Spring New England Conference for PreK-4th Grade Educators

In school and in life, the advantages of sharing far outweigh the disadvantages. Caldecott Medal-winner Jane Yolen and her daughter, Heidi Stemple, know this all too well. In this uplifting morning keynote, you'll discover how co-writing can lead to better learning and better writing. You'll gain amazing insight. And, you'll walk away with real-life strategies to create a community of writers who are focused, productive, and love to write.

Maximize learning with movement, rhyme, and chants. Discover Ginny's unique hunking and chunking strategies for reinforcing writing and decoding skills in all your students. Plus, learn classroom-tested techniques for making language arts the best part of the day!

Discover how Singapore's students shot to the top of world math achievement! Explore the components of Singapore Math and how you can put this amazing math approach to work in your classroom—without changing your curriculum! And, learn how to help your students understand mathematics in a way that is concrete and back-to-basics, using the innovative model drawing approach.

Clear your curriculum, encourage student independence, and address a multitude of learning styles—do it all with centers! Explore techniques designed to make centers simple and easy to manage in your classroom. Plus, learn a variety of novel activities and materials all your students will love!

Learn how to use the powerful Six-Trait framework to assess and improve your students' writing. With Lori as your guide, you'll explore actual student writing samples, score them on a rubric, and share teacher-tested lessons and ideas. Best of all, you'll leave with easy-to-use techniques to help all your students improve in each of the six traits.

Help your struggling readers master the reading process! Join Jennifer to explore proven strategies for building background knowledge, language experience, and a strong skill base. Plus, take advantage of Jennifer's best book recommendations and motivational techniques to transform reluctant readers into motivated readers.

Join Stephanie as she shares terrific ideas for combining the joy of music and movement with the wonders of science to energize your curriculum. You'll take back fun science songs and engaging extension activities that will pique your students' natural curiosity about the world around them.

Develop your emergent readers' essential oral language skills—while having a ball! Join Paula for fun ways to make sharing ideas and thoughts a joy for your young learners. You'll leave with a variety of engaging prompt ideas, morning routine and daily activities, transition strategies, and much more; all while meeting the standards!

Help your students make the connection between two- and three- dimensional figures. Judy demonstrates real world examples of geometric shapes to get your learners talking, thinking, and writing about geometry using appropriate math language.

Learn how to teach your students the strategies that will help them to better comprehend text. Modeling a variety of mini-lessons from her latest book series, Cheryl will demonstrate how to engage young readers while meeting the standards. Each mini-lesson shared is linked to a National Reading Panel strategy and can be used during whole-group, small-group, and guided reading instruction.

Establishing a well-balanced kindergarten classroom can be extremely challenging. Come join Cristine as she takes you on an exciting journey where teachers and administrators can work together to build well-balanced kindergarten classes. Whether you are a teacher or an administrator, you will walk away with all the tools needed to make your district's kindergarten screening the BEST it can be!

Literature links can make teaching and learning science more fun! Laureen shows you how in this interactive session. You'll explore engaging science-based literature, art projects, writing prompts, and more. And, you'll walk away with sensational story ideas and enticing, easy-to-do follow-up activities you can put to use right away.

Lori offers her best tips, tools, and techniques for organizing, managing, and implementing your own program. From establishing independent learning routines to choosing appropriate materials to assessing and grouping your students, you'll discover how to create a guided reading program that truly works for you, right from the start.

Meet the needs of your most talented readers and writers! Now you can challenge your advanced students with lessons that explore dialogue, interior monologue, plot structures, voice, narrative pacing, and more. You'll learn how to introduce new strategies to help students tackle increasingly difficult text and improve their comprehension skills.

Too cold? Too hot? Too wet? Too icy? Now you can take advantage of some super ideas to keep your students engaged and learning no matter what the weather's like outside. Join Stephanie to discover fun-filled, developmentally-appropriate indoor play and transition activities that you and your students will love!

Math is more than just counting! In this idea-packed session, Paula demonstrates how simple activities and interactive games can introduce basic math concepts to your students. You'll learn how to build on these concepts using great children's books.

Give your students the confidence to apply their math knowledge to solve real-life problems. Explore ways to break down problem-solving strategies into manageable steps for young learners. And, discover how you can help your students become more confident in their abilities to successfully solve increasingly complex mathematical problems.

Discover practical, kid-friendly ways to integrate language arts with your content instruction so that all the standards are covered. Cheryl shares simple yet powerful strategies you can use to plan and align your reading and writing lessons to achieve the greatest impact.

When it comes to writing, it's all in the family for Jane Yolen and Heidi Stemple. Three generations of writers and three hundred books later... explore the journey of this writing family and the many joys they've experienced along the way. You'll learn practical tools to inspire your budding young authors (even the most reluctant ones) to write from what they know, using their personal experiences as a basis.

Discover how Response to Intervention (RTI) as a model for early intervention is also a powerful means for decreasing special education referrals. Hear how one school's establishment of a collaborative intervention team led to better monitoring of students' reading progress and increased response with appropriate interventions.

Discover how a solid number sense foundation begins with place value. Join Torri as she demonstrates ready-to-use manipulatives—such as place value cards, place value discs, and place value cubes—you can use to guide your students to math success. Plus, explore fun and innovative strategies to help your students understand basic math concepts like expanded and standard form.

Children love to see their names, so why not make the most of it. Join Laureen to learn fresh and simple name-based activities that can help you to teach primary math and literacy concepts such as counting, letter recognition, rhyming, writing, word building, and more.

Guided reading is one of the most important tools teachers have for differentiating reading instruction. Discover how guided reading can be used to support the three key areas of a differentiated curriculum: content, process, and product. Plus, learn how to make the most of the 18-minute reading lesson to build independence in all your students while meeting the standards.

Discover the secret to the perfect read-aloud. Join Jennifer to explore what's new and most engaging in children's literature. You'll see the latest from your favorite authors, as well as receive Jennifer's list of top titles.

Hear it, sing it, read it. In this interactive session, Stephanie offers fun ways to develop fluency through engaging music activities. You'll learn how to blend music with familiar strategies such as sing-alouds. And, you'll return to your classroom with exciting and memorable activities to help all your students improve their early reading skills.

Offer your students an exciting learning experience that spans the curriculum. Cooking is key! Join Paula to explore a wealth of cooking activities you can use to teach math, art, science and more. You and your students will love the opportunity to get hands-on in the classroom with Paula's creative cooking ideas.

Help your students find their own writing voices by experimenting with a variety of writing styles. Ginny shows you how! You'll learn how to add purpose to your writing lessons while improving your students' ability to write poetry, letters, fiction, research, and much more. Plus, discover how literature can be the perfect springboard to start your whole class writing.

The ability to use tools to measure and estimate is a valuable life skill. Join Judy to learn how to make measuring and estimating fun for all young learners, including your advanced students. You'll explore techniques for providing first-hand experience with measurement. And, you'll discover how to increase achievement on standardized test scores.

Ready to turn your "ho-hum" writers into enthusiastic, confident writers who love to write? Make your writing instruction more multi-leveled and even your reluctant writers will excel. Discover how to establish a writing workshop that meets diverse student needs—without adding more work to your busy school day. Plus, Cheryl shows you how to conference effectively with students, create a publishing center, sustain publishing cycles, and even establish classroom rules to make your year go smoother.

Join Bettemae to learn guilt-free ways to put play back into your children's day! Come explore super ideas for using organized play to foster a love of learning. And, discover developmentally appropriate strategies, center activities, and lesson plans to make learning fun for everyone, even you!

Make teaching and learning social studies even more fun with literature links! Explore delightful social studies-based literature, art projects, writing prompts, and more with Laureen. You'll leave this interactive session with sensational stories and follow-up activities to use in your classroom right away.

Get your children excited about reading! Lori offers innovative ways you can use sticky notes to scaffold and support strategy application during reading, as well as incorporate graphic organizers and other hands-on manipulatives to promote active, engaged reading.

Discover how the perfect literary example can model voice and/or word choice in writing. Jennifer shares numerous outstanding picture books you can use to illustrate each of the six traits. You'll leave with a variety of mini-lessons to help your students successfully apply each trait to their own writing.

Stock up on classroom-tested practices and tips in this fast-paced, idea-packed session. Enrich your instruction and guide your early learners to success with Stephanie's "doable," ready-to-use strategies for discipline, transition activities, reading, management, and much more.

Spark your students' imagination and ignite their desire to read! In this highly-interactive session, you'll explore a wealth of ideas and strategies for engaging children in good literature, with the goal of helping your students move from "Read it again, please!" to "It's my turn to read"—in no time at all.

Use rhymes, chants, songs, games, and more to get your whole class involved in the math process. Ginny shows you how! Telling time, word problems, measurement, patterning, symmetry, place value, fractions, and odd and even numbers are just a few of the fun and easy problem-solving strategies you'll learn in this high-energy session.

Young learners not only need opportunities to collect, organize, and describe data but to read and interpret data, too. Discover how graphs can help support these skills in both math and science. You'll gain an introduction to the language and forms of graphing as Judy demonstrates ways your students can collect and display data that relate to the world around them.

The key to academic success is knowing how to reach and teach students with different learning styles, personalities, achievement levels, and life experiences. Discover how this can be accomplished in a way that is doable, practical, and manageable. You'll learn how to differentiate your instruction to meet diverse student needs and challenge all levels of learners. And, you'll love the tools and teaching "tricks" Cheryl shares!

When it comes to writing, it's all in the family for Jane Yolen and Heidi Stemple. Three generations of writers and three hundred books later... explore the journey of this writing family and the many joys they've experienced along the way. You'll learn practical tools to inspire your budding young authors (even the most reluctant ones) to write from what they know, using their personal experiences as a basis. (Repeat of A-17)