Class Description - 5 Kinds of Nonfiction: Enriching Reading and Writing Instruction With Children's Books (8.21.26-8.20.27)

Date: Register anytime between August 21, 2026 - August 20, 2027
Course #: EDIA 606
Instructor: Emily Starr (emily@growprofessionally.com)
Number of License Renewal/Graduate Credits: 1
Registration Deadline: Last day to register is Friday, August 20th 2027 by 5:00 p.m.

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Big News! ISEA Graduate Credit is Back—and Better!

Ready to take the next step in your professional development? We've just launched an exciting partnership with Upper Iowa University to bring back Graduate Credit for ISEA Academy courses!

This collaboration provides two major wins for you:

More Affordable: We've successfully negotiated a lower cost per Graduate credit hour! Invest in your education without breaking the bank. (The new rate is in the "Fees" section at the top of the page.)
A Head Start on Your Degree: A select group of your ISEA Academy courses can now count as elective credit in an Upper Iowa University graduate program. Get credit for the professional learning you're already doing! (Don't forget to check with your program advisor for all the details!)

Important Note for Graduate Credit: To be eligible to receive Graduate credit through Upper Iowa University, you must possess a bachelor's degree from an institution that its regional accreditation association recognizes.

Get ready to dive in! This is your opportunity to enroll in a self-paced, one-credit, four-week course that is entirely on your schedule!

Once your registration is processed, look for an email from your instructor packed with everything you need to know. As soon as you get those instructions, you're ready to begin!

Remember, you have the entire 4 weeks to complete all your assignments, discussions, and the final project. It's flexible, but the clock is ticking!

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Course Description:

The Common Core recommends that 50% of classroom reading time be devoted to nonfiction, yet we often fall short of this goal (Common Core, Appendix B). After all, nonfiction is a bit dry and boring and our students prefer fiction, right? Nope! In this course, you will discover how children’s nonfiction has undergone a complete transformation over the past decade. Nonfiction authors now use lyrical language, engaging text structures, and suspenseful page turns to hook student interest. Furthermore, research shows that 42% of students prefer reading nonfiction while 75% of students equally prefer fiction and nonfiction. (Repaskey, Schumm, and Johnson, 2017)

A large body of research strongly supports integrating more nonfiction into your classroom instruction. The Science of Reading research spotlights the importance of reading nonfiction to build background knowledge for reading comprehension (Smith et. al., 2021). Research also shows that nonfiction text structure instruction improves expository reading comprehension (Herbert, Nelson & Brown, 2016; Bogaerds-Hazenberberg, Evers Vermeul, & van den Bergh, 2021) , and that providing students with opportunities to read and analyze high quality texts and instructing on how to emulate those models results in improved writing. Since a majority of our adult reading and writing is nonfiction, it is time for this genre to take center-stage in your classroom!

This course is a book study with the text: 5 Kinds of Nonfiction: Enriching Reading and Writing Instruction with Children’s Books. By reading the text, considering peer-reviewed articles, and watching instructor videos, you will learn the research-based benefits of reading nonfiction, how to introduce and explore nonfiction with your students, and how to improve your students reading and writing using nonfiction mentor texts. During the course you will choose whether to experience activities found in the book with a “student hat”, to implement them with your students, or to do both. You will also develop a nonfiction unit plan to guide your implementation and will create a nonfiction advocacy flyer to share your new knowledge with colleagues.

Learning Objectives:

Upon completion of this course, participants will…

● Explain at least four research-based reasons to incorporate more nonfiction into your reading instruction
● Create a text set to build background knowledge that aligns with a science unit
● Analyze student, classroom, and library nonfiction surveys and develop recommendations for nonfiction selection additions guided by Stewart and Correia’s book collection balancing table
● Design nonfiction advocacy flyer using research-based evidence
● Create lesson plans that utilize book activities to:
○ facilitate exploration of nonfiction
○ introduce the 5 kinds of nonfiction
○ analyze text features, sentence structure, and text scaffolding
○ analyze nonfiction text structures and apply new learning to writing assignments
○ analyze voice and point of view and apply new learning to writing assignments
○ encourage and celebrate nonfiction throughout the school year
● Create a nonfiction unit implementation plan using Stewart and Correia’s activity planner

**Important Information for You**
Please read through as these are Frequently Asked Questions in which answers can be found within this page.

1. The instructor will email you once your class registration has been processed and forwarded to him with information on how to get started in the class:

Emails regarding this class will come from the instructor with the email address emily@growprofessionally.com;
Be sure to check your junk/spam/clutter folders-mailboxes in case the email address isn't recognized as a known address; and
IF YOU ARE USING A SCHOOL EMAIL ADDRESS, many schools have their network security filters set up to push unknown emails directly to spam and you will not even see it; if this is the case you will need to either talk to your IT department and request emails with the email address be allowed through or let us know you want to use a different email address.

2. The Tabs at the top of the registration page have important additional information regarding this class:

The Syllabus gives information of what will be expected of you in the course. Generally it will include course policies, rules and regulations, required texts, and a schedule of assignments;
The Fees will let you know how much this class will cost depending on the type of credit you want to take it for as well as if you are an ISEA Member or not;
The Cancellation Policy is important so you know how to cancel if you need to and how refunds are handled; and
The ISEA Official Transcript page tells you how to access your transcript once the class has ended.