ARPDC: Change Maker Conversations in Education Podcast
Episode 5 in our Reading Across the Curriculum Series
In this episode, we visit with a career English Language Arts teacher, Curriculum Consultant and Professional Learning Facilitator, Tannis Niziol. Throughout Tannis’ 30-year career as an educator in Edmonton and Winnipeg, Tannis has remained passionate about teaching and learning and the need for explicit literacy apprenticeship at all grade levels in all subject areas.
Tannis is a voracious reader who believes students deserve access to rich, diverse reading experiences and to a safe, equitable space to talk about what they see, hear, think and feel. She is on a journey to disrupt and bring clarity to the conversations that drive our planning and assessment in the English Language Arts classroom.
Kazuo Ishiguro, author of Remains of the Day shares, “But in the end, stories are about one person saying to another, this is the way it feels to me, can you understand what I’m saying? Does it also feel that way to you?”
Titles and Websites Touched on in our Conversation:
Treaty Words for as Long as the Rivers Flow by Aimée Craft, illustrated by Luke Swinson (age 10-12)
Refugee by Alan Gratz
The Unwanted: Stories of the Syrian Refugees by Don Brown
All American Boys by Jason Reynolds and Brendan Kiely
The One Hundred Years of Lenni and Margot by Marianne Cronin
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands by Kate Beaton (Graphic Novel)
Tell the Wolves I’m Home by Carol Rifka Brunt
Scarborough by Catherine Hernandez
Lessons in Chemistry by Bonnie Garmus
The Chadwick Family Chronicles by Marcia Willett
The Geography of Genius: Lessons from the World’s Most Creative Places by Eric Weiner (Social Studies/English)
Professional Reading
Patterns of Power: Inviting Adolescent Writers Into the Conventions of Language, Grades 6-8 by Jeff Anderson, Melinda Clark, and Travis Leech
This is Disciplinary Literacy: Reading, Writing, Thinking, and Doing…Content Area by Content Area By Releah Cossett Lent
Websites and other supports discussed in our conversation include:
Learning for Justice – https://www.learningforjustice.org/
Social Justice Books – https://socialjusticebooks.org
Support your Diversity in Literature work with support from the #Disrupttexts folks: https://disrupttexts.org Tannis specifically mentioned Tricia Ebarvia @triciaebarvia
Tannis has created a slide deck – electronic bookshelf you can check out here
Check out Text Talk Tuesdays Monthly 3:30 – 4:30 Enter “Text Talk Tuesday” in the search bar.