Rethinking Small Group Instruction In The Intermediate Grades

Small-group instruction becomes a strategic, differentiated tool for Response to Intervention in Dr. Nancy N. Boyle's new resource, Rethinking Small-group Instruction in the Intermediate Grades. In this complete and ready-to-go resource, Dr. Boyles answers key questions about transforming small-group instruction to meet RTI objectives: How can I teach comprehension strategies during small-group instruction?; How do I align high-stakes standards with comprehension objectives?; Where do fluency, vocabulary, and author's craft fit in small-group discussion?; How can I explicitly teach skills and ­promote meaningful discussions?; and How do I effectively include intermediate-grade students who function at a primary level? Rethinking Small-group Instruction in the Intermediate Grades provides sixteen options to differentiate small-group instruction. Teachers focus on reinforcing comprehension skills and strategies while explicitly teaching students how to construct basic meaning about both literary and informational texts and master the art of discourse, which leads to higher-level critical and creative thinking. Boyles shows intermediate teachers how to embed the Common Core State Standards into small-group instruction and provides all of the rubrics, checklists, planning templates, and prompts necessary to implement these instructional formats in both the book and the included CD. The useful CD also contains target sheets matched to each objective that explain how to find the best evidence to meet the objective. Let Rethinking Small-group Instruction maximize the power of your small-group instruction to differentiate your teaching and efficiently meet RTI goals and national standards at the same time.

Educators spend an abundance of time planning and preparing lessons, but how often do we as educators stop to think about and analyze the overall outcomes of our lessons--retention of knowledge, the appropriateness of the strategies, learner engagement, etc. The Educator Reflection Tips series provokes in-depth analysis of your everyday instructional practices, provides insights into what research says should be included within all aspects of instruction, poses reflection questions to help readers determine the effectiveness of the educational approaches used, and Fowler-White has even included tools to use as you craft a plan to adopt, adapt, or enhance your current practices. The distinctive format of the first volume in this series enables readers to choose their own path to attain knowledge. Unlike other educational books, each Reflection Tip is written independently from the others, so there is no need to read the text cover to cover as is the traditional method of content written for educators. The three distinct clusters found within this volume include: #1 Content-driven Concepts which focuses on the instructional core and content-specific knowledge. #2 Classroom Competencies that outline instructional strategies educators can incorporate into their practice. #3 Classroom Culture which provides guidance for developing relationships and meeting the diverse needs of students. Additionally, you will find the E.M.P.O.W.E.R. Feedback Framework which the author created to outline the steps educators should take to help students take ownership of their learning and a Summertime S.L.I.D.E. Toolkit to help combat learning loss. It's everything you need to elevate your instructional practice. Come reflect with me!!

Close . . . Closer . . . Closest! Close Reading. Not in a very long while has a term been freighted with so much responsibility to lead every student to a great future of college and career readiness. Finally, here’s a book that tunes out all of the hubbub and gets down to the business of showing how exactly to “get close reading right.” Chapter by chapter, Nancy Boyles delivers astoundingly practical ideas on how to Connect close reading with other instructional practices Select rich texts and plan for initial close reading lessons Deliver initial and follow-up close reading lessons Coordinate comprehension strategies and close reading

Teaching English language arts at grades K-5 is both a science and an art. Educators must teach literacy skills and content with best practices, while also keeping focus on each student's individual needs. They are challenged to monitor students working independently while also conducting small group instruction. And they must focus on providing differentiated support with a rather complicated text. With increased attention to rigor, requirements, and personalized instruction, it can be a challenge to make sure all students are receiving instruction that is just right. Comprehensive Literacy Basics: An Anthology by Capstone Professional contains useful tips to support educators. Chapters focus on each part of the literacy and language arts block, including whole group, small group, writing, and differentiation. A collection of expert authors specializing in literacy and language arts instruction contributed chapters to the book. The quick tips and suggestions within will reinforce current practices while providing an invaluable go-to reference.

The ability to comprehend and to respond meaningfully to text is a skill students need every day--not just on test day. That's a GREAT Answer! provides complete and ready-to-go support to help teachers get great answers to open-ended comprehension questions from the students who need help the most--elementary students, struggling older readers, and English language learners. In this revised second edition, Nancy Boyles now includes new Common Core State Standards-based objectives, step-by-step lesson sequences, collaborative tasks that link teaching to learning, insightful new teaching tips, updated and enhanced bibliographies, and student targets on the CD that specify how to meet each objective and answer a particular comprehension question. Her ready-to-go student scaffolds then break comprehension objectives into fifty-three specific, measurable, open-ended questions divided among four thinking strands. A chart shows the correlation between all objectives and the Common Core State Standards for comprehension--easily aligned to the literacy objectives of any state curriculum. Each open-ended question includes: a step-by-step lesson sequence; a template for a related oral collaborative task; teaching tips; a bibliography of fiction and nonfiction picture books aligned with the question; a template instructing students how to find key evidence for the objective before writing their response; an answer frame scaffold for initial response practice that helps students at any grade level organize and elaborate; and a target on the CD that specifies for students how to meet each objective and answer a particular comprehension question. The included CD provides all of the answer frames and targets for the open-ended questions, as well as rubrics, criteria charts, planners, and an extensive master bibliography that matches key fiction and nonfiction literature models with appropriate objectives. From setting a foundation with great standards, books, and instruction through guidelines for assessment, That's a GREAT Answer offers a (now more) complete, great answer for teachers who want to empower their students to respond well to open-ended questions.

Now you can easily deliver the shared reading comprehension lessons you need to launch RTI Tier 1 instruction--setting the stage for Tier 1 small-group instruction as well as Tier 2 and Tier 3 interventions. Launching RTI Comprehension Instruction with Shared Reading provides intermediate-grade teachers with: Flexible shared reading plans for 45-, 60-, and 90-minute instructional blocks and guidelines to implement Tier 2 and Tier 3 comprehension interventions; Criteria to select comprehension objectives, choose texts, and create lessons that support students before, during, and after reading; Strategies that move students toward independence in meeting comprehension objectives through explicit, systematic instruction that culminates in written response; Assessment rubrics, checklists, and anchor sets to evaluate students' literature responses; Lessons and support materials for 40 different objectives organized into four thinking strands: forming a general understanding, developing an interpretation, making reader/text connections, and examining content and structure; and Independent follow-up activities in oral language, fluency, vocabulary, comprehension, and writing that help students apply what they have learned in the shared lesson. Tips for adapting instruction to English language learners and reflection questions at the end of each chapter round out this complete resource. The included CD provides modifiable electronic versions of planning and support documents, along with additional lesson materials not included in the book.

In this Grade 5 Teacher's Resource Guide, you will find:10 best practices for close reading applied to small group instruction; Strategies for differentiating instruction for on grade level, approaching grade level, above grade level, and English Language Learners; Mini-lessons to teach the process of independent close reading; A launching lesson for each unit; Lessons for all six books (3 literary sources and 3 informational sources) that include independent close reading, follow-up text-dependent questions, and a skill matched to the selected passages; A text-to-text lesson at the end of the unit integrating all sources; Assessment tasks aligned to Common Core Standards and Depth of Knowledge; Rubrics, checklists, annotation sheets, skill targets, answer frames, and more to help you scaffold student learning.