http://www.readwritethink.net/about/community-stories/readwritethink-entry-point-professional-11.html
Contribute to ReadWriteThink / RSS / FAQs / Technical Help / Contact Us
- About IRA
- About NCTE
- About Verizon Thinkfinity
- Standards
- Our Advisors
- Our Authors
- Community Stories
- News
Home › About Us › Community Stories
Community Story
Scott Filkins
Champaign, IL
Literacy Coach
"I've been impressed at how often I've been able to recommend and adapt ReadWriteThink resources with colleagues in coaching situations."
ReadWriteThink is an Entry Point to Professional Growth
I take my role as a teacher and literacy coach seriously, gaining satisfaction from the intensity of collaboration with other teachers as we work together to implement effective ways of supporting learning through literacy in their classrooms. But I also enjoy the excitement that comes with every class period with students, not always knowing for sure where the fifty minutes will take us. I like to think of ReadWriteThink as my entry point into other resources from NCTE and IRA. I’ll often find a link to an article from English Journal or The Journal of Adolescent and Adult Literacy that I may have missed. I’ve also found book titles related to lessons I like that have become the starting point of more sustained professional development.
When I'm not teaching, I enjoy reading, obsessing over the content and organization of my iPod, and spending weekends exploring the parks of our community with our son.
 |
Highlights |
Affiliation with a professional organization, particularly NCTE in my case, has been a great experience. Collaborating and sharing ideas with dedicated professionals has offered me ways of viewing myself as a contributor to the field while also improving my work with students in the classroom. This certainly applies to my affiliation with ReadWriteThink. When I submit a teaching idea as a lesson plan, I get valuable feedback from peers, helping me to refine my work for publication and to reflect on my classroom practices and procedures.
 |
Recommendations |  |
When I find a lesson plan on ReadWriteThink that really speaks to me as a teacher, I always check to see what other lessons the author has published on the site. More often than not, I find some other great ideas to incorporate into my classroom repertoire.
|
ReadWriteThink Favorites | |
Grades 6 – 12 | Podcast Series
Text Messages: Recommendations for Adolescent Readers
Text Messages is a monthly podcast providing families, educators, out-of-school practitioners, and tutors reading recommendations they can pass along to teen readers. Each episode will feature in-depth recommendations of titles that will engage and excite teen readers.
Grades 9 – 12 | Lesson Plan | Standard Lesson
Sonic Patterns: Exploring Poetic Techniques Through Close Reading
Students develop close reading skills connecting sound with sense in the poem “Those Winter Sundays,” and write an original text that reflects their new learning.
Grades 6 – 12 | Student Interactive | Learning About Language
Explore the similarities and differences among words typically considered synonyms with this tool that allows middle- and secondary-level students organize groups of words by connotation on one axis and by register on another.
Grades 7 – 12 | Calendar Activity | August 4
President Barack Obama was born today in 1961.
Students are introduced to a passage by President Barack Obama in his book Dreams from My Father and are encouraged to engage in an examination of the ways they are portrayed by the media.
