Poetry Proves to be Positive in the Primary Grades

Learning to read and write and achieve good conduct are crucial in the primary grades. One teacher from a state in the Midwest implemented poetry with her second grade students to guide classroom conduct and improve literacy. This article discusses poetry as a literature genre, the benefits of poetry, and poetry curriculum where children read and write poems, enhancing critical thinking skills. In addition, student feedback, classroom orientation, classroom management, poetry as bibliotherapy, and the teacher’s evaluation of poetry and student progress are discussed

Exploring Text Level Difficulty and Matching Texts for reading Achievement

This qualitative multicase studies research design focuses on the topics of textlevels and guided reading practices. Why is it so important for children toread the right books at the right level of difficulty? How do teachers useassessment data to match books to readers? Can we engage and motivate childrento read and want to read more with books at varied levels of difficulty? Mostof the research related to levels of reading difficulty began with Betts (1946)and his focus on the learner and reading achievement. Betts notes that maximumlearning begins at the level of instruction where children are challengedintellectually. Research shows (Stanovich, 1986; Allington (2005) it isimportant for children to read the right books at the right level to achievethe greatest growth in word knowledge, fluency and reading skills, and not riskfalling behind their classmates. Specific activities for instruction includedadministration of assessments, selection of texts at independent, instructionaland frustration levels and implementation of four block lesson records. Primaryassessment tools included interest inventories, informal reading inventory andrunning records

Theory Into Practice: Issues To Consider When Selecting Reading Software To Meet Different Readers\u27 Needs

According to a report from the U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment (1988), over 10,000 computer pro grams are currently being marketed. With such a large and divergent array of materials to choose from, software consumers need to understand exactly how programs they are considering for purchase function before they can be sure that any particular program will actually fit their specific classroom needs. Similarly, it is important to determine whether or not the programs are compatible with the teacher\u27s philosophy of reading — reader-based, text-based or interactive (Leu and Kinzer, 1991)

Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome

The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead

Initial sequencing and analysis of the human genome

International audienc