The Language Arts Forum met last week at Central School. Three big ideas came up in our discussion.
1. We are working to develop Anchor Charts for teaching narrative, expository, and persuasive writing. We will have grade level teachers provide input so that we have an articulated guide by grade level for each type.
2. We will tackle a book study on A Framework for Understanding Poverty by Ruby Payne. If you don't have access to a copy of the book, it is available for $20 - 25 new on the Barnes and Noble or Amazon websites. You can also buy used copies or the e-reader format for kindles for $12 - 15. Put it on your Christmas list! Check back in January for discussion starters on this blog.
3. We hope to establish a Logan County Lending Library for classroom sets of novels. Michelle Ryan, from LCHS, talked about having several sets of books which are more appropriate for 6th - 8th grade students. We will spend some time this spring and summer on the lending library project.
A final note: contact Michelle Ryan if you are interested in joining Illinois Association of Teachers of English. They are trying to increase their elementary and jr. high contacts. The first year's membership is free!
I'm interested in the idea of the book study, especially after hearing so many good things about the book and the author. Also, I enjoyed our meeting last week. It's always so helpful to converse with other teachers about our experiences in the classroom, ideas, strategies, and so on.
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