Teaching Reading Across the Day, Grades K-8
Methods and Structures for Engaging, Explicit Instruction
“Reading well across disciplines and within varied contexts will help students to be versatile, flexible, deep readers who can better learn from their reading, transfer skills across subjects, and use strategies to meet the unique demands of reading in each content area.”
– Jennifer Serravallo
Research-based, easy-to-use lesson structures for explicit and engaging teaching
In Teaching Reading Across the Day, literacy expert Jennifer Serravallo provides nine effective, predictable, research-based lesson structures that help busy teachers save planning time and focus their teaching—and student attention—on content rather than procedures. Each of the nine lesson structures (read aloud, phonics and spelling, vocabulary, focus, shared reading, close reading, guided inquiry, reader’s theater, and conversation) has its own chapter and features a wealth of resources that let you see the lessons in action in ELA, Science, and Social Studies classes, including:
- An annotated teaching vignette, lesson explanation, and research notes
- Tips for planning, structure and timing suggestions, and ideas for responsive teaching
- Detailed planning templates and 22 accompanying online videos covering over 3 hours of classroom footage
- Jen’s reflections, key look-fors, and ideas for next steps
The nine lesson structures can be used with any curriculum or core program, text, and subject, making it easier for teachers to maximize explicit and engaging teaching time across the day, and simplify planning and preparation.
Jen incorporates a wide range of compelling research about how best to teach reading to every student in your class and translates the research (or the science of teaching reading) into high-leverage moves you can count on to deliver powerful lessons again and again. She also honors the art of teaching reading, helping teachers tap into their experience and hone their expertise to make quick, effective classroom decisions that take student learning to the next level.
Teaching reading is the responsibility of all teachers – but how? This is the book that highlights the critical skills regardless of age or curricula. It emphasizes the active view of reading, the critical nature of reading for purpose, starts from what the reader brings to the text, and acknowledges that reading tasks and purposes can be unique to content areas. Packed with great ideas, grounded in research, and written for the teacher who wants to increase their impact on their students to share the passion for learning.
Teaching reading and learning to read are enormously complex tasks. It certainly involves phonics, but so much more. Jennifer Serravallo does a masterful job of unpacking what is involved in becoming a proficient reader. Equally important, she provides remarkably clear and readable examples, with supporting detail, of how to teach those many essential competencies involved in reading instruction. It's one thing to talk about what needs to be done to create readers; it's quite another to actually show how it's done in the classroom. Clearly Jennifer Serravallo is a master of both! If you're interested in putting the science of reading into action, this book is for you.
We know that teaching reading is rocket science but aren’t always sure how to fly the ship. This is the instruction manual. It’s the guide you need to right the ship and ensure that students learn to read at high levels. You’ll find practical ideas and examples that help you maneuver the complex world of literacy learning with ease.
This book is packed with tools, tables, tips, and practical lesson structures that support predictability and teacher decision-making. With student engagement front and center, Jen shows us that we don’t have to choose between structured and responsive teaching. Kids need both!
Once in a generation a teacher’s teacher comes along and makes plain what adults can do to ensure children thrive. Jen is that teacher, and this book is required reading for all of us who believe every child can develop powerful literacies, and want a role to play in that development.