Born to Teach

• Teacher reads to the class from a book.
• Teacher reads something to the class from a newspaper, magazine, riddle book, joke book, book or poetry, or other “real-world” sources.
• Children read something they choose from a large and varied selection.
• Children learn more about the topic they are studying.
• Children do a word wall activity with high-frequency, commonly misspelled words and /or with topic related big words.

• Children participate in guided reading activity.
• Children participate in a focused writing lesson.
• Teacher models topic selection and writing a short piece.
• Children write on a topic of their own choice.
• Children work with words- looking for patterns, learning how to chunk and decode big words and so forth.

• All children share something they have written.
• All children share something they have read.
• One-third of the class revises, edits and publishes a piece of writing.
• Children read to their little buddies.
• Children do research related to a topic. 

Adapted from Classrooms That Work by Allington and Cunningham, page 268.