Literacy Masterminds
Flipped PD on high-impact literacy routines.
Our flipped PD provides an engaging and effective alternative to one-stop, sit-and-get PD to help teachers incorporate
evidence-based instructional practices into their lessons.
This program has really helped me to build my skillset to teach phonics to upper elementary since there are huge learning gaps I see on a day to day basis. I feel way more confident now in my ability to teach and identify phonics gaps. I HIGHLY recommend this program to anyone looking to gain more insight about foundational learning skills and the Science of Reading. This has been the most responsive program I have EVER done.
Literacy Masterminds is our flipped PD model that provides teachers with the time and space to learn, adapt strategies to their classrooms, collaborate with grade-level peers, and overall build towards
full implementation of an evidence-based literacy routine.
In a group, teachers participate in weekly live Zoom calls with the course instructors and are given access to step-by-step implementation plans so that key literacy routines are fully integrated into their class curriculum.
On their own, teachers log onto our platform weekly to watch short and engaging PD videos that are digestible, manageable, and only teach the most recent strategies and relevant sources of information. They’ll also complete readings, participate in discussions, and receive assignments that include planning lessons and trying strategies with students.
Unlike typical PD webinars, our live calls are teacher-driven.
Teachers are given space to reflect, exchange ideas, and troubleshoot together — helping them feel less isolated and make meaningful connections with other grade-level teachers across school campuses.
Together, they’ll build a community of learners that lasts long beyond the Mastermind.
Our flipped PD is right for you if . . .
- You have students who are not reading fluently, who struggle with decoding words, or who find it challenging to read aloud.
- You have “small group instruction” as part of the literacy block, but your teachers aren’t sure how to design instruction to meet the needs of your students.
- You have students who have not made progress on their reading assessments between benchmark periods.
We break down high-impact literacy routines into bite-sized steps to try each week, leading to full implementation of:
*A five-part structured literacy lesson (grades K-2)
*A multi-day fluency routine for whole class, partner, and independent time (grades 3-12)
*A five-step advanced decoding routine for multisyllabic words (grades 3-12)
Join our next info session or contact us to find out more.
Our weekly PLCs aren’t a typical Zoom webinar.
We prioritize talking, collaborating, and the sharing of ideas, with ample time for participants to dig into reading data, plan for student misconceptions, and practice lessons.
See what people are saying about Literacy Masterminds!
Join our next info session or contact us to find out more.
One-stop, large group PD isn’t enough.
Whether within a district or across school classrooms, students’ ability to access targeted literacy instruction depends on the teacher’s knowledge of evidence-based literacy instruction and the teacher’s access to implementation support.
Although the solution is to provide PD — large-group PD often comes with challenges:
- Participants may not have time to have their questions answered in a group setting.
- Participants have limited opportunities to submit assignments and receive tailored feedback.
- The learnings are not grade-specific or fail to account for students’ specific needs.
- Participants aren’t provided with meaningful support on how to implement the PD strategies with their students.
Literacy Masterminds is a more manageable way for teachers to access evidence-based literacy strategies, receive support, collaborate with their peers, and ultimately implement their learnings in their classrooms.
Three topics, each focusing on a
different high-impact literacy routine:
Structured Literacy for All Learners (K-2)
By the end of this series, participants will be able to:
- Administer and analyze a decoding and encoding diagnostic assessment.
- Demonstrate understanding that not all written languages are alphabetic, that many alphabetic languages are more phonetically regular than English, and that English learners’ literacy development in English is affected by these factors.
- Explicitly and effectively teach concepts of word recognition and phonics; apply concepts to reading single words, phrases, and connected text.
- Use student data and a phonics scope and sequence to plan and effectively teach targeted phonological awareness, sound spelling correspondence, decoding instruction
- Plan and effectively teach the connected text portion of the structured literacy lesson using decodable texts that position students to cumulatively practice the phonics skills that they have already learned.
- Know the difference between “high frequency” and “irregular” words; use the Heart Word method to introduce and practice high frequency words.
- Articulate the components of reading, their connection to decoding and comprehension, and how they are related to the Simple View of Reading and Scarborough’s Reading Rope.
- Describe the brain processes involved in how students learn how to read and spell, and how these reciprocal processes influence instruction
- Define terms and concepts such as phonemic awareness, orthographic mapping, phoneme, grapheme, digraph, and morpheme.
Accelerating Reading Growth Through Fluency (3-12)
By the end of this series, participants will be able to:
- Administer oral reading fluency assessments to evaluate accuracy, rate, and prosody.
- Interpret the results of ongoing assessments in reading fluency and to use the results to inform instructional planning and delivery, including differentiation strategies, groupings, and interventions.
- Demonstrate knowledge of key concepts related to reading fluency, including:
- the key indicators of fluency (i.e., accuracy, rate, and prosody);
- the role of automaticity in reading fluency;
- interrelationships between prosody and comprehension;
- the relationship of fluency to the Simple View of Reading and Scarborough’s Reading Rope.
- Apply knowledge of strategies for addressing common factors that disrupt reading fluency, such as:
- limited phonics knowledge;
- lack of automaticity in key decoding skills;
- limited recognition of grade-level, high-frequency words;
- unfamiliarity with a text’s content, vocabulary, and/or grammatical structures).
- Plan and effectively teach a regular fluency routine that engages students in a mix of whole group, small group, partner, and independent practice.
- Use a variety of research-based techniques to improve all aspects of fluency, such as repeated readings of passages, choral/echo reading, phrase-cued reading, and oral reading with a partner.
Targeting Reading Needs with Advanced Decoding Instruction (3-12)
By the end of this series, participants will be able to:
- Administer oral reading fluency assessments to evaluate accuracy, rate, and prosody.
- Interpret the results of ongoing assessments in reading fluency and to use the results to inform instructional planning and delivery, including differentiation strategies, groupings, and interventions.
- Demonstrate knowledge of key concepts related to reading fluency, including:
- the key indicators of fluency (i.e., accuracy, rate, and prosody);
- the role of automaticity in reading fluency;
- interrelationships between prosody and comprehension;
- the relationship of fluency to the Simple View of Reading and Scarborough’s Reading Rope.
- Apply knowledge of strategies for addressing common factors that disrupt reading fluency, such as:
- limited phonics knowledge;
- lack of automaticity in key decoding skills;
- limited recognition of grade-level, high-frequency words;
- unfamiliarity with a text’s content, vocabulary, and/or grammatical structures).
- Plan and effectively teach a regular fluency routine that engages students in a mix of whole group, small group, partner, and independent practice.
- Use a variety of research-based techniques to improve all aspects of fluency, such as repeated readings of passages, choral/echo reading, phrase-cued reading, and oral reading with a partner.
This PD is right for your school or district if . . .
- You have teachers who never received training on foundational reading instruction and want to know more about the role this plays in your students becoming skilled readers.
- Your teachers aren’t sure what to do with the reading assessment data they’re being asked to collect.
- Your teachers are tired of sitting through typical large-group PD sessions and crave a small group approach to adult learning that supports them through implementation of new strategies.
- Your teachers could benefit from more support on implementation, a place to ask questions, connect with grade-level peers, and see lasting results from their PD hours.
- Your school has a high teacher to literacy coach ratio, making it difficult for the literacy coach to provide all teachers with regular support.
Join our next info session or contact us to find out more.
