Don’t Miss These Stand-Out Sessions at NCTE!

The annual National Council of Teachers of English conference is right around the corner, and what a line up they have waiting for us! Below are some not to miss sessions with some of our favorite experts in the field of education. Be sure to check them out!

Saturday 11/21: 8:00AM – 9:15AM Pam Allyn, director and founder of LitWorld and LitLife, will be part of two paneled discussions with authors and literacy activists advocating the power of authentic texts! This session Resilience-Building, Transformative Powers of Children’s Young Adult Literature, will focus on the power of conversation, writing and storytelling. *Saturday 11/21: 11:00AM – 12:15PM* The second session, Expert-to-Expert on the Joy and Power of Reading, is a panel discussion about the importance of independent reading and student book selections. Included in this panel of experts are Kylene Beers, Kwame Alexander and Ernest Morrell.
Saturday 11/21: 2:45pm – 5:30PM In addition to joining Pam in their panel discussion, Kwame Alexander, author of The Crossover, will join other Charlotte Huck Honor Book Award authors and illustrators as they share their book and provide insight to their writing process.
Friday 11/20: 2:30PM – 3:45pm Lucy Calkins, founding director of the Reading and Writing Project, will share her units of studies that support comprehension, word solving and fluency in Creating Communities of Primary Readers, Rallying a K-2 Classroom around Giant Goals.
Friday 11/20: 2:30PM – 5:15PM Kelly Gallagher will be a keynote speaker at High School Matters along with Penny Kittle and Carol Jago. Participants will be taking home a variety of ideas and strategies after attending. *Friday 11/20: 12:30PM – 1:45PM* Kelly will be participating in another round table discussion, Reading and Writing for Life: Taking Students Beyond the Classroom, along with Donalyn Miller, Chris Lehman and Penny Kittle, which will focus on topics that can inspire students to read and write outside of the classroom. *Saturday 11/21: 2:45PM – 4:00PM* In his last session, The Art of Teaching: Crafting Instruction to Inspire and Challenge, Kelly will join Penny Kittle and Donna Santman as they discuss the importance of becoming deliberate role models for our students’ reading and writing.
*Saturday 11/21: 11:00AM – 12:15PM* Want to rekindle the curiosity in students they once had when they were younger? Join Stephanie Harvey and a panel of four others as they share new ideas and strategies for inquiry that leads to action in The Art of Inquiry: Curiosity, Responsibility, and Social Action. Saturday 11/21: 12:45PM – 4:00PM Videos, visuals and digital projects illustrate a year-long emphasis on interdisciplinary literacy in a second grade classroom as Stephanie, Brad Buhrow and Anne Goudvis in Becoming Scientists: Investigations in Science and Literacy.
Friday 11/20: 9:30AM – 10:45AM Donalyn Miller is presenting numerous times throughout the conference. She is presenting with a panel of diverse award-winning authors including, Cece Bell author of El Deafo, about busting stereotypes in BYOD: Bring Your Own Diversity: Our Responsibility to Create Authentic Connections for All Readers with Diverse Books. Friday 11/20: 2:30PM – 3:45PM Donalyn will also serve as a chair member on the Nerdy Book Club: Empowering Readers’ and Writers’ Voices and Finding Our Own panel to encourage all of us to reflect on our own experiences and explore response and discussion activities that foster effective reading communities.