• Beyond the Kidney-Shaped Table: The New Role of the Specialist

    Beyond the Kidney-Shaped Table: The New Role of the Specialist

    By Rita Platt “Most people think of leadership as a position and therefore don’t see themselves as leaders.” ~Stephen R. Covey           When I first began as a reading specialist my job was simple and clear. [...]

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  • Two-Column Notes: The Twin Pillars Supporting Reading and Writing of Non-Fiction Texts

    Two-Column Notes: The Twin Pillars Supporting Reading and Writing of Non-Fiction Texts

    By Rita Platt & John Wolfe The amazing processes of reading comprehension may never be as invisible as when students first start reading informational texts. For a neophyte reader of non-fiction texts, word-for-word or even sentence-by-sentence, the text has meaning. [...]

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  • 5 Things I Finally Understand About Teaching and Learning

    5 Things I Finally Understand About Teaching and Learning

    By Rita Platt What is your philosophy of education? This was the question that the professor asked us in my second year of my teacher education undergraduate program. Philosophy of education? I had no idea. In fact it wasn’t until [...]

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  • Reflecting on Suicide

    Reflecting on Suicide

    By Amy Klein The resource room was a rare oasis of calm. One boy, typically surly and irritable, sprawled in a papasan chair, reading. Actually reading. At a round school table, another usually unsettled young man with flashing, intelligent eyes, [...]

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  • 3 Pillars of strong PLCs

    3 Pillars of strong PLCs

    I’ve been teaching for three years at St. Croix Falls Middle School, but have recently had to relocate to Stanley-Boyd, where they feel that they’re a good school, but are ready to make the push to be great. They’ve got a lot of big ideas, with the PLC being the most prominent. So, as a new teacher, I was recently able to attend a PLC conference facilitated by Eric Twaddle to learn about some of the expectations of my new school.

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  • Online literacy and new literacy

    Online literacy and new literacy

    This article is the 2nd in a series, based on action research I collected while studying for my M.Ed, explores the impact digital technology can have on how our students learn, and how we, as educators, can leverage that impact for the good of our students. Before I was introduced to wikis in April 2008, I never would have envisioned how much my teaching could use these new technologies. More importantly, my students could not be more ready to take their education to a new level that I sincerely hope will better connect them to the world and prepare them to participate in a digital world. The time is now, and while students have been hungry for this opportunity, the reinforcing research is thorough enough to justify using wikis,blogs, podcasts, Flickr, Moodle, and online writing technologies that I feel can significantly improve students’ writing, and perhaps more importantly, prepare them for digital citizenship.

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