Past Institutes

Best Practices in Reading Instruction
 

Between October 2019 and January 2020, Humanities Texas and UT Austin's Meadows Center for Preventing Educational Risk partnered to hold two series of workshops on teaching reading.

Curriculum

At the workshops, faculty presented evidence-based approaches to teaching reading in grades four, five, and six. Each program included interactive sessions on word study and recognition, vocabulary, and reading comprehension with an emphasis on social studies texts. The two series were cumulative—each workshop built on previous sessions and explored the material presented in greater depth. Teachers were encouraged to implement the approaches in their classrooms between sessions and seek feedback from faculty and peers.

The workshops featured close interaction with leading literacy experts and presented an innovative, comprehensive approach to evidence-based reading instruction. Content aligned with the fourth-,fifth-, and sixth-grade Reading and Comprehension TEKS.

Faculty

Workshop faculty included Dr. Diane Haager of California State University, Los Angeles; Dr. Jennifer Schnakenberg of The University of Texas at Austin; and educational consultant Dr. Alejandra Rodríguez Mielke.

Locations and Schedules

Each series consisted of three one-day sessions. The Austin workshops took place on October 23rd, December 4th, and January 29th at the Lady Bird Johnson Wildflower Center. The San Antonio workshops took place on October 24th, December 5th, and January 30th at Trinity University.

Partners and Sponsors

Humanities Texas developed these programs in collaboration with the Meadows Center for Preventing Educational Risk at UT Austin. The workshops were made possible with support from the Kronkosky Charitable Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities.