Learning to read in Charmon Evans's first-grade classroom is skills-oriented but fun -- whether students are interacting with a talking puppet or playing the Word Wall Game Show. Ms. Evans carefully balances skill development -- phonemic awareness, phonics, and sight word identification -- with authentic reading and writing tasks and a love of learning. To meet the varying learning needs of her class she uses whole-class, small-group, and individual groupings. Students revisit poetry charts, read decodable texts in guided-reading groups, and write in their journals about a challenging, read-aloud chapter book.

Ms. Evans's literacy lessons demonstrate the following: Literacy Teaching Practices •  Read-Aloud •  Guided Reading •  Independent Reading and Writing Reinforcement of skills in playful and creative ways Authentic experiences that help students develop a love of reading and writing Ongoing assessment of students' reading and writing to inform teaching Reinforcement and repetition of skills in whole-class, small-group, and independent activities that meet the literacy needs of a range of learners

"You need to take different approaches and use the best from all."
Charmon Evans

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