As educators, we are always rummaging for just the right specimen, sample, manipulative, or visual to make our teaching whole. In Playing with Poems, Zo? makes the search for teaching treasures just a bit easier. No need to make space on your shelf for this book. You will use it every day. - Gretchen OwockiAuthor of Literacy Through Play Word study does not always follow the same path in all classrooms, and Zo? makes it easy for teachers to find their own paths through her fantastic and fun poems. I can trust Zo?'s lessons to meet the needs of a wide range of learners. - Stephanie ParsonsAuthor of First Grade Writers and Second Grade Writers What a joy to read a book about word study that considers both the playful, curious nature of young children as well as their needs as readers, writers, and learners The ideas presented here are incredibly practical, easily implemented, and highly effective. - Kathy CollinsAuthor of Growing Readers Why aren't there more good poems for use in shared reading? Poems that address key curricular goals while making the most of young children's love of rhythm and rhyme? Now, thanks to Zoe Ryder White, there are. She's stocked Playing with Poems with lessons built around 44 brand-new, original poems written precisely for word study. Only a teacher could write both poems filled with word study concepts and lessons that help children internalize them. Through a shared reading framework, White presents word study lessons that target literacy foundations such as: concepts about print rhythm and rhyme sight words spelling patterns vocabulary. Playing with Poems is a lot of fun for children, and it's packed with helpful features for you.Its lessons are carefully sequenced to lead students from beginning concepts to more complex ones. Special navigation charts help you match lessons to areas of need. Each poem can be downloaded in a reproducible format at books.heinemann.com/white. And Playing with Poems even provides great ideas for writing your own shared reading poems and for collecting them from outside sources. Finally, you'll never need to worry again about tracking down poems that work for word study. Just pick up Playing with Poems, You'll get years' worth of poems perfect for shared reading. And best of all you'll have powerful lessons designed to make the most of them. Only from the pen of a teacher.

Zoe Ryder White is the author of the Heinemann title Playing with Poems (2008) and a is a coauthor of One to One: The Art of Conferring with Young Writers, as well as a coauthor of Units of Study for Primary Writing, classroom materials from Heinemann firsthand. She is a kindergarten teacher at PS321 in Brooklyn, New York. Before life as a classroom teacher, Zoe worked as a writer-in-residence through the Teachers and Writers Collaborative in nearly 25 public schools throughout New York City.