Professional Learning for Busy Educators

"The following are a few of the reasons students might be reluctant to read. It is by no means an exhaustive list. There are some excellent researchers and teachers who have been exploring this topic in-depth. However, I would like to focus on four different trends that I noticed as a middle school teacher and explore of a few ideas for how to address these issues."

The term “student agency” continues to be at the forefront of the educational discourse around the world. By encouraging children to have more control over their learning, educators hope students will leave our classrooms and schools with a range of skills that will support them in being lifelong learners, engaged humanitarians and empathetic people.

Power and Agency is a crucial practice in our new ELA curriculum, as it gives the “why” for the work in our ELA classroom.  Power and Agency empowers students to advocate for themselves, our local and global communities and our environment.  It also encourages students to think critically about perspective, bias, and consider the equity of who’s voice is being represented, honoured or missing and neglected.  For an alway evolving Goodreads list of texts I recommend for Power and Agency- click here.

If I had to pick one thing that makes the biggest difference in the quality of any person’s education, the quality of their life, really, it would be reading. And I’m not really talking about basic literacy—not about the ability to read—I’m talking about reading for pleasure, to satisfy curiosities, to understand how people work and find solace in knowing we are not the only ones who think and feel the way we do.

That kind of reading.

But when I see what my kids do in school for “reading,” it doesn’t really look like reading. I ask them what books they are reading in school, and a lot of times they give me a blank stare. What they do in reading, they tell me, is mostly worksheets about reading. Or computer programs that ask them to read passages, not books, and answer multiple-choice questions.

each a student a lesson, and they learn something. But when they have a chance to author their own learning, including picking a subject and the method of explaining that subject, they likely will master a new skill and increase their knowledge of the subject at the same time.

Podcasting is a way of telling a story through audio — using pieces of sound files, voice overs, recorded conversations and effects woven into a narrative. Educators are finding podcasts useful in delivering content to students in all subject areas, including English-as-a-second-language classrooms, where educators “can use this tool to increase student exposure to English at home and in school,” Hani Morgan, now a professor of education at the University of Southern Mississippi, Hattiesburg, wrote in a 2015 article in Childhood Education, citing a 2008 article, “Podcasts in Education: Let Their Voices Be Heard.”

I love reading books, talking about books and sharing children's and young adult books with anyone who is willing to listen and chat. I have been a kindergarten teacher, a primary teacher, a teacher-librarian, a book reviewer and a workshop presenter for more than 30 years and have an endless, abiding passion for getting great books into the hands of children, young adults, teachers and parents. I hope you find something here that you will love; and then you can pass it on to someone you love!