AdLit.org is a national multimedia project offering information and resources to the parents and educators of struggling adolescent readers and writers. AdLit.org is an educational initiative of WETA, the flagship public television and radio station in the nation's capital, and is funded by Carnegie Corporation of New York and by the Ann B. and Thomas L. Friedman Family Foundation.

Writing Poetry with English Language Learners

Writing Poetry with ELLs

Poetry gives students a chance to play with language and vocabulary. Although writing poetry can be intimidating, this article recommends some poetry forms just for beginners, including writing group poems and acrostics.
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Retelling History with "Found Poetry"

The Library of Congress Found Poetry Primary Source Set supports students in honing their reading and historical comprehension skills by creating poetry based on informational text and images.
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Voices: Books About Poets and Poetry

A fictionalized account of the life of Emily Dickinson as a young girl, a lively guide to poetry forms both familiar and obscure, and more, in our eclectic collection of poetry books.
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Video Interview with Margarita Engle

In this interview Margarita recounts her childhood memories of Cuba and how her search for her own heritage led to the discovery of her unforgettable heroes and heroines.
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Featured Strategy

Featured Strategy: Inferential Reading

Teaching students to "read inferentially" helps them read more strategically. Inferential reading helps students make connections between their personal experiences and their comprehension of a text. Rather than stopping students during reading to comment on specific points, this strategy focuses on their thinking and how new information reshapes prior knowledge.
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Featured Resource

Integrating Knowledge and Ideas Across Multiple Sources of Information

In this lesson, 11th grade history teacher Joanna Heppeler sets the stage for an ambitious multi-day unit examining four key documents from President Lincoln: his first inaugural address, the Emancipation Proclamation, the Gettysburg Address and the second inaugural address. She helps students draw inferences from Civil War-era photos, cartoons and maps as well as the primary texts.
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Featured Glossary Term

Reader's Theatre

A strategy in which students read story scripts or poetry aloud during an informal skit or performance. In this active approach to reading, a student assumes the role of a character and reads his script aloud. A teacher works with small groups of students to help them read their scripts accurately, fluently, and with proper inflection. This experience can improve a child's reading fluency, comprehension and self-confidence.
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Research & News

Pennsylvania's Keystones to Opportunity: Advancing Adolescent Literacy

In a time when students must have reading and writing skills that compare with — and can compete with — their international peers, Pennsylvania has created a road map for improving literacy that all schools, districts, and states should observe closely. A new report from the Alliance for Excellent Education, Advancing Adolescent Literacy: Pennsylvania's Keystones to Opportunity Comprehensive Literacy Program, describes Pennsylvania's Striving Readers Comprehensive Literacy (SRCL) grant program. The report focuses on the design of instruction and interventions for students struggling to read and write in middle and high schools, including students with disabilities and English language learners, and it includes federal, state, and district policy recommendations.
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