writing

Literacy Links – Volume 81

literacy links, online learning, poetry, professional resources, writing
Next week’s theme is autumn!

Since it is the most gorgeous time of year in New England right now, I decided that next week’s theme will be AUTUMN! To get students in the writing mood, I *highly* recommend taking them OUTSIDE for a nature observation walk. Check out the poems I selected and my resources and ideas for teaching them by clicking on the image or link above. Happy poem writing!

Here is this week’s roundup of literacy links if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

Literacy Links – Volume 80

literacy links, poetry, professional resources, writing
Conferring Notes portal for the second grade support team.

This year, I’m pumped to support the second grade team! I spend my days helping students at home with their remote learning, so I created digital conferring sheets to record their strengths and goals. After filling one out, I share it with the teacher for their records. I’m hoping it will provide some consistency and formative assessment info to help teachers make instructional decisions.

Here is this week’s roundup of literacy links if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

Literacy Links – Volume 79

book clubs, creating, literacy links, poetry, professional resources, writing

I just posted a new poetry collection on my door! This week’s theme is IDENTITY. I’d originally thought the next theme would be feelings, but I realized kids should share their selves before their feelings. 🙂 I’m hoping to change my poems every week this year. The single week of remote learning threw off my plan.

Here is this week’s roundup of literacy links if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

Literacy Links – Volume 78

book list, literacy links, professional resources, writing
Fiction Learning Progressions for 2nd Grade
Nonfiction Learning Progressions for 2nd Grade

As a literacy coach, I usually have to stretch across six grades, so it’s a treat to focus on a single grade level this year. I’m pumped to be assigned to second grade for hybrid support, but the coach in me can’t help not coaching. As such, I’ve decided to develop toolkits for reading and writing. I’m going to pull from lots of sources: The Literacy Continuum, the Units of Study, and more. First up? Creating a fiction learning progression and nonfiction learning progression (only available to LPS teachers since we have already purchased the Units of Study for our teachers) to help teachers choose focuses for units, conferences, or read alouds. This may just become one of my goals this year…

Here is the first official roundup of literacy links of the 2020-2021 school year if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

An Open Door to Teaching Poetry

coaching, poetry, professional resources, reading, writing
Walls that teach can be the doors that open our minds.

When I heard the adjustment counselors say that we all need outlets for discussion and expression in their hour-long summer PD, I *immediately* thought of poetry. Poetry is perfect for social-emotional work, and don’t we ALL need more of that? I agree.

So while I’m working with second grade this year (YAY!), I’m letting my office door do some passive coaching, and I’m going to focus on poetry this year. I’ve gathered some resources for teachers to peruse on their long, physically distanced treks through the Connector. The WHY, WHAT and HOW of teaching poetry is all there as well as some tips and tricks that I’ll continue collecting all year. I’m planning to share different mentor poems every few weeks. Right now, the poems are back-to-school themed: “Ready” by Amy Ludwig VanDerwater and “To a No. 2 Pencil on May 1, 2020” by Kimiko Hahn. Teachers can even snag copies of these poems by taking one from the plastic sleeve. Anything to make teachers’ jobs easier!

I can see embedding poetry into morning meeting, replacing one Reader’s or Writer’s Workshop lesson per week, or even some asynchronous work during students’ independent hybrid times with some poetry exploration. It’s truly a wonderful way to develop students’ literacy skills AND their sense of self. It does it all.

Happy reading and writing!

Literacy Links – Volume 77

Just for fun, literacy links, online learning, writing
Couldn’t get my hands on a Starbucks notebook tumbler (because: quarantine), so a notebook tee will have to do!

It is officially back to school season–my favorite time of year! It sure is different and full of new obstacles, but one thing I know for sure is that elementary teachers everywhere are bringing their all like they always do. I’m in awe of what my colleagues and others did from March to June, and I have NO DOUBT that they will continue to bring it this year. I ❤ teachers.

Here is another summer roundup of literacy links if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

Literacy Links – Volume 76

coaching, literacy links, poetry, reading, writing

Screen Shot 2020-08-21 at 9.04.12 AM

I may be a little late to the back-to-school-read-aloud roundups, but here’s my Back to School digital library! I kept it super simple so that you can copy the linked read alouds to put in your own digital Bitmoji library for your students or just have available for the first days of school. Clare Landrigan first introduced digital libraries to me back in the spring, and they’ve been a VERY useful tool that I can see using in the Now AND in the After. Here’s her, “Creating a Community of Learners” digital library to kick off the school year. #classroombookaday creator, Jillian Heise, also has a brilliantly curated book list of read alouds to launch learning that could easily turn into a digital library. Happy reading!

Here is another summer roundup of literacy links if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

Literacy Links – Volume 75 (ANOTHER Bonus Summer Edition!)

literacy links, online learning, professional resources, writing

Screen Shot 2020-08-14 at 8.50.29 AMThe cover of my digital writer’s notebook. Click it!

Even though I love physical writer’s notebooks, I knew that, under these unprecedented circumstances, a digital writer’s notebook would be useful. I used this link from Slides Mania to make my digital writer’s notebook, and instead of using tabs, I created a table of contents with the sections I lean on the most as a writer and teacher of writers. I learned that even if you add slides to a section that the link in the table of contents stays with the right slide! Those Googlers are clever…

Here is another summer roundup of literacy links if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

Literacy Links – Volume 74 *Bonus Summer Edition*

coaching, literacy links, professional resources, reading, summer, writing

Screen Shot 2020-07-20 at 2.33.15 PM

Hyperlinked docs and choice boards have been a really useful tool during quaranteaching and quarancoaching. Over the summer, I’ve been developing this coaching choice board. Each colorful dot links to a page that focuses on that option with a video of me explaining what it looks like and links to the supporting documents I use. Not only will this hyperdoc share coaching opportunities that teachers might not have considered in the past, but it also helped me clarify my role.

Here is this summer’s roundup of literacy links if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment:

Literacy Links – Volume 73 (Last for 2019-2020 year)

book list, Harry Potter, Just for fun, literacy links, poetry, professional resources, summer, writing
Screen Shot 2020-06-19 at 9.23.02 AM

Dear teaching,

From the moment
I wrote on Mrs. Francescutti’s chalkboard during student teaching

and gave fourth graders
word search advice
in an evergreen Lake Forest Park classroom,

I knew one thing was real:

I fell in love with you.

A love so deep I gave you my all–

From my creativity and money

To my loneliness and energy.

As a twenty-something

deeply in love with you,
I never saw the endless standards,
stacks of papers to grade,
or hours of lost sleep.
I only saw students

at the beginnings of their journeys.

And so I learned.

I read books cover to cover
and observed countless classrooms,
growing my pedagogy with
each page,

each visit.

You demanded everything.

I gave you my heart

because you yielded so much more.

I taught through the fatigue and hurt

Not because problem-solving called me
But because YOU called me.
I do everything for YOU.
Because that’s what you do
when someone makes you feel as

alive as you’ve made me feel.

You gave me my be-the-change-you-wish-to-see dream,

and I’ll always love you for it.

But this year’s crisis challenged me to my core.

These past three months I gave you more than I actually have.
I think my heart can take the pounding.
I think my mind can handle the grind.
But I’m so, so tired and so, so worried.

And that is going to have to be OK.

It’s so unlike me, but I’m ready for this year to end.

Let’s savor every moment we have left together —
The good and the hard.
We’ve given each other

All that we have.

And we both know, no matter what the summer and fall bring…

I’ll always be the teacher
Wearing the silly costumes,
Surrounded by books,
With a clipboard, pen, and notebook nearby
Happily reading and writing

Page after page after page.

Love you always,

Ms. Vigna

(my copycat poem of “Dear Basketball” by Kobe Bryant)

Here is the LAST official roundup of literacy links for the 2019-2020 year if you’re looking for some quick inspiration, tips, and refreshment: