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    IRA Grant, Award Deadlines Extended

    by IRA Staff
     | Oct 22, 2014
    Have you been too busy to finish your International Reading Association award or grant application? Good news: The deadline for some of the programs has been extended until Jan. 15, 2015. Here is the list of those with the extended deadlines,...Read More
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    Six Words for the 60-for-60 Challenge

    by April Hall
     | Oct 20, 2014

    Since the kickoff of the ILD 60-for-60 challenge last month, IRA staffers have receive a daily treat in their email inboxes:  a 60-second literacy activity. For our latest two-week round, we imagined what it would be like to pack for a yearlong trip to space. There are some very specific parameters to what someone can bring to the International Space Station and we started small and went smaller.

    For our personal belongings lockers, we asked questions that included what three CDs, books and movies had to be onboard, among other sentimental items. After admitting that, sure, you could take some type of tablet that could probably hold all the music, books, and movies you would ever want or need, we asked the staff to suspend their disbelief and work with us here. Our responses ran the gamut from The Bible to The Bell Jar, from reggae to experimental hip-hop.

    IRA’s brand new copywriter, Jessica Abbey, had a 60-for-60 baptism by fire when she started midstream. She says getting the questions every day helped her transition into the organization while she’s still working remotely from Brooklyn. She says she’s already found some common ground with new coworkers, even if she hasn’t met them face-to-face yet.

    “Overall, I think that the staff participating in the ILD 60 day challenge is a great idea, in that we are practicing the literacy lessons that we preach,” she says, “and having fun at the same time!”

    The second week of our challenge made things even more difficult when we had to pack our Personal Preference Kits. Just 3-inches-by-3-inches, this kit can hold items that are small in size, big in meaning. A photo, a special lucky charm, a slip of paper—not much more can fit. So we asked about those things, including a favorite quote that would be of comfort during a long year away from Earth. Answers included song lyrics, passages from books, and quotes from athletes.

    IRA Development Manager Rachel Krall said this latest round of activities is her favorite so far.

    “Like getting lost in a great story, a 60-second literacy activity allows us to explore the world in new ways,” Krall says. “I personally have never dreamed of being an astronaut—just the idea of space makes me sweat—but allowing ourselves to dream, even if only for 60 seconds, shouldn’t be something that we lose as adults.”

    As we enter the second half of the 60-for-60 challenge, the staff will have a chance for a little reflection from our 2014 ILD activity kit. Taking a cue from the “six-word memoir” movement, Jayme Gravell, IRA social media strategist, will send out a theme each day to inspire a six-word story (to be written in 60 seconds). Today’s prompt is “describe your weekend in six words.”

    Can you? Share your six-word story at social@reading.org.

    April Hall is the editor of Reading Today Online. She can be contacted at ahall@reading.org.

     
    Since the kickoff of the ILD 60-for-60 challenge last month, IRA staffers have receive a daily treat in their email inboxes:  a 60-second literacy activity. For our latest two-week round, we imagined what it would be like to pack for a yearlong...Read More
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    Bringing Diagnostic Teaching to Sierra Leone

    by Nancy Allen and Peter McDermott
     | Oct 16, 2014

    Editor’s Note: This story was originally printed in Reading Today magazine. Currently,  Sierra Leone is highly impacted by the Ebola crisis and schools are closed throughout the country and to compensate, students are learning some subjects at home via radio. As of this online publication, the Koinadugu region is Ebola-free and teacher training continues. IRA sends our sympathies for Ebola losses and our hopes the region will soon eradicate the disease.

    As rain thunders from the sky on the tin roof and the generator rumbles, 30 Master Teachers from villages across the Koinadugu region of Sierra Leone demonstrate best practices in literacy education. Volunteers from the International Reading Association (IRA) look on in celebration. This scene is part of an IRA initiative that was successfully launched in July 2013, through which approximately 640 teachers have been trained in Diagnostic Teaching Methods (DTM). The two-year project is co-sponsored with Catholic Relief Services and funded through the United States Department of Agriculture. The ultimate goal of the project is to improve classroom teaching and children’s learning throughout Sierra Leone.

    What Is the Diagnostic Teaching Methods Model?

    DTM is a K–12 model of instruction that is based on current literacy research and effective classroom
    practices. It is intended for countries where literacy educators have not been exposed to contemporary methods of teaching. A central component of DTM is its emphasis on participatory teaching methods that integrate research about prior knowledge, emerging literacy, vocabulary, comprehension, and the writing process. Teaching strategies such as KWL (what I Know, what I Want to know, what I did Learn), prediction, retelling, story structure, reciprocal teaching, and every-pupil-respond techniques are presented through demonstration lessons. After each demonstration lesson the participants discuss and reflect about how the DTM method might be effectively applied to their own school contexts. The project has been implemented in other African countries, such as Tanzania and Kenya, but this is the first time it has been taught in this West African country.

    Civil War Recovery, 80 Students Per Class

    Sierra Leone is a beautiful country that rests on the Atlantic Ocean and stretches inland to the neighboring countries of Guinea and Liberia. Although it has many natural resources—such as one of
    the finest ports in the world, iron, diamonds, and gold—the country continues to recover from a devastating civil war that created enormous challenges to its infrastructure and schools. The majority
    of its teachers are volunteers who are uncertified by the educational ministry. These volunteers teach in the hope of someday becoming certified. Teachers are typically faced with large classes containing
    as many as 80 children and have limited, or nonexistent, books and supplies. Most schools have no electricity or even plumbing, and certainly no technology. Yet despite these formidable challenges the teachers, both certified and uncertified, are highly motivated and committed to helping all children learn to read and write.

    The purpose of the project is to prepare school leaders in DTM so that they can later prepare other teachers throughout their regions. Two IRA members, Nancy Allen (Qatar University) and Peter McDermott (Pace University) conducted three one-week workshops spread across the academic year. Participants who complete all three workshops are eligible to be certified as DTM trainers. During the course of the program, they have been training other teachers in their districts in DTM methods and will be expected to continue to do so in the future. There are challenges in sharing DTM’s literacy methods in Sierra Leone. Many of the schools lack sufficient literacy materials such as books, paper, and pencils, and participants must learn to become creative with the few resources they do have. There are language differences to overcome, as the first language of people in Sierra Leone is Kreole, with English as a second language. Often written materials that seem clear in the United States are difficult for teachers in Sierra Leone to understand because of specialized vocabulary used in literacy education (e.g., schema, text structure, etc.).

    Combining Local Tradition With Teaching Methods

    The most exciting and engaging DTM lessons are those that actively involve the participants in discussion and critical thinking about the familiar. For example, to teach story structure, Nancy and Peter asked a volunteer to tell a traditional story. Kai, an experienced teacher, shared a story his father taught him when he was a boy. The story was about a boy who was always lazy and later became a
    poor, lazy man who could not afford a wife or children. Realizing that his life was a mess, he sought the advice of a sorcerer, who told him that he could easily become a rich man. All he had to do was collect a bucket of sweat! The man set out to collect his magic bucket of sweat, which required that he work without stopping. To his surprise, he soon found that he had filled the bucket and had also become rich. He married, had children, and lived happily ever after.

    After listening to Kai’s story, the trainees analyzed it according to its narrative structure and discussed its similarities and differences to other stories they knew. They discussed how story structure could be effectively used when teaching children how to understand, retell, and question other narrative texts. Culturally specific connections such as this were often used to demonstrate how to use the teaching strategies in the DTM Handbook. IRA’s efforts to contribute to literacy education in Sierra Leone are greatly needed and appreciated by all the people with whom Nancy and Peter met. The 21st Century requires skilled readers and writers, and countries such as Sierra Leone will only prosper when their children are literate and well educated. IRA is making important contributions to literacy education in this western African country.

    Nancy Allen, PhD (nancyjaneallen@gmail.com) is a visiting professor at Qatar University and has been an IRA member since 2009.
    Peter McDermott, PhD (pmcdermott@pace.edu) is a professor at Pace University and has been an IRA member since 1986.

    Editor’s Note: This story was originally printed in Reading Today magazine. Currently,  Sierra Leone is highly impacted by the Ebola crisis and schools are closed throughout the country and to compensate, students are learning some subjects at...Read More
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    Conference Makes Literacy/Science Connection

    by Morgan Ratner
     | Oct 10, 2014

    The National Science Teachers of America (NSTA) and the International Reading Association are teaming up to promote the importance of literacy in science education. The NSTA Area Conference on Science Education is Oct. 16-18 at the Greater Richmond Conference Center in Richmond, VA. Science and literacy are important partners, experts say, and teachers need more training to address the connection. On the final day of the conference, an entire series of sessions will focus on how literacy is vital to deep science learning.

    NSTA and IRA will convene a panel to kick off the day’s sessions. As the day goes on, the series of sesions will also feature a panel of eight award-winning authors affiliated with the NSTA and American Association for the Advancement of Science to meet with families and discuss literacy through a scientific perspective.

    Juliana Texley, President of the NSTA, says the motivation of science will encourage students to improve their reading skills, while great literature extends the ways in which students can apply their understanding of science.

    “Children approach science from many backgrounds, perspectives and learning styles. Great literature challenges the imagination, extends and deepens concepts,” Texley said. “The whole child benefits when great literature is used to put active learning in context. We must not only learn science but communicate it!”

    Saturday morning, IRA Exective Director Marcie Craig Post and Bill Badders, retiring president for the NSTA, plan to talk about literacy in the context of science. The pair is expected to provide concrete examples of the connection between the two areas.

    “We know literacy is the foundation of all learning,” Post says, “and that all teachers are educators of literacy, in every content area.

    “IRA supports teachers in every classroom, to deepen cross-curricular learning, and to make all students career and college ready.”

    Other area NSTA conferences are ongoing through the Fall. Registration for the full Richmond conference and for single days is still open.

    Morgan Ratner is a communications intern for the International Reading Association.

    The National Science Teachers of America (NSTA) and the International Reading Association are teaming up to promote the importance of literacy in science education. The NSTA Area Conference on Science Education is Oct. 16-18 at the Greater...Read More
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    The 2 Sisters Bring Student Choice and Successful Strategies to Teachers

    by Joanne Duncan
     | Oct 06, 2014

    Gail Boushey and Joan Moser are known all over the world as “The 2 Sisters.” Real-life sisters and educators, the woman have more than 60 years of experience combined in K-6 and special education, as well as a reading resource specialist and a literacy coach. As a professional development training duo, they collaborated to find a replicable, reliable way to teach children how to be independent lifelong learners.

    The authors of books including The Daily 5: Fostering Literacy Independence in the Elementary Grades and The CAFE Book: Engaging All Students in Daily Literacy Assessment & Instruction, they’ve also written a number of online articles and created professional development DVDs. The Sisters will join International Reading Association at 8 p.m. ET Oct. 9 for the next #IRAchat. Follow along on Twitter to talk with the ladies about the need and value of student choice.

    Nine years ago I attended my first Daily 5/CAFE workshop in Cheney, WA. That day changed my life forever. I sat in the crowded audience and hung on every word “The Sisters” spoke. They were witty, charming, wise and warm but most of all they had lived, breathed, and experienced the struggles I was currently having on my own teaching journey. I felt like they were talking to me about my classroom and my teaching as they described their early teaching/learning journey.  Several times throughout the conference I had to contain myself from wanting to stand up and shout, Yes! Yes!! Yes!!!

    The Daily 5 created by The Sisters is a framework to structure time for students to develop lifelong habits of reading, writing and working independently. The CAFE system helps students with mastering Comprehension, Accuracy, Fluency, and Expanding vocabulary.

    I attended the workshop on Saturday. On Sunday, I spent the day “redoing” my classroom so when my first graders came in Monday I was prepared to begin implementing the foundational lessons which create and sustain independent, motivated, strategic, and voracious readers. I felt a wave of relief because for the first time in my teaching I had a clear vision of where I was headed with my students and with the support of the Sisters, I knew how I could get there.

    After attending their conference I began to consider students’ strengths, the role choice and motivation played in students’ progress, explicit teaching of reading strategies, creating a sense of urgency, one-on-one conferring, classroom libraries, and the gradual release of responsibility. I bought books and more books by some of the educators/researchers The Sisters followed and became a member of the International Reading Association.

    The more informed I became, the greater my inspiration grew to do my own Classroom Action Research Project which centered on the impact of using a Student Centered Literacy Framework like the Daily 5/CAFE on students’ literacy growth as well as their love of reading and writing. Through my wide reading, active membership in the IRA, and my research project I came to believe in the process and saw the positive effects the Daily 5/CAFE had for my students, but I also experienced the impact it had on my teaching, learning, and understanding of how all the complex pieces of guiding students fit together to make successful, independent readers and writers. I was also informed, inspired, and empowered to share with colleagues and administrators what was happening in my classroom.

    After implementing the Daily 5/CAFÉ here is what it sounded like in my classroom, First Graders stating a reading goal:

    “I’m working on accuracy, that means I need to be able to read the words. I’m working on chunking letters and sounds together.”

    “I’m working on comprehension, I’m reading a chapter book without pictures, so I’m going to be making a picture in my mind because that will help me better understand the story.”

    “I’m reading about mammals. I will jot down my thinking about how lions and elephants are the same and how they are different.”

    However, the most inspiring comments to hear from the class at the end of Readers or Writers Workshop is a low groan. “Ohhh! Do we have to stop reading?” or “Do we have to stop writing?” Those words from my students let me know I truly succeeded in reaching them.

    Gail Boushey and Joan Moser are known all over the world as “The 2 Sisters.” Real-life sisters and educators, the woman have more than 60 years of experience combined in K-6 and special education, as well as a reading resource specialist and a...Read More
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