Jillian Marshall

By Jillian Marshall
Before the pandemic, my family of four ate our meals in different rooms of the house. My husband would sit behind the closed glass office doors, eating spaghetti on his lap with our three-year-old daughter, while I fed peas to our one-year-old son at the dining-room table. This was one of the many accommodations we made for our daughter because, within the first few months of our son’s life, she became afraid of him. Our son triggered a response of fear and avoidance in he...

Fifth grade is a year of many transitions. As students gain more maturity and life experience, they can access books that expand their minds and hearts. With the right books, the freedom to explore new genres and content can be invigorating for you and your readers. Get ready to laugh, cry, and learn alongside them as you experience these literary gems together. And as they incorporate deeper themes of hope, loss, and connection, these chapter books for fifth graders are sure to stay with you...

Friends are the best! Cultivating friendships is a huge part of the classroom and school experience. And one of the best ways to encourage kindness, inclusion, and successful friendships is through read-alouds. We adore these one-of-a-kind children’s books about friendship for exploring relatable challenges in an accessible way and for inspiring discussions about making friends. There’s no age limit for a good book—kids at any age can benefit from learning about friendship struggles and trium...

Boys are three times more likely to be diagnosed with ADHD than girls. But do boys actually present with ADHD that much more frequently? The short answer is no. We are learning more and more about ADHD and how it affects adults and children alike, and we now know that there are significant differences across gender. Because of these differences, ADHD in girls is easier to miss. Being aware of specific ADHD symptoms in girls can help get them diagnosed, which could make a significant impact on...

Picking chapter books for second graders may seem like a daunting task. After all, second grade is an important time in reading development when the emphasis shifts from basic decoding to reading for meaning. Good chapter books support students’ fluency and comprehension skills, all while setting them up to become lifelong readers. That’s a high bar for a book! But these books deliver. We’ve created this list of chapter books for second graders with diverse characters, heartwarming stories, a...

As third graders develop more advanced reading skills, they unlock a whole new world of chapter books. With higher reading levels comes more opportunity for complex, entertaining stories that will captivate your students. We’ve compiled this list of must-read chapter books for third graders to engage your established readers or encourage those looking to get lost in a good book for the first time. Many of the books are longer with more mature content and honor the significant jump in reading ...

Fourth grade is a magical time for reading growth. With more profound themes and complex topics, chapter books for fourth graders can inspire and stretch our readers. What’s more, these books promote strong comprehension and vocabulary development while challenging readers and keeping them engaged. In addition to realistic stories, these books offer a sprinkling of humor, fantasy, and historical fiction, reflecting the importance of reading for different purposes. With so many genres to choos...

Rich stories steeped in tradition and meaning, folktales for kids are a great choice for your classroom, no matter the grade. Filled with valuable lessons and explanations for the ways of the world, folktales across cultures and genres offer stories of morality and teach us important lessons. Folktales often include fables or animal stories, using a bit of imagination and magic to share observations about friendship, kindness, and good character. Often these stories have been passed down for ...

Wondering which chapter books to incorporate into your first grade reading instruction? We’ve got you covered! At this age, students display a wide range of literacy skills, from learning to decode to reading multisyllabic words and longer text. Not every student will be ready to tackle them on their own yet, but these memorable chapter books for first graders would also make great read-alouds. We’ve curated this list to engage students in stories that will make them laugh, smile, and get exc...

The process of understanding what we are reading, also known as comprehension, is complex and nuanced. When we read, we seek to understand. Making meaning from text is the overlying purpose of reading, whether we are reading to learn or reading a story. That’s all well and good, but the important question is how? It’s not easy to just instantly understand something, even for seasoned readers. And what about those who are just learning to read or those who are beginning to read more difficult ...

Since we now know the importance of teaching phonics explicitly and systemically, it’s easier than ever to find resources on the science of reading to implement effective literacy instruction in your classroom. Still, it’s important to become experts in learning about the definitions of different types of words and patterns. Vowel teams are just one of these important elements. But just what is a vowel team? Read on to find out more about this type of word pattern and how to incorporate activ...

Reading in the classroom can be so much fun. We all work hard to plan robust literacy instruction, but who said we couldn’t have a little fun with it? Check out these engaging and enriching reading activities, ranging from preschool to upper elementary and beyond. We guarantee both you and your students will appreciate these outside-the-box ideas and games to help readers practice and strengthen their literacy skills.

Happy and content. Easy and simple. These are examples of synonyms—words that have the same or very similar meaning. Teaching students about these types of words is an important part of effective vocabulary instruction. Also, coming up with new ways to say the same thing makes language more interesting and writing more lively and appealing. We’ve rounded up some fun (or should we say enjoyable?) ideas to spice up your repertoire of synonym activities.

There are so many different elements to include in quality reading instruction, you might wonder how you could ever teach them all. At first glance, teaching compound words, for example, may not seem essential. But these words can be a very valuable tool for enhancing vocabulary and phonics instruction and even improving reading comprehension. That’s a high-value activity! What’s more, students can readily learn the concept and have fun with it.

To set up early readers for success in literacy, it’s helpful to have a variety of tools at our fingertips. One great way to enhance instruction is to include big books as part of a foundational reading curriculum. While providing important learning opportunities, these larger-than-life books are ideal for reading aloud. Through shared and guided reading experiences, big books help introduce concepts of print to emergent readers.