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Recent Newsletter Articles
Barbie Bungee: Illuminations
From the posting: "In this lesson, students model a bungee jump using a Barbie® doll and rubber bands. The distance to which the doll will fall is directly proportional to the number of rubber bands, so this context is used to examine linear functions." Appropriate for CCRS Level D, Level E. [Note: Resource only accessible for NCTM members.] Read More
Balancing the Equation
In this 5-minute talk, Matt Larson addresses the historic pendulum swing in instructional practice, addresses recent concerns about national academic standards and "new math", and suggests what math educators might advocate for today. Read More
Achieve the Core – Math Standards
The site describes itself as "full of free content designed to help educators understand and implement the Common Core and other college and career ready standards." Resources include CCRS-aligned tasks, activities, lessons and more, but also materials to support educators in understanding the standards and the content. Read More
What does text complexity mean for English learners and language minority students?
In this paper, the authors demonstrate how English learners can be provided with strategies for accessing complex texts, such as closely examining one sentence at a time, and argue that instruction must go beyond vocabulary and should begin with an examination of our beliefs about language, literacy and learning. Read More
Rigor, Relevance, and Respect for Beginning Adult English Learners
Oxford Picture Dictionary author Jayme Adelson-Goldstein shares tips for laying the foundation of college and career readiness skills in beginning level adult instruction. Read More
ReadWorks.org
ReadWorks provides a large, high-quality library of curated nonfiction and literary articles, along with reading comprehension and vocabulary lessons, formative assessments, and teacher guidance. Through this website teachers can access curriculum, lesson plans, and free training. Read More
Reading Skills for Healthcare Workers – ESL
A free online Career Pathway literacy curriculum based on CNA and general healthcare content, including 175 selections for intermediate-level readers between 5.5 and 8.5 grade levels. Read More
Choosing Complex Text
This video from ReadWriteThink features a first-grade teacher talking through the steps that she uses to select a complex text for her class. The strategies that are described are easily adapted to adult EL classrooms. Read More
Text Analysis Tools
ATOS for Text is used to calculate the readability level for shorter text passages such as magazine and newspaper articles, test items, and other classroom materials. Results that you will receive from this analysis include: ATOS Level, Word Count, Average Word Length, and Average Sentence Length. The Academic Word Finder from Achieve the Core (found in the Reading library) is a text analysis tool that pulls the most useful academic vocabulary words from a given text that is copied and pasted onto the homepage. Read More
Depend on the Text! How to Create Text-Dependent Questions
In this video from ReadWriteThink, a first-grade teacher demonstrates the process she uses to create text-dependent questions around a reading text. The strategies that are described are easily adapted to adult EL classrooms. Read More