This November the 21st annual Literacy For All PreK-8 Literacy Conference and Reading Recovery Institute will be held in Providence, Rhode Island at the Rhode Island Convention Center. We invite all literacy and Reading Recovery teachers in the northeast to attend this wonderful event! This year a new Technology Strand workshop will be available for those who are using technology in their classrooms to help engage young readers. There are also separate strands designed for literacy coaches, administrators, and trained Reading Recovery teachers. Keynote speakers will include David Booth, Steven Layne, and Susan O'Leary. Participants can earn up to 14.5 professional development hours for attending this 3-day event.

We are also excited to be speaking at the PreK-6 conference sessions! This conference is coordinated by the Lesley University Center for Reading Recovery and Literacy Collaborative, which is directed by Irene.

Here is a summary of the events scheduled for this 3-day conference:

Pre-Conference Workshops, Sunday, Nov. 14, 2010
Energize your teaching by registering for a one-day workshop! Pre-conference workshops are intensive study sessions on specific topics with experts in the field of literacy learning.

PreK-8 Literacy Conference with Middle School Strand, Monday-Tuesday, Nov. 15-16, 2010
You will have the opportunity to learn about the best literacy practices from the finest trainers in the field. Participants will come away with a better understanding of the current practices in literacy education and learn strategies to use in the classroom.

Reading Recovery Institute, Monday-Tuesday, Nov. 15-16, 2010
This is your opportunity to strengthen the skills of Reading Recovery teaching. The Reading Recovery Institute promotes a greater understanding and facilitates better teaching practices for Reading Recovery professionals.

For more information visit the Lesley University Center for Reading Recovery homepage here.

We are looking forward to participating in this wonderful gathering of literacy teachers, and we hope to see you there!

Warmest regards,

Gay and Irene

As you may have noticed, recently we haven't been able to update our blog as much as we'd like to. This with good reason - we have been busy preparing for our first trip to Australia to promote our Continuum of Literacy Learning, Benchmark Assessment System, and Leveled Literacy Intervention programs.

Right now we are on our way to Melbourne, Adelaide, and Sydney to work with teachers and administrators on the Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessment System. It is a grueling plane trip but exciting to meet teachers who are using the system down under! We will keep you posted.

A wonderful group of teachers from Tasmania will be coming over to the mainland for our workshop. First stop - Melbourne!

Best wishes,

Irene and Gay

Hello to everyone,

We are so excited about the response to the Fountas and Pinnell concept of community. Thank you all for contributing.  (We never thought that we would be on Facebook, but here we are! )

We've heard from so many people that we have met at conferences and meetings and we have met new teachers and administrators through this wonderful communication tool. 

We love hearing about your successes with children and also your honest reports of frustration.  It would be great to get conversations going so that you can talk with each other about the critically important work you do.  We hope that this will truly become a virtual community of educators who care and who support each other in providing the best.

We recently met with a group of adminstrators and literacy coaches (facilitators, staff developers, etc.) who shared their hopes and dreams in these days of economic challenges.  There was consensus among the group that the most important goal is teacher development.  It's through skilled teaching that students succeed--not materials or programs. (Yes, teachers do need good choices among materials, but it's the moment to moment decision making and the powerful teaching interactions that make the difference.) 

So, we are so grateful that you are communicating with us and joining the community.  We hope you are having a wonderful summer and looking hopefully--as we are-- towards the new beginning of a new school year. 

Our best,

Gay and Irene

Dear Educators,

As you may have noticed, lately we've making a lot of efforts to reach out to our community of fellow educators via the Web. We've been busy on Facebook, we're adding new blog posts regularly, and we've been Tweeting to our hearts' content. We've also setup an online form that you can use to submit questions to our team directly: http://www.fpblog.heinemann.com/contact.aspx

Later this summer keep an eye out for the Fountas & Pinnell Community - an online gathering place where everyone can come to learn, share, network, and benefit from the collective knowledge of all Fountas & Pinnell educators.

We are thrilled whenever get great feedback from the educational community, and we'd like to share some of it with you. This comment just came in through our blog contact form:

"I cannot thank your team enough for all the tools you have put out since my training as an LC coordinator. The benchmarks, continuum, LLI etc etc are amazing!!!! They are really helping to improve reading instruction across our country and even other parts of the world. And now the blog.... With personal responses to my troubling questions?!
Genuis!

Thank you thank you thank you.... Which doesn't seem to even be enough.

Keep up the great work!"

We just want to thank you—the educators who put our good work to great use—for letting us know how our work is impacting yours, and, more importantly, how the children are benefiting from it. Thank you all!


Sincerely,
~ Gay and Irene