This resource is a demonstration lesson presented at the 2014 Write for Texas Summer Institute. It provides a snapshot of a four to five week unit that engages students in the reading and writing workshop model.

This online resource is designed to enhance teachers’ knowledge and skills so they can effectively teach adolescent students who struggle with reading.

This resource series is designed to enhance teachers' knowledge and skill so they can effectively teach grammar in context. Teaching grammar in context uses powerful models like sentences within mentor texts, rather than marking errors and correcting weak or wrong examples. 

You will learn how to determine the meaning of grade-level academic English words derived from Latin, Greek, or other linguistic roots and affixes.

You will learn how the setting in a story can influence the development of the plot.

You will learn how the internal and external responses of characters, including their motivations and conflicts, contribute to the development of the story’s plot.

You will learn how to analyze different points of view, including first person, third-person omniscient, and third-person limited.

You will learn how to explain a playwright’s use of dialogue and stage directions.

You will learn how to determine or clarify the meaning of words using context within a sentence and in larger sections of text.

You will learn the importance of graphical elements (e.g., capital letters, line length, word position) in the meaning of a poem.

You will learn how to describe multiple themes in fiction, analyze how place and time influence the theme, and make complex inferences.

You will be able to identify figurative language and understand how it creates imagery, appeals to the senses, and suggests mood.

You will learn how to make connections between and across texts, including other media (e.g., film, play), and provide textual evidence.

You will learn how to describe the structural and substantive differences between an autobiography or diary and a fictional adaptation of it.

You will learn how to evaluate a summary of the original text for accuracy of the main ideas, supporting details, and overall meaning

You will learn how to use different organizational patterns as guides for summarizing and forming an overview of different kinds of expository text while distinguishing factual claims from commonplace assertions and opinions.

You will learn how to synthesize and make logical connections between ideas within a text and across two or three texts representing similar or different genres and to support the findings with textual evidence.