by Michelle Yzquierdo

Picture this: Your tenth grade student is reading her biology textbook. She’s navigating dense paragraphs about cellular processes when she hits the word “photosynthesis” and stops cold. “I don’t know this word,” she mutters, and skips ahead. You’ve seen this pattern many times: students shutting down the moment they encounter unfamiliar academic vocabulary.

So what do you do? Spend the necessary instructional time pre-teaching all the academic vocabulary words? Have students dutifully copy definitions? Maybe even make flashcards? Furthermore, you have 150 students across five classes, reading anywhere from third-grade to college level, and the gaps in academic language and vocabulary are as diverse as your students. How do you differentiate vocabulary instruction for that range?

Continue reading “The Vocabulary Hack That Changes Everything: Why Morpheme Instruction Works” →

by Sarah Welch and Mark Cotham

The season of reflection and renewal is upon us! This new year, we’re looking back at some of our most-read posts of all time. We’re pleased to see that some of our oldest posts are still valuable to educators.

Continue reading “Our Favorite Seidlitz Blog Posts of 2025” →

by Dr. Lora Beth Escalante

What do students do right away when they walk into class? Are there a few minutes when they sit idly while you take attendance or get papers and materials organized from the last class? Maybe the lesson ended early, and you find your class with a glorious 5-10 minutes of “free time.” Maybe you read your audience half-way through a lesson and realize you’ve lost them due to too much sitting. How can we utilize these in-between moments to provide students with low-stress opportunities for meaningful language practice? 

Continue reading “Downtime Do-Nows: Easy-to-Implement Language Rich Strategies for Those In-Between Moments” →