Doug Lemov's field notes

Reflections on teaching, literacy, coaching, and practice.

07.29.24 Scott Wells Models the Foundations of a Successful Cold Call

In our workshops on Cold Call we often provide a summary of four key things teachers can do while Cold Calling to ensure that the experience is positive, productive and successful. They are: 1) Preparation. Giving students time to prepare answers before a Cold Call helps them to develop quality ideas and often rehearse them in…


07.23.24 Using Writing in The (Reading) Classroom–The Amazing Success of First Year Teacher Emily Fleming

    Last week I had the pleasure of joining Kristen McQuillan, Natalie Wexler and Julia Cooper on a webinar sponsored by the Knowledge Matters campaign. Topic: The critical role of writing in reading comprehension. You can watch the webinar here: https://knowledgematterscampaign.org/post/writing-an-unsung-hero-of-reading-comprehension/ Meanwhile I thought I’d share a lovely video of a teacher using writing in…


05.03.24 More Ace Footage from Scott Wells’ Classroom

Earlier this week I posted a clip of Scott Wells of Goldsmith Primary Academy as he Checked for Understanding with his students. Justifiably, the clip got rave reviews in a recent workshop and online as well.  No surprise that- you can see how sharp it is (and some of the highlights from my perspective at least)…


05.01.24 How Scott Wells Checks for Understanding as His Students Read (with Video)

  We recently shot an amazing round of video in Scott Wells’ classroom at Goldsmith Primary Academy in Walsall…. We generated clip after clip of masterful teaching several of which we’ve already begun sharing in workshops. In fact I had the pleasure of showing a clip of Scott Checking for Understanding to participants at a session…