Watch fourth-grade teacher Robin Sands lead students through three different activities that use text passages to build vocabulary, reading comprehension, and collaboration.Read More
As a mission-driven nonprofit organization, our primary concern is helping ensure equitable opportunity for all students.
Working alongside schools, we’ve learned that great teaching is grounded in standards, data, and insights shared among educators. We believe a blog can help us make a difference by spreading the ideas and effective practices of educators we work with.
We’re proud of the expertise our team has built over our ten years, and we'll be featuring contributions from ANetters across the org on topics in which they’ve immersed themselves.
Filtering by Tag: literacy
Craig’s goals for his school are bigger than his team: just eleven teachers and no assistant principal. How did such a small team manage to improve the school’s test scores by a whopping 4.2%—one of the largest positive percentage changes in New York City?Read More
Simply stated, text complexity is how easy or hard a text is to read, based on quantitative and qualitative text features. Learn more about how to measure text complexity.Read More
A focus question is a text-dependent question that sets a succinct purpose for instruction. It outlines what students should be able to answer in writing as a culminating task and will shape the lesson, or series of lessons, to get students to that point.Read More
Text talks—those “book clubs” that help teachers plan instruction—represent a completely new approach to planning for most educators. Are you ready to try text talks at your school? Here is Fall Hamilton’s advice for implementing them as part of text-based planning.Read More
Just imagine a planning session that leaves you more energized and confident for class—or don’t imagine and watch this video of a text talk!Read More
Here are two instructional practices Liberty teachers use to ensure the school’s youngest students become confident, lifelong readers.Read More
In this video, a 4th grade teacher from Fall Hamilton shares her perspective on what it was like to transition from a standards-based to text based approach to planning.Read More
Almost everyone in education, especially teachers and school leaders, understands the importance of high-quality interim assessments to guide effective instruction. The problem is: How do you know which ones are best?Read More
Stanley Elementary School is known for their dedicated educators, who care deeply about students and are constantly developing their practice to meet the needs of their students. As first-year ANet partners, they’ve chosen instructional priorities that will align instruction with standards. In ELA specifically, they’re prioritizing complex text. In math, the focus is on the major work of the grade.Read More
In this post, we want to share a case study of two Chicago teachers’ approach to using the open-source materials offered by the Vermont Writing Collaborative.Read More
We’ve all been there: You’re scrambling to prepare a lesson and you think, "Why reinvent the wheel? Let’s check the interwebs." You google your topic and…28,000,000 results pop up. How on Earth do you decide what might be worth using with your students?Read More
When someone asks you a question, the ball’s in your court. Your brain engages in a deeper, more active way than if information were being fed to you. Teachers take advantage of this phenomenon when they ask thoughtful questions.Read More
Discussion can act as a bridge between reading and writing for students. It can prompt them to articulate, refine, and build on their ideas; and listening to their peers can expand their thinking.Read More
You’d be hard-pressed to find a school that isn’t focused on improving student writing. And that’s not surprising—it takes a lot of practice to transfer thoughts into writing, and to do so in a clear, compelling way.Read More