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Middle School Café – Strategies & Support for Middle School ELA Teachers
Are you a middle school ELA teacher looking for practical, proven strategies to help your students grow as confident readers and writers? Middle School Café is your go-to podcast for engaging teaching ideas, classroom-tested tools, and real talk about what works in today’s ELA classroom.
Each episode delivers actionable tips to help you close reading gaps, build student ownership, and create a classroom culture where literacy thrives. Whether you're navigating a curriculum, supporting struggling readers, or just looking for fresh ways to inspire your students, you'll find support, strategy, and a sense of community right here.
Join a community of passionate middle school ELA teachers working to build confident, engaged readers. Visit www.middleschoolcafe.com for classroom tools, podcast extras, and resources to support every student on their reading journey.
Middle School Café – Strategies & Support for Middle School ELA Teachers
Creating Readers Requires More Than Reading Instruction [Ep. 79]
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Creating readers is one of the most important goals of ELA instruction, but it's also one of the hardest things to measure. In this episode, I explore the difference between reading instruction and reading practice and ask an important question: Are we helping students become readers? As schools continue to focus on improving reading achievement, I wonder if we've unintentionally reduced the amount of time students spend actually reading. We'll talk about reading identity, the role of reading practice, and why students need more than reading skills if we want them to develop a lasting relationship with reading.
We'll also discuss what happens when reading becomes primarily a performance task, why some of the outcomes we value most are difficult to measure, and how creating readers requires us to think beyond today's lesson or assessment. If you've been looking for ways to balance reading instruction, reading practice, and independent reading within a structured curriculum, this episode offers a thoughtful conversation about helping students become readers for the long term.
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