Retelling a Story for Reading Comprehension | Writing About Reading Series

How do you teach retelling in first grade without students telling every tiny detail—or barely telling you anything at all? In this episode of The Education Connection, we're wrapping up Part One of the Writing About Reading series with a simple approach to teaching students how to retell a story using the most important details. I'll share how I use a four-square graphic organizer to help first graders plan their thinking before they begin writing. We'll talk about what to include on the grap

What’s the difference between main idea, central message, and moral of the story—and how do we teach those differences to first graders without making it complicated? In this episode of The Education Connection, we’re breaking down all three skills and looking at simple, developmentally appropriate ways to teach each one. Using The Tortoise and the Hare as a familiar example, we’ll look at: • Main Idea: What is the story mostly about? • Central Message: What does the author want us to unders

How to Teach Problem and Solution in First Grade In this episode of The Education Connection, we're continuing our Writing About Reading series by looking at how to introduce problem and solution to our youngest readers and writers. First graders are expected to understand plot, retell stories, and identify important events. Learning to recognize a story's problem and how it is solved can help build that understanding. And first grade doesn't always have to be about mastery. Sometimes we're pl

How to Teach Beginning, Middle, and End | Writing About Reading Teaching beginning, middle, and end may sound a lot like teaching sequencing, but there is an important difference. When students sequence events, they learn to put what happened in the correct order. When students identify the beginning, middle, and end, they take that thinking one step further by deciding which events matter most. In this episode of The Education Connection, we continue our Writing About Reading series by lookin

What does it really mean when we ask first graders to write about the events in a story? Before students can write about what happened, they need to understand plot, identify important events, and put those events in sequence. In this episode of The Education Connection, we continue the Writing About Reading series with Story Events, Part 1: Understanding Plot and Sequencing. We’ll talk about the difference between plot and sequencing and how to scaffold instruction from sequencing pictures to

Do you ever feel like you're spending more time correcting behavior than actually teaching? I've been there. In this episode of The Education Connection, I'm taking a short break from my Writing About Reading series to talk about something that's on every teacher's mind this time of year...classroom procedures. After 20 years in the classroom, I've learned that classroom management doesn't begin with consequences. It begins with intentionally teaching procedures. I'll share the simple three-ste