Last Friday I invited the world (well, everybody that read that blog) into a new conversation about Reading. More specifically, I reminded readers of some very important issues and research that don’t seem to be part of the current conversations in literacy circles. The current buzz is only focused on standards and teacher assessment and […]
We’re Starting a NEW Conversation about Reading If you have been following my blog lately, you have heard me assert that it is time to “Change the Conversation” around basic literacy. · In late January, referring to babies, toddlers and preschoolers, I suggested that the value in reading a book with kids doesn’t only have […]
Last week, I wrote about Family Scholarly Culture, the qualitative differences found in the richness of conversations available in homes where books are discussed with children, and those where they aren’t (Evans, et al, 2010*). This graphic, inspired by the Evans study (conducted in 27 countries over a 20 year period) is one used in […]
In a recent research report [i], written by sociologists, the phrase, Family Scholarly Culture, was used to describe the quality of life inside homes where books regularly serve as levers for inserting new ideas and experiences into the ongoing family conversation. This research was conducted in 27 countries (of every economic level and every […]
Recently, I’ve made some (what I would hope to be perceived as) gentle (though utterly failed) attempts to coax my colleagues into a discussion about what I see as our confused priorities when it comes to reading education. Beginning with the premise that “What gets measured gets done,” I have shared my observations that our […]
The school library is the most important room in the school. No, Really. It is! For the sake of those who may doubt this assertion, permit me to begin with the more basic idea that avid reading is the keystone of a complete education… “Keystone” of course means that without it everything falls apart. In […]
Oh, they look like they are doing what the teacher assigned, or they leave the impression that they have gone blissfully to bed, or they sit quietly in the back seat, apparently playing a not particularly exciting video game. They go by many names. Amid the din and bustle of the school bus, the driver […]
Books have a complex and magical “Shelf” life. They sit there on a shelf, compact, dormant, unblinking(!) Waiting, even. But the instant they are pulled down and opened, they wonderfully spring to life in our hands. For first-time readers of a book, what emerges is all new and exciting, full of surprises and unexpected connections to things […]
Enough with reading, let’s do some math here. Surely you’ve noticed the trend across blogs and websites to have numbers in their title these days. So, let’s run some of those numbers… My current favorite reading campaigns (You didn’t really think I’d write about anything but reading-focused math did you?) are 1000 Books Before Kindergarten […]
Bringing children to be fluent readers is a laudable goal for any school. However, the sad truth is that so few children actually get there. That’s not even news anymore. Is reading that odious an activity that we can’t get kids to be good at it? Well, no. We have just been trying to do […]
