Top 4 Reasons Administrators Love CommonLit 360 Teachers have a lot on their plates. They have to balance planning, grading, supporting students, and more! As administrators, we know you want to give them the support they need to ensure student success. You have a lot on your plate, too! That’s why CommonLit 360 is here to Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges February 13, 2023 · 6 min read
Elementary 3 Exciting Ways to Celebrate Women’s History Month in Your Classroom CommonLit’a online digital literacy program offers tons of resources to support teacher lesson planning and unit planning. In this blog, we’ll explore resources featured in our digital library that would be great for a lesson or mini-unit to celebrate Women’s History Month with your students. Whether you’ Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges March 9, 2023 · 4 min read
CommonLit 360 Top 4 Reasons Administrators Love CommonLit 360 Teachers have a lot on their plates. They have to balance planning, grading, supporting students, and more! As administrators, we know you want to give them the support they need to ensure student success. You have a lot on your plate, too! That’s why CommonLit 360 is here to Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges February 13, 2023 · 6 min read
Elementary Celebrating Black Excellence: Famous Biographies for Elementary Students These engaging and diverse biographies for elementary students, all featured on CommonLit’s digital literary platform, share the inspiring stories of Black Americans across history, sports, and more. Reading about these empowering leaders and innovators will surely spark reading engagement from elementary students, launch deep classroom discussions, and support reading Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges January 26, 2023 · 4 min read
Secondary Powerful Poems by Black Authors for Secondary Students These engaging and diverse poems on CommonLit’s digital literary platform are all written by Black authors and poets. Each poem will spark reading engagement from secondary students with powerful imagery and strong themes, spurring deep student discussions and supporting reading comprehension practice. “Harlem” by Langston Hughes (6th grade) An Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges January 19, 2023 · 3 min read
Schools & Districts Standards-Based Data Dashboards Make Analyzing Student Growth Even Easier with CommonLit! At CommonLit, we’re dedicated to helping all students grow as readers while simultaneously making teacher’s lives easier. That’s why we’ve updated our standards-based performance charts to make analyzing data and planning targeted instruction seamless for teachers using our digital literacy program. Our standards-based reports calculate student Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges December 21, 2022 · 3 min read
Schools & Districts New Library Feature: Teacher Overviews As a teacher, finding the right text is time consuming. Reading text after text in its entirety to figure out if it fits the unit or highlights the right teaching point takes a lot of time and brainpower. There has to be a better way! At CommonLit, our instructional experts Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges December 21, 2022 · 2 min read
Support Elementary Students with Analyzing Character Change: 5 Skills-Based Comprehension Lessons from CommonLit’s Digital Literacy Program Tracing how characters change over the course of a text is a critical skill of every great reader. As students age, the texts and characters they encounter become increasingly complex, so building a strong foundation of character analysis in elementary school is fundamental for student reading comprehension. Sound overwhelming? Don’ Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges December 20, 2022 · 4 min read
Informational Texts to Help Students Build Background Knowledge Around Current Events (And Support Reading Comprehension Skills!) Student curiosity can lead them to explore all kinds of things - even current events! That’s why we created a round-up of current event articles from our digital literacy platform to help build student background knowledge around popular events, topics, and stories. From COVID-19 to cybersecurity to technological advancements, Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges December 9, 2022 · 4 min read
Cozy Up to a Good Poem: Winter-Themed Poetry for Elementary Students Colder weather doesn’t have to mean frozen content! These engaging and diverse poems about winter on CommonLit’s free digital literacy platform invite elementary students into warm imagery to spark deep student discussions and support reading comprehension practice. From famous poems about snow to moodier poems about seasons, you’ Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges December 5, 2022 · 2 min read
Help High School Students Grow as Argumentative Writers with These Engaging Opinion Pieces Sparking student interest is sometimes best done with a bit of controversy. That’s why we’ve collected some of our most engaging opinion essays for high school students. Each of these informational texts from our digital literacy program will not only launch a class debate but also serve as Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges December 2, 2022 · 3 min read
Curated Lesson Plans to Bravely Support Students’ Analysis of Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World CommonLit’s digital library has over 3,000 high-quality lessons that engage students and strengthen their reading comprehension. Additionally, we offer over 100 Book Pairings [https://www.commonlit.org/en/library?contentTypes=book_pairing&initiatedFrom=library] , carefully curated supplemental texts that support the books teachers read with their class. Students Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges November 28, 2022 · 5 min read
Help Student Reading Comprehension Rise with Curated Lesson Plans for a Novel Study of Esperanza Rising by Pam Munoz Ryan The CommonLit library has over 3,000 high-quality lessons that engage students and strengthen their reading comprehension. Additionally, we offer over 100 Book Pairings [https://www.commonlit.org/en/library?contentTypes=book_pairing&initiatedFrom=library] , carefully curated supplemental texts that support the books teachers read with their class. While using Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges November 28, 2022 · 4 min read
Secondary 7 Informational Texts About Food That Secondary Students Will Devour! Reading comprehension instruction should leave students wanting more, and this round-up of informational texts about food is sure to leave your secondary students hungry to continue reading. From the history and invention of foods to contemporary food innovations, each of these informational texts from CommonLit’s online reading program will Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges November 14, 2022 · 3 min read
Secondary Don’t Get Lost in the Odyssey: Use Reading Lessons from CommonLit to Boost Students’ Reading Comprehension and Engagement These high interest informational texts, poems, and short stories are the perfect complement to a unit of ELA instruction focused on The Odyssey. CommonLit’s digital literacy program features over 3,000 reading lessons complete with standards-aligned comprehension questions, discussion questions, and lesson planning ideas for teachers! These lessons are Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges November 10, 2022 · 4 min read
Secondary 7 Memorable Memoirs for High School Studies Helping high schoolers look up from their feeds and put themselves in the shoes of someone else can seem impossible! A good memoir or autobiography offers students a window into another person’s interior world. That’s why we’ve created a roundup of 7 memoir examples for students from Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges November 4, 2022 · 5 min read
Elementary 5 Flavorful Texts for Elementary Students: All About Dessert Food connects us with our families, neighbors, and the community at large. This round up of scrumptious texts includes informational texts about the history and invention of some of our favorite foods, as well as poems and stories about the memories food can create. Whether you’re new to CommonLit’ Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges November 4, 2022 · 3 min read
7 Short Stories About Revenge for Secondary Students Insults. Betrayal. Infidelity. What do we do when someone wrongs us? Wait for karma? Seek revenge? Here are seven short stories about revenge from our digital literacy program which engage students with plot twists and characters they are likely to never forget. These texts also provide ample opportunities to practice Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges October 28, 2022 · 4 min read
Secondary 6 Historical Letters for Secondary Students Creating opportunities for students to meaningfully engage with primary sources can take considerable time to plan and sometimes feel dry for students. That’s why we’ve put together a roundup of captivating historical letters that bring the voices of historical figures directly to secondary students! Students will love each Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges October 14, 2022 · 3 min read
Secondary 7 Engaging Myths for Secondary Students Exposing students to classic mythology can be daunting. That’s why we’ve put together a roundup of engaging myths from our digital literacy program that both teachers and students will love. Each of these Greek and Roman classics feature compelling characters and exhilarating plots that are sure to keep Dorothy Hodges Dorothy Hodges October 7, 2022 · 4 min read
