The literacy community includes many dedicated groups outside of IRA. Listed here are announcements of upcoming events and recent developments, sponsored by organizations other than IRA and its affiliates.
Announcements of events and updates in the literacy community are being relocated to the Reading Today Daily weblog (http://blog.reading.org). For best results, check the Announcements archive.
Celebration of 2007 China–U.S. Conference on Literacy to take place in Beijing
Global Interactions, Inc., a nonprofit organization that seeks to accelerate global partnerships through education and worldwide professional exchanges, is sponsoring the 2007 China–U.S. Conference on Literacy July 23–26 in Beijing. The theme of the conference is Literacies of Hope: Making Meaning Across Boundaries. The deadline for the call for papers is January 22. For more information, visit Global Interactions’ conference website
Travel grants are available for US teachers
Under the Eurasia/South Asia Teaching Excellence and Achievement Program (TEA), the U.S. Department of State and the International Research and Exchanges Board (IREX) have announced a competition for secondary-level teachers of English as a Foreign Language and Social Sciences from the United States to participate in a two-week professional exchange program. The selected teachers will travel to one of the following countries—Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bangladesh, Georgia, India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, or Ukraine. The program is fully funded and provides visa support, round-trip domestic airfare, lodging and meals to attend the TEA U.S. Conference, round-trip airfare from the U.S. to the assigned country in Eurasia or South Asia, emergency medical evacuation plan, recommended vaccinations, and lodging and a daily stipend in the host country. For more information,visit the IREX website.
New DVD from RFTEN: Changing the Way Teachers Are Taught to Teach Reading
In its new DVD, the Reading First Teacher Education Network (RFTEN) showcases national campus models that are successfully transforming the way that teacher candidates at NCATE-accredited minority-serving institutions are taught to teach reading. The 9:30-minute video features interviews with reading experts such as Timothy Shanahan, as well as faculty, candidates, parents, presidents, and other stakeholders who are using evidence-based reading instruction to bridge the achievement gap in reading. To download a viewer’s guide, view the DVD, and learn more about the RFTEN project, visit www.RFTEN.org or contact Dr. Boyce C. Williams at (202) 466-7496.
First Annual Mark Twain Young Authors Scholarship
A full scholarship is available for 12 students presently in grades 5–8 to participate in a week-long young authors’ workshop to be held in Hannibal, Missouri, June 25–29, 2007. All expenses will be paid, even travel. Students must submit a writing sample, and a blind review process will be used to select scholarship recipients. Full details are available at the Stetson University website.
IBBY launches initiatives to bring books to children in need
At the conclusion of its recent biennial congress in Macau, China, The International Board on Books for Young People (IBBY) announced several new initiatives to foster literacy and the love of books in all the world’s children. One of these is a new Fund for Children in Crisis, intended to support children in regions torn by war, civil disruption, or natural disaster. Another is an expanded Every Child’s Right to Become a Reader workshop program, intended to ensure that children everywhere have access to books of high quality written and produced in their own countries, as well as access to the best books from around the world. The workshops assist in training authors, illustrators, publishers, librarians, bibliotherapists, and teachers. For details visit the IBBY website at www.ibby.org.
United Arab Emirates University to host school reform conference
The College of Education at the University of Dubai, will host an international conference on “School Reforms: Challenges and Aspirations” April 17–19, 2007. For additional information, contact Prof. Abdullateef Haidar, PhD, Dean, College of Education, United Arab Emirates University, via e-mail (A.Haidar@uaeu.ac.ae), phone (9713 7677270), or fax (9713 7671294).
New edition of classic reference on children’s book awards
The Children’s Book Council announces publicaton of a new, print-on-demand edition of Children’s Books: Awards & Prizes. This new edition, the eleventh since 1960, contains 288 of the 318 awards and prizes contained in the CBC’s Awards & Prizes Online database. Please visit http://awardsandprizes.cbcbooks.org for more information.
Consortium offers subscriptions to Thinking Classroom/Peremena
RWCT International Consortium is happy to offer online subscriptions to Thinking Classroom, a peer-reviewed international journal in English with a parallel Russian-language version, Peremena. The journals serve as a forum for teachers and faculty interested in promoting democratic teaching practices.
Call for papers: Literacy Teaching and Learning
Published by the Reading Recovery Council of North America, Literacy Teaching and Learning: An International Journal of Early Reading and Writing provides an interdisciplinary forum on issues related to language acquisition, literacy development, and instructional theory and practice. The journal is seeking original manuscripts that reflect diverse methodologies: Ethnographic, empirical, and case study research are encouraged. For further information please contact Susan King Fullerton, editor, at susanf@clemson.edu; phone 864-656-6149; fax 864-656-1322.
Organizations seeking to publicize an activity or upcoming event are welcome to e-mail details to us. Your message should contain text of a brief announcement, along with contact information, e-mail address, or URL for people seeking more information. Sponsoring organizations and activities should be noncommercial and should promote literacy, reading instruction, or related topics. The Web editors reserve the right to edit announcements, or to decline to post those deemed unsuitable.
-->Announcements of events and updates in the literacy community are being relocated to the Reading Today Daily weblog (http://blog.reading.org). For best results, check the Announcements archive.
If you have any trouble reading the PDF documents linked to from this page, please see our PDF Help page.
Teaching Tools
Literacy Community