College Ready

Sharing strategies for student success, college readiness and academic coaching

Monthly Archives: July 2013


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Keep it REAL–4 Easy Steps to Determine Source Credibility

The problem: Not all sources are created equal.

The solution: Keep it REAL–4 Easy Steps to credible & authentic source material.

When it comes time to do research, most of us (not *just our students),  reach for our phones and just “Google it.”

Yet, when it comes time to incorporate source content into their writing, we want students to go beyond that one easy step. Our students have an enormous amount of  information at their fingertips. And therein lies the difficulty. They literally carry around so much data in their smartphones, it’s enough to make a grad student’s head spin, let alone a frosh college student, or the high school set.

As we know though, all internet sources are NOT created equal. From paid links, to content farms and the like–what steps can students-and the rest of us–take to analyze a source for credibility? By using this handy chart with the mnemonic REAL , they will be able to sort through a lot of the “junk” that’s available and find a nugget of REAL, and credible information.

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The four quick and easy steps are: Read the URL. Examine Content. Ask about the Author. Look at the Links.

Use an in-class discussion to educate students on the importance of each of these four categories, using the chart as a guide while you talk. Have a variety of articles related to the same topic, but from different websites, ready to look at on your smartboard, so students have a visual for the type of comparisons and analysis that is involved.

There are other approaches to this question of source credibility. However, I’d rather give my students a quick and easy tool that they are likely to actually remember and use, then a long, pragmatic list of filters and variables that will cause their eyes to gloss over.

So, when it comes to source credibility, let’s help our students keep it REAL. What do you think–is this an approach that would work in your classroom? Or in your own professional writing? If you’re a student, would this method help you? I’d love to hear from you!

This post “4 Tools to Avoid Summer Learning Loss” from Edudemic lists four tools for stopping the “summer slide.” Check it out and help kids stay on track this summer.

“Combatisummerreading1ng learning loss over the summer for young readers is a challenge that many teachers face. The amount of time it takes to assign summer reading along with the lack of face time to keep students up to date with their reading and comprehension can make summer reading seem like a less-than-useful task.”

These apps might just make the summer reading less of a chore. What do you think?


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1 Easy Way to Be a Hero

Be a Hero. Mentor a child.

Did you know…the presence of at least one caring, supportive adult in a child’s life can make all the difference?

I’m passionate about student success and educational equality. Sometimes, we look at our education system, and all we see are the broken pieces the media reports on, so we toss up our hands and say, “well what can I do, I’m just one person,”  absolving ourselves from the whole thing. But, that’s exactly right–you are ONE person and ONE person is all it takes. That’s the Power of You.

Research shows that when adults get involved to mentor and work with students, they have the power to help kids increase10573321855[1] academic achievement, stay on track, think more positively about themselves and increase their opportunities of going on to college.

Think you’re too busy to get involved? Mentoring doesn’t take as much time as you might think. It is as simple as signing up to read to a child for an hour a week. This can make all the difference in the life of an at-risk child, because statistics show us that a child that can’t read well by the end of third grade is FOUR times more likely to drop out of high school.

So, the easy way to earn your Super Hero cape? Sign up as a mentor. Help close the opportunity gap a little bit. And the funny thing is–you will end up feeling like you’re the one that was given a gift. That’s right! By helping someone else move forward a little bit…you move yourself forward.

If you don’t know where to start, try your local library or the United Way. If you already volunteer as a mentor, leave a comment and tell us what you’re involved in. If you think you might want to mentor a young person, but haven’t made the leap, what’s holding you back? I’d love to hear from you.

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Source: Double Jeopardy: How 3rd Grade Reading Scores and Poverty Influence High School Graduation

This is true!

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This is true!

Books are like oxygen.

To me, they are nothing short of life support.

Some of my favorite books to read lately are Children’s Literature. I’m rediscovering those sweet tales, and they’re the perfect reminder of all the good in the world. Books like Charlotte’s Web and The Wind in the Willows. They also remind us, that even as adults, it’s ok to smile, to have fun, to take care of your friends…and

…to Dream.

So, what are you reading?


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Think Before You Share–7 Rules for Posting Photos Online

“Is it Going to Cause Drama?”

Digital natives have grown up in front of the cameras. Posting, tweeting, selfies–it is all about the image. In an Instagram world, those images are shared at lightening speed and often without permission. This infographic by CommonSense Media, which appeared on Edudemic, is a great visual to help students consider responsible use of photos on social media. I like that it asks students to think about whether or not the photo would “pass the Grandma test.”

So, I Took A Photo Of My Friend, Now What?


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“Life’s most urgent question is,
What are you doing for others?”

—Martin Luther King Jr.

pink flower


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Always Learning

Day one. We begin.

I’m a gal from New Jersey, now located on the West Coast–teaching, raising a family, & living my dream.career passion

The theme for this blog is “Always Learning.” I’m a college English instructor and although it’s my name on the schedule where the instructor is listed, each day I learn from both my students, and my colleagues. Add in the wider academic community (ie, all of you!), via my Twitter PLN, Pinterest, teacher blogs on Tumblr, and well…the access to information, learning, and new ideas is endless. Family, friends and life are also all great teachers. I’m always learning and I love it!

For a while now, I’ve been determined to start a blog to both reflect on my own teaching, learning, writing, and reading, and to share content and ideas with others.To give back. To model the openness that is so vital in our profession. I’ve been doing this on other social media channels, and even blogging with my students, but I came late to setting up my teaching blog. (Ok, truth be told this blog has been in the planning stage for over a year! A year! Wow!) No more. Summer, sunshine and time off have given me the burst of creativity that I needed to envision and launch this new site. And here it is.

I’m passionate about student success, literacy, and educational equality. I believe in education to empower people of all ages and backgrounds,  and to save & change lives. To teach is to be a small part of this and that to me, is living my dream.  In my next post, I’ll explain how I named this blog…but here’s a hint. I’ve taught college English for 16 years in a student-centered classroom.

I’ll try to keep future posts short and sweet and end with something useful each time. Today, it’s this link to “15 Young Adult Books Every Adult Should Read.” I plan to read Feed next. How about you-have you read any of the books on this list? Which would you recommend?

Happy Summer. Happy Reading.

~Lisa