Joanne Jacobs
'Parents can't solve a problem they don't know they have'
Many parents don't realize how badly their children are doing in school, reports AP's Bianca Vazquez Toness. Teachers don't like to...
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Joanne Jacobs
- Mar 14
- 2 min
Why even kids who like to read hate English class
English teachers are teaching kids to hate reading, writes Pamela Paul, a New York Times op-ed columnist, in response to Nathan Heller's...
Joanne Jacobs
- Mar 13
- 2 min
When 3rd-graders can't read, should they repeat the grade?
Third graders who read more than a year below grade level will be passed on to fourth grade in Michigan, where Democratic Gov. Gretchen...
Joanne Jacobs
- Mar 8
- 2 min
Harvard students can't handle 'The Scarlet Letter' -- but prisoners can
“The last time I taught The Scarlet Letter, I discovered that my students were really struggling to understand the sentences as sentences...
Joanne Jacobs
- Mar 2
- 2 min
From wombats to koalas: Does knowledge 'transfer' for young readers?
"Chatty Chick chats in church" in a poem used by reading tutors. Last year, the second grader I was tutoring was shocked at Chatty...
Joanne Jacobs
- Mar 1
- 1 min
The author of 'Cat in the Hat' is back
Dr. Seuss has been uncanceled for Read Across America Day, which falls on his March 2 birhday. The White House proclamation quoted the...
Joanne Jacobs
- Feb 21
- 2 min
Rewriting Roald Dahl: Nobody's 'fat' or 'female'
Characters can be "enormous" and "beastly," but not "fat" or "ugly," in the new sensitivity-edited versions of Roald Dahl's children's...
Joanne Jacobs
- Jan 16
- 1 min
'Letter from a Birmingham Jail'
"We will reach the goal of freedom in Birmingham and all over the nation, because the goal of America is freedom," Martin Luther King Jr....
Joanne Jacobs
- Jan 13
- 2 min
Sneetches are racist! No, they're anti-racist! Or maybe ...
Dr. Seuss's Sneetches learn that outward differences don't matter. There's no need to pay to get a star added or removed from their...
Joanne Jacobs
- Jan 8
- 2 min
If liberal arts are dying, is it suicide?
Liberal educators aren't making the case for liberal arts education, writes John Agresto, former president of St. John's College in Santa...
Joanne Jacobs
- Jan 3
- 3 min
NAACP pushes for literacy reform: Teach our kids to read
Black leaders have transformed reading instruction in northern Virginia, reports Sarah Carr in the Washington Post. The Fairfax County...
Joanne Jacobs
- Jan 3
- 2 min
Teaching reading in high school
Memphis high schools are teaching reading skills to teenagers who didn't learn to read well in the early grades, reports Sarah Mervosh in...
Joanne Jacobs
- Dec 14, 2022
- 2 min
Third graders are way behind in reading and catching up very slowly
Third graders are way behind in reading, reports Hechinger's Jill Barshay. These students, who were in kindergarten when their schools...
Joanne Jacobs
- Dec 2, 2022
- 1 min
Florida's special-ed students are doing very well: Is it choice?
In Florida, which pioneered school choice for special-needs students more than 20 years ago, students with disabilities are doing very...
Joanne Jacobs
- Dec 1, 2022
- 1 min
Can Jayden read?
Parents are positive thinkers: 92 percent say their kids are doing reading and math at grade level, even after the pandemic, according to...
Joanne Jacobs
- Dec 1, 2022
- 2 min
Once they can decode ...
Once students can sound out words, the next step is teaching comprehension, writes Matt Bardin on The 74. Once a middle and high school...
Joanne Jacobs
- Dec 1, 2022
- 2 min
Leave the straw man alone: Teach those kids to read
Students don't need to sound out words, letter by letter, teachers were told. They don't need to be taught phonics systematically. If...
Joanne Jacobs
- Nov 18, 2022
- 2 min
Kids stream more, read less
The rise in screen time -- not just school closures -- is a factor in the decline in achievement, suggests Tim Daly, who runs the...
Joanne Jacobs
- Nov 14, 2022
- 3 min
The magic of reading: Teach first, joy later
In The Superstar, part of her Sold a Story podcasts, APM reporter Emily Hanford explains how a romantic view of how children learn to...
Joanne Jacobs
- Nov 7, 2022
- 2 min
Los Angeles schools will follow reading science, says Carvalho
"If we are going to follow the science, then we should really embrace all science, including the science of reading," said Alberto M....
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