Reading Language Arts

Tailored for Grades 3-12

Instructional coaches, specialists, and strategists will explore how to increase their district or campus RLA team’s collective efficacy through job-embedded professional development and instructional coaching in a workshop environment.

During three days of face- to-face learning, we will define the role of the RLA coach, take a deep dive into research-based, high- leverage instructional practices, and practice how

to effectively coach new and experienced teachers through classroom observation and feedback. During 2 half-day on-site implementation visits, coaches will receive real-time feedback to continuously developing their coaching skills

This RLA service is a four part series session

RLA Series of Fortunate Events: A Framework for Integrating Reading and Writing

Session One

Talk to Text: Processing Ideas From Thinking to Writing. Available by grade band: elementary and secondary.

Session Two

Evidenced Based Writing: The What & How for Constructing Responses to Text. Available by grade band: elementary and secondary.

Session Three

Refining the Structure of Writing: Building Sentence to Paragraph to Whole Text Coherence, and 4) Writing on Demand: Maximizing Instructional Practices to Improve Student Outcomes. Available by grade band: elementary and secondary.

Session Four

Writing on Demand: Maximizing Instructional Practices to Improve Student Outcomes. Available by grade band: elementary and secondary.

Tailored for grades 6-12.

Participants will explore effective instructional practices and strategies to increase students’ interaction with complex texts and
to extend their thinking beyond a superficial understanding of texts. Additionally, participants will collaborate with other educators to plan instruction integrating routines and strategies discussed during the session in a workshop environment.

Levels of Learning: Teaching for Transfer

How do we progress students to the highest levels of learning? Participants will understand and apply the progression of learning from surface to transfer by unpacking standards from the English Language Arts and Reading TEKS and aligning content and skills to the corresponding levels of learning with sequenced learning objectives and instructional activities.

Making Comprehension Visible Through Writing

Available by grade band: 3-5, 6-8, 9-12.

Participants will explore STAAR rubrics for extended constructed response and gain understanding of the literacy demands students must meet to create a successful written response to reading. In this session, teachers will also examine effective instructional strategies to support student comprehension and evidence-based writing.

Making Writing Work: Revising for Structure and Style

Tailored for Grades 9-12

Let’s generate discussion about writing! In particular, revising for structure and style (or the bones and the flair). In this session, we will discover elements and activities that provide a sound basis for focus, form, framing, cohesion, clarity, and voice.

Promoting Literacy in Reading Language Arts and Social Studies

Available for grades 6 - 12.

Participants will engage in a collaboration between the two disciplines to better prepare students for STAAR and End of Course Assessments.

Topics include

• Teaching for Transfer of Learning,
• Integrating Cross- Curricular Passages
• Strategies for Response to Text
• Student Writing.

Reading Language Arts Instructional Coaching Academy

Tailored for Grades 3-12

Instructional coaches, specialists, and strategists will explore how to increase their district or campus RLA team’s collective efficacy through job-embedded professional development and instructional coaching. During three days of face- to-face learning, we will define the role of the RLA coach, take a deep dive into research-based, high- leverage instructional practices, and practice how to effectively coach new and experienced teachers through classroom observation and feedback. During 2 half-day on-site implementation visits, coaches will receive real-time feedback to continuously developing their coaching skills

RBIS are a set of research-based practices that highlight misconceptions that are most common in the field. They cover topics that sometimes require conceptual or philosophical changes to how we approach instruction and form a set of practices that are supported by research and should be present in classrooms, regardless of instructional materials. These strategies are based in the science of how students best learn math and reading in K-12 classrooms. The RBIS also demonstrates why High Quality Instructional Materials are important and what is required to implement those materials well.

A Texas legislative mandate for all K-3 Teachers and Administrators to participate and successfully complete the reading academy through a blended, comprehensive, or local implementation model.

Writing: Moving Through the Composing and Writing Process

Tailored for Grades 9-12

This session will provide an overview of how to guide students through the writing of a multi-paragraph essay from prewriting strategies, to paragraphing, to revision. Structure and form will be emphasized to produce a successful composition with a controlling idea/thesis/claim, supporting details, attention to critical thinking and reasoning, as well as the use of evidentiary evidence.

Writing: Merging Description and Narration

Tailored for Grades 9-12

Writing a personal narrative or memoir is more than simply writing about a life event—it requires the study of form and structure. In this session, participants will understand how merging description and narration creates a dominant impression built by sensory details that showcase a writer’s arc of self and engages the audience with an authentic voice.
 

Writing: The College Admissions Essay

Tailored for Grades 11-12

When writing a personal essay or statement for college admissions, authenticity is key. Students must present themselves as thoughtful and offer insight to who they are as individuals. The topic is merely a lens, but words and voice reveal the writer and a unique individual that differentiates one candidate from another.