The authors, pioneers in detracking and in shrinking achievement gaps, pose a question: Is it possible to have all students in a large high school successfully complete a challenging curriculum that gives them practice in the habits and skills necessary for success in college? The answer, they say, "is a resounding yes." This article…

Building on the groundbreaking research of the MacArthur Foundation's Digital Media & Learning initiative, this book crosses the divide between digital literacies and traditional print culture to engage a generation of students who can read with a book in one hand and a mouse in the other. "Reading in a Participatory Culture" tells the story of an…

The local district in this study has not made adequate yearly progress in the past several years in language arts literacy on state assessments. Particularly problematic were poor reading skills among district students. Poor literacy skills negatively affect student learning across the curriculum. The purpose of this case study was to identify…

How might a tertiary English teacher use Garth Boomer's ideas on "teaching against the grain" to challenge the rules and assumptions that dominate the Academic Language and Learning (ALL) industry in the university sector today? How might such a teacher use Boomer's ideas to enact "emancipatory pedagogies" (or something like…

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation invested in the Literacy Design Collaborative (LDC) as one strategy to support teachers' and students' transition to the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in English language arts. This report provides an early look at the implementation of LDC in sixth-grade Advanced Reading classes in a large Florida…

This article examines how a teacher drew on her urban students' outside-school literacies to inform teaching and learning in a reading/language arts classroom. The following findings are discussed: curricular invitations the teacher offered to students; the teacher's curriculum development process; the relationships between the genres of students'…

"The Common Core Companion: The Standards Decoded", by Jim Burke, provides schools, districts, and departments with a common language or set of reference points for effective school-wide implementation of the Common Core State Standards. The book--available in middle and high school editions--clarifies what each standard says, what each…

The heart of effective programming for gifted services lies in the development of curricula that will challenge and enhance learning outcomes for gifted students. Educators have voiced concerns about the lack of differentiated curricula and instruction in gifted classrooms and the paucity of empirical evidence to support their effectiveness for…

According to the author, last year they set out to apply the four-step approach that they found in research from the University of Kentucky to design a unit for their language arts curriculum. They identified the appropriate standards, figured out what skills they would teach in conformance with the standards and what outcomes were expected, and…

For educators, the content of the curriculum really is like oxygen: it is the necessary precondition for improving schools, closing the achievement gap, engaging parents, and preparing teachers. However, when educators take the content of the curriculum for granted, they lose opportunities to coordinate and collaborate. Good curriculum instruction…

A successful middle school team of teachers employed effective middle level philosophy to structure a curriculum around themes that were relevant, challenging, integrative, and engaging for their particular students and community. Realizing that their young adolescents were involved in tough, delicate issues in their out-of-school lives, the…

This article focuses on the connection between the visual arts and language arts with the many teaching and learning possibilities that may arise from an art curriculum infused with language arts. As a K-5 art specialist in a rural Georgia public school, the author feels passionately about the importance of interdisciplinary art education for…

When educators think about what makes learning relevant to students, often they narrow their thinking to electives or career technical education. While these provide powerful opportunities for students to make relevant connections to their learning, they can also create authentic experiences in the core curriculum. In the San Juan Unified School…

Place-based education has received significant attention in recent years. This article briefly surveys common place-based education models and then argues for a more place-focused English language arts classroom in secondary schools where rural and regional literature is often absent from the curricula. The author posits that teacher-education…

As new times become hard times, there may be little time for multimodality in school unless educators confront the accountability culture. This commentary reviews the arguments for multimodal transformations of school literacy curricula and explores the potential of reflective talk about multimodal meaning-making as an assessment practice. Talking…