Supporting Test-Taking Skills All Year-Round: Routines that Deepen Reading Comprehension and Strengthen Writing

Dates: 11/06/2026 and 12/11/2026 Grades: 3-8 Venue: Online via Zoom Time: 9:00am - 3:00pm ET

Regular Price: $525 Early Bird Discount Price: $420 (Until October 16, 2026) Group Discount: $420 for groups of 3 or more

Audience: Teachers, Coaches, and Literacy Leaders (open for all US States)

Course Overview 

This two-day course invites teachers and literacy leaders to explore how writing about reading deepens reading comprehension long before testing season begins. Rather than treating these strategies as temporary test prep, participants will establish explicit, year-long instructional practices using read-alouds, close reading and writing to build key language & comprehension skills, as well as skills for both short and long written responses. No matter the curriculum you teach, we have suggestions for structures, strategies, and essential feedback that can fit into your day that can make all the difference!

Participants will learn how to leverage whole-class instruction, partner work, and small groups to foster oral language, text based discussions, consistent assessment practices, and targeted practice for students to guarantee regular productive struggle and growth. By utilizing writing skills, feedback, and self-checklists, educators will gain transformational tools to help students think critically, react deeply, and hold onto their ideas across fiction and informational texts. Starting early, by embedding key routines and habits into your ELA time, can help build confidence and stronger skills not only for testing later in the year, but into their overall ability to  enjoy and find purpose in their literacy work. 

Learning Objectives

• Understand the research-based strategies for reading comprehension and vocabulary development

• Learn key structures to embed in any curriculum to build testing sophistication skills that are explicit, engaging, and strategic for all learners

• Develop and use key models and exemplars to support powerful writing about reading  

• Walk away with reading strategies to use in read-aloud and close reading that explicitly teach and practice different written responses to texts

• Build a toolkit for teaching, including ways to use note-taking strategies and feedback to help students capture and deepen their thinking about short texts.

• Design small groups and 1:1 coaching around strategies for learners to teach and build  confidence, clarity, and collaboration in your own classroom.

• Leave with a concrete plan for weaving writing about reading into your instruction all year long.