Story starter websites – In this School Library Journal feature, Richard Byrne suggests apps to help students get started with their writing. Here are three that are free:

• Write About This http://ow.ly/CwmbT 

• WordWriter http://www.boomwriter.com/wordwriter 

• StoryToolz…

Nonfiction That’s Good for the Learning Environment

by Steve Peha

As many of us adjust to the Common Core and new standards in other states which mimic the Core in all but name, we know we’re going to be teaching a lot more nonfiction. In particular, we’re going to be teaching issue-oriented, analytic, short-form nonfiction of the kind we often find in newspapers, magazines, and on the Internet. I recently came across an incredible set of materials that seem…

Countering 'churn and burn'

Since the no-excuses movement began in the 1990s, its schools have had a reputation for teachers who are young, idealistic, white, and available to families around the clock -- until they leave, writes Sara Neufeld for The Atlantic. Some are ready to have children of their own or more lucrative careers; others are just fried. The dynamic has been criticized for depriving students of stable adult relationships and creating mistrust…

Separate, equal-ish

If wealthy Malibu can convince less-affluent Santa Monica, Calif. that two districts would work better than the one they now share, it could offer a template for others around the country that have sought independence from their less-well-off partners, writes Kyle Spencer for The Hechinger Report. "Separatist movements" are increasingly common as parents in mostly white, mostly middle-class communities in and around such places as Memphis, Salt…