Choosing Texts for ELA CCSS

The Common Core State Standards for ELA are in part designed to help students become engaged, critical, interactive readers and interpreters of texts and information. As students grow into more capable readers and learn new strategies for engaging with texts and resource materials, educators can select texts with increasing levels of complexity to challenge their students and motivate them to move forward. Many teachers have questions about how to make these text selections, and how to find texts that are aligned
with the CCSS.

Achievethecore.org has a toolbox of resources for teachers to help them better understand what goes into text selection, and how to choose texts and reading materials that align with the expectations for text complexity set by the CCSS for each grade level.

CHECK OUT THEIR TEXT COMPLEXITY PAGE to find resources for measuring text complexity, finding texts, lesson planning from text complexity, and more.

FREE WestEd Webinar: A Curriculum-First Approach to Technology and the Web

Many educators have concerns about the way that technology can seem like a haphazard element of instruction--something that gets added into the classroom because it seems important and on-trend, but isn't necessarily integrated with the curriculum.

This free webinar from WestEd helps present ideas and strategies for making technology a central, integrated, transformative part of the learning environment, and not merely something added on in an ad hoc manner.

Take a look at the webinar (roughly 1hr and 15 minutes) to get a better sense of how everything from technology infrastructure to stakeholder readiness can impact the way technology is integrated into the curriculum.

CLICK HERE TO WATCH!

Free Video Series--Geometry Instruction for K-8 Teachers!

If you have spare time this summer, take a look at the amazing, in-depth, comprehensive teacher resources from ANNENBERG LEARNER. The mission of the nonprofit organization is "To Advance Excellent Teaching in American Schools." The website is full of fantastic resources for all disciplines, and well worth a closer look.

Included in those resources are a number of in-depth video courses with supporting materials targeted to a variety of grade levels and subject areas. THIS VIDEO SERIES helps frame geometry, not only as a set of skills or objectives for your students to master, but also as a strategic method for problem solving in general. To follow the entire series, you should allow for the better part of a day. Begin with the first session, and then follow along with the prompts to move through the entire series.