Literacy for All

Last week several Bartlett staff members attended the Literacy for All conference sponsored by Lesley University. The conference has been held for many years in Providence Rhode Island. I have been attending since 1980. In those days it was called the Lesley Kindergarten Conference and was held in Randolph Ma. I have seen some top notch names in early childhood education over the years at this conference including Mary Baretta Lorton, Don Holdaway and Regie Routman, to name a very few! Nowadays there are sessions for middle schoolers as well as kindergarteners, but the presenters continue to be excellent. This year Tony Stead impressed me with this thoughts on non-fiction reading and writing, and especially his emphasis on the importance of promoting independent reading in the classroom. One quote from Mark Twain sums up the importance of this reading time : "The man who does not read books has no advantage over the man who cannot read books." As a classroom teacher, and reading teacher, my greatest satisfaction is having students who love to read. Check out Tony's new book : Good Choices for lots of ideas in efficiently promoting independent reading in the classroom.

Reading on the bus creates calm...who knew?

OK, busy teachers, moms, dads, kids, and especially bus drivers. Not enough time to read? Did you ever think about book buddies on the bus? A bus driver in Wisconsin, faced with too many rambunctious students, calmed them all down when she paired them up and passed out books. The older students read to the younger ones, and peace prevailed. What do you think, Mrs. Evans? Could it work on Bartlett bus runs?