Fans often express their love of authors or books by creating and sharing "fanfiction," a genre wherein fans write new narratives that add to beloved works or take place in existing story worlds. In this article, we describe a kindergarten teacher's efforts to enhance students' foundational literacy skills by combining author studies…

The purpose of this paper is to explain how teachers can build on children's oral language resources to support writing. Thus, we offer recommendations and specific examples for classroom applications that connect oral language with written expression. Specifically, we provide examples on the transition from phonemic awareness to phonics to word…

In this Action & Learning article, we describe the connections between the popular Spanish nursery song "Los pollitos dicen" (The Little Chicks Say) and Aesop's fable's "The Fox and Hen" with the literacy teaching of bilingual Latinx students. In this metaphor, the bilingual teachers represent the Mamá Gallina (Mother Hen)…

Despite strong support for integrating reading and writing instruction, writing practice is often crowded out of the schedule in elementary classrooms. To promote increased emphasis on writing, a working group of literacy researchers highlights three writing goals and six research-based reading-to-writing practices to enliven instruction with more…

Poetry has often been described as the neglected genre despite its potential to engage and motivate students of all abilities in reading and writing. Indeed, poetry provides an excellent forum for the development of literacy skills and strategies in a meaningful context. The author describes how a teacher implemented a poetry genre study in a…

Children's literature plays an essential role in the literacy development of children. This department column focuses on the teaching and use of children's literature and provides educators with information about a wide range of books across multiple genres that are representative of the diverse world in which we live. A strong emphasis is placed…

Proficient writers spend substantial time planning for writing, and that planning begins with analyzing the writing task. They spend time considering the topic, the audience and its needs, and the genre and form of the writing. This rhetorical analysis helps them set goals, orient their attention, and get organized. Task analysis can also help…

Children's literature plays an essential role in the literacy development of children. This department column focuses on the teaching and use of children's literature and provides educators with information about a wide range of books across multiple genres that are representative of the diverse world in which we live. A strong emphasis is placed…

Current standards and assessments emphasize the importance of a variety of genres in students' literacy diets, which has placed increased attention on informational texts. Unfortunately, young students' current exposure to and experiences with informational texts are often limited by the texts' availability, quality, and relevance to children's…

The Common Core State Standards for English language arts expect that teachers will use narrative and informational texts to teach content area material across the curriculum. However, many teachers at all grade levels struggle to incorporate both kinds of text, especially given the vast amount of specialized content they are required to teach.…

The precision of terminology and language used with students can be a help or a hindrance to teaching writing. This article explores the writing instruction terms mode, genre, and format, and establishes the need for a common language to understand and apply them consistently across teachers and grades.

Six-word memoirs are readily available through books, magazine articles, and on the Internet. This teaching tip explores how to use six-word memoirs to guide students through the writing process steps from developing and revising a concise memoir, to employing technology and imagery, to publishing final versions of their work online. Included in…

This article highlights research exploring the benefits of small-group storytelling as a way to promote rich language in early childhood classrooms. Using the storytelling of children from a preschool classroom serving lower SES children, the author explores the collaborative affordances of story circles. Results show that small-group storytelling…

Primary-grade students' experiences with text should prepare them to critically read an extensive range of text types throughout their schooling and career, a primary goal of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS). However, research demonstrates that narrative text overshadows other text types in the primary grades. The purpose of this…

This article describes how one teacher implemented a memoir genre study in her sixth grade classroom using a writing workshop approach. It begins by outlining the author's philosophy and rationale for teaching writing in this manner. This is followed by a discussion of how one could organize one's classroom for a memoir genre study. Several…