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Today’s Literacy Headlines

Each weekday, Reading Rockets gathers interesting news headlines about reading and early education.

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Note: These links may expire after a week or so. Some websites require you to register first before seeing an article. Reading Rockets does not necessarily endorse these views or any others on these outside websites.


A deep dive on U.S. reading and math scores, and what to do about them (opens in a new window)

National Public Radio

February 14, 2025

U.S. students were still nearly half a grade level behind in both math and reading in the spring of 2024, compared with achievement levels before the pandemic. That’s according to the latest release of the Education Recovery Scorecard, a data-rich deep dive into student learning. The Scorecard is a joint venture between Harvard University’s Center for Education Policy Research and The Educational Opportunity Project at Stanford University. Here are six quick takeaways from the new, third-annual Scorecard.

Opinion: Easy, DOGE. IES matters. (opens in a new window)

Flypaper (Fordham Institute)

February 14, 2025

DOGE, if it actually sought the “government efficiency” in its name, could help modernize IES, perhaps even put out to pasture some sacred cows, such as the regional labs. But slashing and burning, as happened the other day, won’t improve matters. It’s just going to weaken the foremost truth squad in American education, the chief sponsor and funder of rigorous analysis, reliable data, and clear-eyed evaluations in a realm that needs more of those things, not less.

Push To Dismantle Ed Department Fuels Worries About Special Education (opens in a new window)

Disability Scoop

February 14, 2025

While experts say that closing the agency would require an act of Congress, advocates are warning that any efforts to weaken the Education Department could have an outsized impact on the nation’s 7.5 million special education students. While federal laws including the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act guarantee students with disabilities certain rights in schools, the Education Department plays a major role in ensuring that these laws are implemented.

St. Louis Educators Learn What’s Missing in How They Teach Science of Reading (opens in a new window)

The 74

February 13, 2025

Flat test scores prompt educators from four St. Louis schools to visit Washington, D.C. to learn from Garrison Elementary. The school had implemented the science of reading before it gained popularity across the nation and has seen improved literacy scores as a result. The trip was part of a two-year program called the Emerson Early Literacy Challenge that launched last fall to help educators from the four St. Louis-area schools brainstorm ways to improve reading in the early grades.

Where Is the Kid Lit Community Online? (opens in a new window)

Publishers Weekly

February 13, 2025

As social media communities splinter, children’s authors and publishers wonder where their next digital gathering place will be. This social media shakeup has some considering the purpose of being online. “It gives us an opportunity to step back and reflect on our values—on what we want from social media in the first place, on who we want to be there and how we might lift up others via our platforms,” Messner says. “The chance to reset is an opportunity to follow people who share those values and want to build positive supportive communities together.”

Aliens and A.I. Are the Heroes of These Kids’ Sci-Fi Novels (opens in a new window)

The New York Times (gift article)

February 12, 2025

In the past few years, my journeys have taken me around the world. My audiences are mostly young people in middle school and high school. No matter the country or continent, they yearn to fit in, to not feel so “different.” In “What Fell From the Sky,” by Adrianna Cuevas, and “Oasis,” by Guojing, the best examples of humanity aren’t necessarily human, and the emotional yearning of the characters, longing for missing parents, is what makes the stories sing.

Teaching Young Students How to Overcome Cognitive Overload (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

February 12, 2025

Too often, cognitive overload prevents the true capabilities of competent students from shining through. They know and understand the content being taught, but they have difficulty demonstrating their mastery of the material. I teach all of my students, including those with ADD or ADHD, how to recognize and handle cognitive overload as a necessary life skill. Here’s how I teach it to students in grades K–6.

Chronic Absenteeism & Achievement Gap: Lowest NAEP Scorers Missed the Most Class (opens in a new window)

The 74

February 11, 2025

The quality of instructional materials, tutoring programs or new technology tools can’t make much of a difference if students aren’t in school. t’s impossible to prove that students performed better because they were in school every day, but it’s the logical conclusion. A detailed comparison of state test scores and student absenteeism by Rhode Island education officials suggests as much. 

Grounding Math Lessons in Picture Books (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

February 11, 2025

Starting lessons with a read-aloud can boost engagement and inspire students to make personal connections to math concepts. While some books directly align with current standards, many others tie into broader themes, seamlessly enhancing our learning. For example, A Three Hat Day, by Laura Geringer, illustrated by Arnold Lobel, provides a great introduction to multiplication by three, while Rollercoaster, by Marla Frazee, supports our exploration of estimating and rounding numbers.

Are picture books undervalued? This new ambassador of children’s literature thinks so (opens in a new window)

National Public Radio

February 10, 2025

Barnett is the Library of Congress’ newest National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. The position was established in 2008 to promote books and reading to kids across the country. Barnett’s plan is to focus on picture books. “The picture book is my favorite art form,” he said. “It’s such an incredible, vibrant, exciting, forward-looking, experimental art form. And I think it’s really undervalued, too.”

When Marian Sang by Pam Muñoz Ryan and Brian Selznick (opens in a new window)

School Library Journal

February 10, 2025

Just in time for Black History Month we consider this 2002 release and see how it has aged. Old nonfiction picture books age so poorly sometimes but this title had some incredible backmatter, even by 2025 standards. We discuss how this book has “sepia with depth” and somehow manages not to be boring looking and how we’d love to be remembered as “fierce but famous.”

Why the Buzz Around Teaching Facts to Boost Reading is Bigger Than the Evidence for It (opens in a new window)

KQED Mindshift

February 10, 2025

A growing chorus of education advocates has been arguing that phonics isn’t enough. They say that being able to decode the letters and read words is critically important, but students also need to make sense of the words. Some educators are calling for schools to adopt a curriculum that emphasizes content along with phonics. More schools around the country, from Baltimore to Michigan to Colorado, are adopting these content-filled lessons to teach geography, astronomy and even art history. Content skeptics … point out that there’s never been a study to show that increasing knowledge of the world boosts reading scores.

Explicit instruction: Students need more of it (opens in a new window)

Chalkbeat New York

February 07, 2025

As a progressive educator in New York City for 30 years, I thought I had all the answers. The best teaching had to do with inquiry, with “higher-level thinking,” with “student-centered” project-based learning. I still believe in all of that, but I now understand that these are just part of the picture. What students — especially struggling students — also need is teacher-directed explicit instruction. By explicit instruction, I am speaking of the “I-do, we-do, you-do” strategy, where the teacher models a concept or skill, engages students in targeted practice, checks and corrects understanding, and then gives students more independent practice, with more checking for understanding and corrective feedback.

4 Activities for Music and Reading Integration (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

February 07, 2025

An interdisciplinary approach can help elementary students deepen their appreciation for music while developing their literacy skills. Here are four specific reading and music integrations with clear benefits for reading and music learning: beatboxing and phonemic awareness; lyric dictations and fluency;  choral singing and comprehension; and hip-hop rhyming and reading with expression.

Scaffolding Like a Pro: Powerful Ways to Support Learning (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

February 07, 2025

Scaffolding provides tailored support through three approaches. Cognitive scaffolding is the general process by which a teacher provides targeted guidance and resources to help learners gain new skills that are initially beyond their independent abilities. Metacognitive scaffolding supports learners in planning, monitoring, and evaluating their own learning strategies. Procedural scaffolding guides students through the steps required to complete tasks. These approaches translate into specific, actionable strategies.

Reading Skills Are in Sharp Decline. Rescuing Them Won’t be Easy. (opens in a new window)

Ed Surge

February 06, 2025

Dolores Perez started tutoring students around the time the COVID-19 vaccine made it safe to meet in-person. What started as a part-time gig for a couple of students in 2021 now keeps her busy six days a week. When it comes to the youngest students she tutors, those in kindergarten through fourth grade, Perez says they all need help with reading. It’s not their fault, she says, or their parents’ or even the schools’ fault. It’s just what happened during the early days of the pandemic, when kids were stuck at home and beaming into school through a computer.

Grammar Aids Early Vocab Building (opens in a new window)

Language Magazine

February 06, 2025

A new study carried out at the MIT Language Acquisition Lab offers a novel insight into the early acquisition of vocabulary—sentences contain subtle hints in their grammar that tell young children about the meaning of new words. The finding, based on experiments with two-year-olds, suggests that even very young kids are capable of absorbing grammatical cues from language and leveraging that information to acquire new words.

New Book Says There’s More to Holding Students’ Attention Than Silencing Phones (opens in a new window)

The 74

February 04, 2025

From the myth of multitasking to ‘attention contagion,’ high school teacher Blake Havard hopes to arm educators with the tools of cognitive science. Step into Blake Harvard’s classroom and you’ll find that Less is Decidedly More. Sixteen tables, two seats to a table, all in rows, face front “because that’s where the instruction is coming from,” he said. About the only technology in the room: small handheld whiteboards, dry-erase pens and small stacks of index cards. The walls are almost entirely bare. And phones are out of the question, stowed in backpacks before class. Harvard has put these principles into his first book, published last week, titled, appropriately, Do I Have Your Attention? Understanding Memory Constraints and Maximizing Learning. 

5 Ways Teachers Can Get Boys to Love Reading (opens in a new window)

Education Week (subscription)

February 04, 2025

In response to the nation’s persistently poor reading report cards, a growing number of states in recent years have introduced sweeping legislation to mandate that schools implement evidence-based reading instruction in their classrooms. But overall, students’ reading test scores have yet to show significant improvement, and the number of “reluctant readers” grows. Now, some educators are bearing down on a strategy they hope will create better, and lifelong, readers: pleasure reading. Here’s a look at how four teachers across grade levels are piquing boys’ interest in reading for fun.

A Literary Genius Who Championed Nonsense (opens in a new window)

The New York Times (gift article)

February 04, 2025

Gianni Rodari used puns, topsy-turvyism and zany names to invent stories for children and help children invent their own. It goes largely unacknowledged but is nonetheless true that a complete accounting of any country’s literary geniuses will include several writers for children. Near the top of the list for Italy would be Gianni Rodari. Rodari was a schoolteacher, a journalist and, most important, the author of stories and poems for kids. 

Mac Barnett Named 2025-26 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature (opens in a new window)

School Library Journal

February 03, 2025

“It’s a profound honor to serve as ambassador. When I got the news, I was speechless, which is unusual for me,” Barnett said in a statement. “Now I feel energized to proclaim the many glories of children’s literature, with a particular focus on a unique and marvelous way of telling stories: the children’s picture book.” He has written more than 60 books for children, including picture books (and Caldecott Honor titles for Jon Klassen’s illustrations) Extra Yarn and Sam & Dave Dig a Hole, as well as the graphic novel series “The First Cat in Space.” Barnett’s platform will be “Behold, The Picture Book! Let’s Celebrate Stories We Can Feel, Hear, and See.”

6 Ways Technology Can Help You Teach Reading More Effectively (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

February 03, 2025

Some research points to benefits when digital tools like embedded dictionaries, shareable comments, or animated illustrations are available to readers. When used well, experienced educators say, technology can dramatically improve early reading instruction inside classrooms, revealing areas that students struggle with, providing a tangible record of growth over time, or motivating students to continue taking steps forward. Over time, a smart mix of print-based and tech-powered options enable students to flex their literacy muscles, reflect on their progress with intention, and develop into more thoughtful, proficient, curious readers.

Expected to Keep Ed. Dept. Focused on Achievement (opens in a new window)

The 74

February 03, 2025

Among supporters, Schwinn is primarily known for pushing the academic needle forward following the devastating effects of pandemic lockdowns in Tennessee. As commissioner under Republican Gov. Bill Lee, she used COVID relief funds to launch a statewide tutoring program and has been credited with revamping instruction to incorporate the science of reading. “This gives me hope that the Trump Administration wants to play a constructive role in addressing learning loss and improving our schools,” said Michael Petrilli, president of the conservative Thomas B. Fordham Institute.

The case for storytelling in the history curriculum (opens in a new window)

Flypaper (Fordham Institute)

January 31, 2025

For decades, we’ve bemoaned how remarkably little our students know about history. There are many reasons for this, but a critical one is that we rarely take advantage of their first years in school to provide structured and consistent social studies instruction. This is compounded by our failure to provide elementary teachers much, if any, history training during their preparation classes. The result is that teachers are often uncomfortable teaching it. A comprehensive, content-rich history curriculum offers a superior approach, one that distinguishes between truths and myths, primary sources and secondary ones. Exposed consistently to coherent, compelling stories, students would build a cohesive understanding of our history that prepares them much more effectively to carry on the civic work of perfecting our imperfect Union.

Why Are Reading Scores Still Falling on the Nation’s Report Card? (opens in a new window)

Education Week (subscription)

January 31, 2025

“Reading and math scores were declining even before the pandemic—especially for the lowest-performing students,” Colorado Gov. Jared Polis said. “Our challenge isn’t just to get back to normal; it’s to reverse decades of deterioration.” Why have scores on this national gauge of student achievement faltered over the last decade, and how can schools reverse that pattern? Those are complex, thorny questions. Education Week spoke with experts to dig into the factors that could be shaping the results.

The science of reading: It’s time to bring preschool teachers into the conversation (opens in a new window)

Chalkbeat

January 30, 2025

As a transitional kindergarten teacher in Oakland, California, my job is to get the youngest learners ready for school as part of California’s universal public preschool program. I teach my students how to get up when they fall, how to open a carton of milk without incident, and how to master the skills they will need to eventually become readers. Nursery rhymes to teach phonological awareness so students can recognize and manipulate the spoken parts of words. Play-Doh to teach phonics so they understand the relationship between letters and sounds. Dramatic play to teach comprehension since acting out stories can help kids better understand them. To me, this early literacy work is integral to addressing the current literacy crisis. 

Nearly 5 years after schools closed, the nation gets a new report card (opens in a new window)

National Public Radio

January 30, 2025

Almost five years have passed since COVID-19 first disrupted America’s schools, and new data, known as the Nation’s Report Card, offers cause for hope — and concern. The good news: In math, many students have made up at least some of the academic ground they lost during the pandemic. The bad news: In both reading and math, most fourth- and eighth-graders in 2024 still performed below pre-pandemic 2019 levels. What’s more, while these achievement declines were exacerbated by the pandemic, they appear to have begun even before COVID-19, raising important questions about why students are still struggling and what educators and policymakers can do about it.

NAEP scores show disheartening trends for the lowest-performing students (opens in a new window)

Chalkbeat

January 30, 2025

Most American students are still performing below their pre-pandemic counterparts in reading and math, while the yawning gap between high-achieving and low-performing students got even wider, data from “the nation’s report card” shows. Results released Wednesday from the 2024 National Assessment of Educational Progress, or NAEP, paint a sobering picture of academic haves and have-nots. Scores are increasing for many students who already do well, while struggling students stagnated or fell even further behind their peers. That’s making a trend that began about a decade ago even more pronounced.

A dismal report card in math and reading (opens in a new window)

Hechinger Report

January 29, 2025

The kids are not bouncing back. The results of a major national test released Wednesday showed that in 2024, reading and math skills of fourth and eighth grade students were still significantly below those of students in 2019, the last administration of the test before the pandemic. In reading, students slid below the devastatingly low achievement levels of 2022, which many educators had hoped would be a nadir. The test, the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), is often called the nation’s report card. Administered by the federal government, it tracks student performance in fourth and eighth grades and serves as a national yardstick of achievement. Scores for the nation’s lowest-performing students were worse in both reading and math than those of students two years ago. The only bright spot was progress by higher-achieving children in math. 

‘Shock and Awe:’ Erin Entrada Kelly Wins Second Newbery Medal (opens in a new window)

School Library Journal

January 29, 2025

Erin Entrada Kelly wanted to write a love letter to one of her all-time favorite books—2010 Newbery Medal winner When You Reach Me by Rebecca Stead. The result, Kelly’s middle grade novel The First State of Being, just won the 2025 Newbery Medal. The First State of Being separated itself from a strong group of Newbery contenders. “Erin Entrada Kelly juggled so many things and did them all beautifully,” said Maeve Knoth, Newbery committee chair. “This is science fiction, adventure, kid-taking-his-mom’s-car-without-permission, and even historical fiction if you are too young to have lived through Y2K! There are three important central characters who are distinct and well-drawn. The setting is so vivid—both time periods and place—and Kelly’s themes about each of us being a part of making history and awareness of every moment as we live it are important and timely. The book is also a great romp.”

2025 Youth Media Award Winners (opens in a new window)

American Libraries

January 29, 2025

On January 27, the American Library Association (ALA) announced the top books, digital media, video, and audiobooks for children and young adults—including the Caldecott, Coretta Scott King, Newbery, and Printz awards—at ALA’s 2025 LibLearnX conference in Phoenix. The First State of Being, written by Erin Entrada Kelly, is the 2025 Newbery Medal winner. Chooch Helped, illustrated by Rebecca Lee Kunz, is the 2025 Caldecott Medal winner. A complete list of the 2025 award winners follows.

Two Kinds of Readers, Two Kinds of Nonfiction (opens in a new window)

School Library Journal

January 29, 2025

If you’re a narrative lover, you certainly aren’t alone. Most literacy-oriented educators think just like you. But it’s important to recognize that many young readers think differently. Expository-loving info-kids aren’t interested in making an emotional connection with a main character, and they don’t read to escape or become immersed in the world of the book. Instead, they read to learn. They want to soak up ideas and information about the real world. That want to understand how it works and their place in it.

The Reading Wars Go to College (opens in a new window)

The Assembly (NC)

January 28, 2025

Nearly everyone backs the latest research on teaching kids to read. Why did it take eight years to update the UNC System’s literacy curriculum? The UNC System’s efforts began years before the recent surge of interest in the science of reading. Then-president Margaret Spellings—previously George W. Bush’s secretary of education—commissioned a review of the system’s educator preparation programs in 2017. It found highly varied approaches to literacy instruction and many using the debunked method of “using context and pictures to decode words.”

Incorporating home languages can improve multilingual learners’ reading comprehension (opens in a new window)

K-12 Dive

January 28, 2025

Educators who serve multilingual learners can adopt many different strategies to support their literacy development, including the use of reading comprehension templates and the practice of incorporating a student’s home language into the classroom. Pamella Moura is a special education doctoral student at Michigan State University who authored a 2024 paper on reading comprehension best practices for multilingual learners. To incorporate multilingual learners’ own languages into the curriculum — for example, in spelling lessons — Moura suggests translating the words on a search engine, or even asking the students themselves to do this, and then dictating the words in both forms to the class. This can be done across many different subjects, particularly those that are “vocabulary-heavy.”

Helping Young Students Build Confidence in Writing Through Revision (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

January 28, 2025

Upper elementary teachers can guide their students to look forward to revising their writing with this positive, reflective approach. I blend this approach with more traditional methods such as step-by-step procedures, checklists, and rubrics. Each year, I open with an informal writing assessment to analyze students’ needs and interweave some or all of the following strategies to build a more complete understanding of the process.

2025 Youth Media Award Winners (opens in a new window)

School Library Journal

January 27, 2025

The ALA Youth Media Awards were announced at LibLearnX in Phoenix, AZ, on Monday. Here are the winners on children’s literature’s biggest day. John Newbery Medal: The First State of Being by Erin Entrada Kelly. Randolph Caldecott Medal: Chooch Helped illustrated by Rebecca Lee Kunz. 

A researcher said the evidence on special education inclusion is flawed. Readers weighed in (opens in a new window)

Hechinger Report

January 27, 2025

A prominent scholar critiqued the evidence for including children with disabilities in general education classrooms. Advocates, parents and teachers argued for inclusion, against inclusion and for some hybrid of the two. The director of education at the Learning Disabilities Association of America weighed in, as did the commissioner of special education research at the U.S. Department of Education. More than 160 people commented on one Reddit discussion about the story. Here’s a sampling of views I received or saw on social media. 

The knowledge revival (opens in a new window)

Flypaper (Fordham Institute)

January 27, 2025

Deep, transferable learning depends on domain-specific knowledge, and thinking itself is inextricably linked to the content of thought. A robust foundation of knowledge is not merely the raw material for thought, it is the scaffolding that makes higher-order thinking possible. None of this is news, but neither is it dominant—yet—in education thought or practice. A new open access book Developing Curriculum for Deep Thinking: The Knowledge Revival dives deeply into these ideas and makes a case for knowledge-rich curriculum that embraces the role of disciplinary knowledge in education.

Signature moves: are we losing the ability to write by hand? (opens in a new window)

The Guardian (UK)

January 24, 2025

We are far more likely to use our hands to type or swipe than pick up a pen. But we lose something when handwriting disappears. We lose measurable cognitive skills, and we also lose the pleasure of using our hands and a writing implement in a process that for thousands of years has allowed humans to make our thoughts visible to one another. We lose the sensory experience of ink and paper and the visual pleasure of the handwritten word. We lose the ability to read the words of the dead.

Celebrating International Mother Language Day (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

January 24, 2025

When schools create a welcoming environment and celebrate linguistic diversity, they help foster global awareness, tolerance, and understanding. One way for schools to reaffirm the identities of their students—and impart a universal lesson that multilingualism is an asset to be preserved and leveraged—is to recognize International Mother Language Day, on February 21. A middle school teacher shares her favorite ways to celebrate linguistic diversity, both on International Mother Language Day and year-round.

Learners with disabilities benefit from more complex reading instruction, Stanford researchers say (opens in a new window)

Stanford Report

January 23, 2025

Students with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) such as autism and Down syndrome are often left behind when it comes to literacy instruction – casualties of the misperception that at best, they could only read by learning to recognize common words by sight. But researchers are finding that students with IDD, like their peers without disabilities, can benefit from a more complex approach, including phonics, vocabulary, and reading comprehension. 

Researchers Created a Phonics Program With ‘Dramatic’ Results. How It Works (opens in a new window)

Education Week

January 23, 2025

A new study has found evidence of big gains in students’ reading ability from using one specific phonics program—and suggests that consistent implementation is key to getting the strongest results. The foundational-skills curriculum, UFLI Foundations, was created by researchers at the University of Florida Literacy Institute. When kindergarten and 1st grade teachers in one Florida district used the program for a year, their students grew at a much faster rate than similar students in other classrooms in the district that continued business-as-usual reading instruction. Teachers who followed the program more closely saw better results than those who didn’t teach lessons in the recommended sequence, or with all of the listed steps.

OPINION: Parents have way more influence than they realize in shaping their children’s success (opens in a new window)

Hechinger Report

January 23, 2025

Findings from almost 450 studies demonstrate U.S. parents’ influence on student engagement, well-being and learning. When kids get older, the best thing parents can do to support their engagement and learning in school is “discussion and encouragement.” Translation: Talk to them about what they learn at school and what is happening in their lives, cheer them on in their academic pursuits and help them get through hard times. Meaningful discussions about their kids’ interests, experiences and challenges, their thoughts and feelings serve as the foundation for children’s love of learning, the fertile ground that breeds student motivation, curiosity and engagement. This, much more than direct homework assistance, helps teens grow and plays a crucial role in shaping their relationship with learning.

Is there a ‘right’ way to read? (opens in a new window)

National Geographic

January 22, 2025

With more information than ever at our fingertips, there’s a sense of rush to take it all in and “skim.” Here’s what the experts say about our reading habits—and whether you should change them. According to experts, skimming—where you skip over words and sections to grasp the main idea of a text—is a common reading strategy. That’s totally fine, says Daniel Willingham, a psychologist at the University of Virginia—as long as skimming or scanning doesn’t get in the way of understanding. Experts often contrast skimming with “close” reading, when a reader connects new information to prior knowledge, asks questions, and develops a deeper understanding of the text (although the exact definition is contentious).

This School Librarian Thinks Her Job Is the ‘Best-Kept Secret in Education’ (opens in a new window)

Ed Surge

January 22, 2025

Since 2010, Jami Rhue has been a school librarian at Providence Englewood Charter School, a preK-8 school on the South Side of Chicago serving primarily Black and brown students who live in a community colloquially known as “Chiraq.” Though she didn’t initially see herself ever becoming a school librarian, Rhue has come to love the dynamism and variety of her job. She teaches concepts as wide-ranging as American Sign Language, critical thinking, typing, conducting research and writing in cursive. And she gets to work with children from pre-K all the way through eighth grade in any given week — a challenging but rewarding charge. “It’s the best-kept secret in education, to be a school librarian,” Rhue says with pride. “You get to interact with everybody. It’s a treat.”

Supporting Neuroplasticity in Multilingual Learners (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

January 22, 2025

Being an independent learner means a student can carry more of a cognitive load in the class without so much reliance on their teacher. A lot of this comes from educators designing and creating innovative opportunities for students to learn language, continue to expand their neuroplasticity, and become more critical thinkers.

Jules Feiffer, Acerbic Cartoonist, Writer and Much Else, Dies at 95 (opens in a new window)

The New York Times (gift article)

January 21, 2025

In his long-running Village Voice comic strip and in his many plays and screenplays, he took delight in skewering politics, relationships and human nature. In the mid-1950s, Norton Juster, a neighbor of Mr. Feiffer’s in Brooklyn, invited him to illustrate a children’s book he was writing, “The Phantom Tollbooth.” An ingenious kaleidoscope of wordplay arguably akin in style to Lewis Carroll, the book, published in 1961, was an instant hit. Later in life he derived great pleasure from writing and drawing children’s books, some in collaboration with his daughter Kate, among them “The Man in the Ceiling” (1993), “Bark, George” (1999), “By the Side of the Road” (2002), “The Daddy Mountain” (2004) and “A Room With a Zoo” (2005). A 2010 reunion project with Mr. Juster, “The Odious Ogre,” was warmly reviewed.

Kidlit for Los Angeles (opens in a new window)

School Library Journal

January 21, 2025

The children’s publishing industry is uniting to support a fundraising initiative launched by four picture book authors in response to last week’s devastating wildfires in Los Angeles. The online auction will run from January 20 to 26, raising funds for the California Community Foundation’s Wildfire Relief Fund, the Los Angeles Fire Department Foundation, the Los Angeles Regional Food Bank, and the Animal Wellness Foundation’s Wildfire Relief Fund. Top auction items include a complete set of signed Diary of a Wimpy Kid books with an original sketch from creator Jeff Kinney and virtual school visits from Kate DiCamillo.

Want Better Teaching? Get Better Curricula. (opens in a new window)

Education Next

January 21, 2025

Science-based teaching can not only raise the level of student achievement overall but also make the system more equitable by narrowing gaps between high- and low-achievers. Unfortunately, this kind of teaching is happening in only a few small pockets in the United States, and many educators are either unfamiliar with the principles behind it or view them with skepticism or outright hostility due to their training. What can be done to overcome those obstacles and bring science-informed teaching to the millions of children who could benefit from it?

To boost kids’ reading, Minnesota schools start to shift the way they teach (opens in a new window)

Minnesota Public Radio

January 17, 2025

On a cold winter morning, kindergartners gather on a rug in Holly Hins’ classroom at Woodbury’s Middleton Elementary School. Her students are learning to recognize sounds, decode words and learn phonetic patterns to let them read and spell with confidence. Called structured literacy, this method boasts decades of research showing it as the most effective way to teach kids to read. But it’s not the way Hins used to teach, and it’s not how she learned literacy instruction in college. Like elementary school teachers around Minnesota and the nation, she’s had to come to terms with a difficult reality: What she was doing wasn’t working, and she had to change.

‘We raised the bar’: Cardona shares highs, lows as he exits Education Dept. (opens in a new window)

K-12 Dive

January 17, 2025

Miguel Cardona, the nation’s 12th education secretary, said he’s most proud of the work that focused on instruction and put more resources in schools. Despite the challenges wrought by the public health emergency, Cardona set high goals for student academic achievement, expansion of career pathways, increased access to student mental health services and more opportunities for multilingualism. During Cardona’s tenure, the U.S. Department of Education was also tasked with managing the largest historic one-time influx of federal funding provided by Congress to help schools recover from the pandemic. 

Cultivating Writing Skills in Young Learners (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

January 17, 2025

Teaching writing in the elementary grades comes with its own set of challenges: helping students plan their writing, organizing materials, providing appropriate drafting tools, differentiating instruction to a wide range of abilities, and ensuring that publishing is manageable for young learners. To better overcome these obstacles, I’ve developed a simple but effective solution: DIY booklets. These custom-made, stapled booklets compile all the materials students need to be supported through a writing project—graphic organizers, drafting pages, anchor charts, revision tools, and editing checklists—into one well-organized system.

3 myths about rural education that are holding students back (opens in a new window)

The Conversation

January 16, 2025

Rural education often can seem like an afterthought to policymakers and scholars, who tend to design reforms aimed at urban and suburban areas, even though 20% of the nation’s students are educated in rural schools. This lack of rural research and focus has perpetuated many myths and misconceptions about rural education that overlook the strengths and opportunities for students who attend rural schools. As scholars who study rural education, we compiled a list of three facts about rural education accompanied by the myths that would help policymakers better design programs to support rural students.

The Most Anticipated Children’s Books of 2025 (opens in a new window)

Lit Hub

January 16, 2025

To create Literary Hub’s inaugural list of the most anticipated children’s books of the year, we turned to the experts, asking authors and illustrators of books for young people to share which upcoming releases they’re most looking forward to reading. Here are their choices: a wonderfully eclectic range of books to keep readers of all ages and interests turning pages throughout the year.

4 Classroom Design Tactics to Motivate Students (opens in a new window)

Edutopia

January 15, 2025

Teachers can make small shifts in their classroom design to boost engagement, spark curiosity, and celebrate success. Motivation doesn’t have to be a battle of wills. By reducing friction, using visual cues, sparking curiosity, and celebrating progress, you can create a classroom environment where engagement and success feel natural. You’ll be amazed at how these seemingly minor changes can lead to big results—not just in your students’ motivation, but also in their confidence and enthusiasm for learning.

Autism Affects More Than 60 Million Worldwide, Study Finds (opens in a new window)

Disability Scoop

January 15, 2025

New estimates show that 61.8 million people around the globe have autism and that the developmental disability is among the most common health issues facing youth. As of 2021, researchers found that 1 in 127 people worldwide were on the spectrum, according to findings published recently in the journal The Lancet. Autism was twice as likely to affect males versus females and there was high prevalence among young people, with the condition ranking in the top 10 causes of non-fatal health burden for those under age 20, the study found.

Does Social-Emotional Learning Really Work? Educators Had a Lot to Say (opens in a new window)

Education Week (subscription)

January 15, 2025

To get a better sense of how SEL approaches are (or are not) working in K-12 schools, the EdWeek Research Center asked the following open-ended question in a December 2024 survey of teachers, principals, and district leaders: What approaches, if any, do you find are most effective in teaching SEL skills in your classroom, school, or district? The responses showed a wide range of opinions about what does or does not work, from outright opposition to the concept to questions about its impact on academic learning to a full embrace of SEL as a key tool to improve student learning.

Fuse 8 n’ Kate: The Caldecott Contenders of 2025 (opens in a new window)

School Library Journal

January 14, 2025

Hooray! With the ALA Youth Media Awards on the near horizon (Monday, January 27th at 8 a.m. MT to be precise) it’s never been a better time to debate some possible winners of the Caldecott Award. Today, I hand over to Kate an unprecedented FOUR possible contenders (rather than my usual three)! Will she opt for the vibrant father-daughter vibes of My Daddy Is a Cowboy, the rainbow wry-wit of Touch the Sky, the luminous family-centric storytelling of Joyful Song, or the heartfelt sincerity of Home in a Lunchbox? Only this podcast can say for sure.

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