many additional reproducible tools, such as coaching templates and the Informal Decoding Inventory. *Beyond lesson plans and materials, the second edition offers more guidance for designing instruction and grouping students, making it a one-stop resource. *Reproducible tools now available to download and print.

Today, educators often find themselves facing a dizzying array of materials and resources, whether they are a box of dusty skills cards handed down from a retiring teacher, a professional book passed on by a colleague, a procedure recommended by a supervisor, a program required by a district, a book reviewed on a blog, a unit downloaded from a website, or a strategy highlighted in a brochure. But how do we know which of these will help the children in our classrooms? How do we find helpful resources without squandering funding or instructional time-not to mention our students' potential? In The Right Tools, Towanda Harris lays out a path that teachers and administrators can use to make informed decisions about what resources and practices they need for the students they teach. Rather than telling you what to buy or use, Towanda offers tools and guidance to help you to make that decision as you identify what you and your students need match resources with your goals for your students use the resource with a focus on your students assess how well the resource is working adjust how you are using the resource as necessary utilize one of the most powerful resources available to you as a teacher-your colleagues. Resources are only a piece of your teaching, alongside knowledge of best practices, and a deep understanding of your students. Yet each of these pieces can have powerful effects. By finding and using resources that are well matched to your students and their academic goals, you can keep working to help students reach their full potential.

CNN host and best-selling author Fareed Zakaria argues for a renewed commitment to the world’s most valuable educational tradition. The liberal arts are under attack. The governors of Florida, Texas, and North Carolina have all pledged that they will not spend taxpayer money subsidizing the liberal arts, and they seem to have an unlikely ally in President Obama. While at a General Electric plant in early 2014, Obama remarked, "I promise you, folks can make a lot more, potentially, with skilled manufacturing or the trades than they might with an art history degree." These messages are hitting home: majors like English and history, once very popular and highly respected, are in steep decline. "I get it," writes Fareed Zakaria, recalling the atmosphere in India where he grew up, which was even more obsessed with getting a skills-based education. However, the CNN host and best-selling author explains why this widely held view is mistaken and shortsighted. Zakaria eloquently expounds on the virtues of a liberal arts education—how to write clearly, how to express yourself convincingly, and how to think analytically. He turns our leaders' vocational argument on its head. American routine manufacturing jobs continue to get automated or outsourced, and specific vocational knowledge is often outdated within a few years. Engineering is a great profession, but key value-added skills you will also need are creativity, lateral thinking, design, communication, storytelling, and, more than anything, the ability to continually learn and enjoy learning—precisely the gifts of a liberal education. Zakaria argues that technology is transforming education, opening up access to the best courses and classes in a vast variety of subjects for millions around the world. We are at the dawn of the greatest expansion of the idea of a liberal education in human history.