Professor
Julie Wood is a leading expert on how we can help children become
fully literate in the 21st century — beyond activities involving
paper and pencil. As computers have become more commonplace, offering
an unprecedented wealth of resources and accessibility, Dr. Wood has
been at the forefront as a strong advocate of their use as tools to
achieving and maintaining literacy in the classroom.
Dr. Wood discusses
how you can take advantage of new technologies to enhance your literature
studies with online literature circles. Such online connections
with peers around the country can be a great way to generate discussion,
promote authentic writing, and deepen children's interpretation
of what they read. Dr. Wood will also show you how to use the Web
to expand your professional repertoire in teaching children's literature.
She offers links to a wealth of resources such as teacher-created
lesson plans for popular book titles.
BIO
Julie Wood is
currently designing a professional development tool called the  Literacy
Matters Website at Education Development Center, in Newton, Massachusetts.
Dr. Wood is also a researcher and lecturer at the Harvard Graduate
School of Education, specializing in new technologies and 21st-century
literacies. She has taught elementary school and has developed educational
products, including a video-based literature series called Masterpiece,
for grades 1–8, for Simon & Schuster. Dr. Wood has also conducted
research as a member of the Vocabulary Improvement Project, a Federally
funded initiative designed to increase vocabulary acquisition among
young English-language learners. Her areas of expertise include
children's literacy development, the integration of new technologies
into educational settings, school change, and teacher online professional
development. She is a cofounder of a summer Literacy Institute in
a charter school in Dorchester, former Director of the America Reads
program at MIT, and former Director of the Jeanne Chall Reading
Lab. She is currently writing a book, CyberKids: Struggling Readers/Writers
and How Computers Can Help, for Heinemann Publishers.
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