Summer Literacy Institutes

ENGL 919.01, Monday-Friday, 8:15am-2:30pm
       “There isn't anyone you couldn't love once you heard their story.”    
                                                    Sister Mary Lou Kownacki 

This course investigates the integral role of storytelling in fostering community, empathy and social cohesion. Students will explore how narratives—both personal and collective—shape identities, convey cultural values, and create a sense of belonging within various communities and classrooms. This class is suitable for teachers working in grades K-12. 

Through a combination of readings, discussions, writing exercises, and collaborative experiences, participants will have the opportunity to create their own narratives and explore how different mediums can enhance the storytelling experience. 

By the end of the course, participants will harness the pedagogical tool of storytelling as a means of fostering engagement, motivation, empathy, social change and more. 

Tomasen M Carey is a Senior Lecturer in the English Department at the University of New Hampshire where she is the Field Coordinator of the Learning Through Teaching Program and Director of UNH Writers Academy for youth. She is the voice behind the blog, Conversation Education (https://conversationeducation.com/) where she shares resources, questions the current state of education, and reflects on her work and her own literary life.

ENGL 920.01a, CRN 70744, 8:15am-2:30pm in person plus two additional virtual classes. (3 credit)

The ELA standards can be daunting as a whole—especially if you are trying to simply tackle engagement among your students (and who isn’t?!?). In this course, we will navigate the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) in reading, writing, speaking, and listening, making sense of not only how they fit together, but how they amplify our outcomes for reading and writing achievement. 

With a focus on a Universal Design for Learning, this mindset will lead us to approach literacy full circle, addressing the full intention of the standards while honoring the genius of the learners in your care. 

Participants will: 

• Learn to deconstruct the opportunities the ELA standards present through a lens of multidimensional literacy. (For teachers in grades K-5, we will also consider how these ELA standards can be leveraged for the other content areas.)​​​​​​
• Practice ways humans interact with language through a receptive/generative language model. 
• Develop a broad definition of what it means to interact with text that includes—and transcends—the printed word.

• Construct and share text sets and sample lesson sequences that leverage reading, writing, speaking, and listening.  

  

Jaclyn Karabinas is an energetic, creative educator who was a classroom teacher until 2014. Now an independent consultant and instructional coach, she is passionate about mixing and matching skill sets from the worlds of educational technology integration, arts integration, and progressive literacy instruction. She holds a Master’s Degree in Arts Integration in Curriculum & Instruction, is a Google for Education Certified Trainer, Heinemann Professional Development Online PD consultant, and UNH Learning through Teaching adjunct.

July 16-18^th, June 25-27^th, August 22-23^rd

UNH-Manchester and on-site in schools

Sponsored by a U.S. Department of Education grant, the SLATE Institute focuses on bringing together teams of ELA, STEM, and EL teachers from the middle-levels. Teachers will work on inquiry in science and writing, as well as building stronger practices for working with multilingual students in their classrooms. Instructors will include experts in literacy, writing, and STEM from UNH. Teacher teams will have time to develop interdisciplinary collaborative curricular units with their teams. One of the goals of the Institute is build student interest in STEM through inquiry, while at the same time, gaining valuable experiences in reading and writing in the Language Arts and beyond. The SLATE Institute is a collaboration between the UNH Leitzel Center, the UNH Community Literacy Center, and the NH Literacy Institutes. Application only and available in schools that are currently part of the SLATE program. For more information, see https://www.unh.edu/leitzel-center/programs/stem-language-arts-teaching…

For grantees only.

ENGL 911.01, CRN 70738, 8:15am-2:30pm in person, plus two additional virtual classes. (3 credit)

Shelley Girdner’s poems have been published in several journals, including Narrative, Nine Mile, Hunger Mountain, The Indiana Review, Mid-American Review, and others.She’s been featured on PBS NewsHour Arts Beat. Her collection, You Were that White Bird was published by Bauhan in 2016. She teaches writing at the University of New Hampshire where she has been a faculty member for over twenty years. This is her second summer teaching with the UNH Literacy Institute.

Three day workshop: July 21-23

8:15am-2:30pm (in person and virtual options)
$399, 15 PD hours

AI in the Classroom: Rethinking What's Possible (Grades 6-College)

This is a workshop for teachers, coaches, and instructors  from grades 6 all the way through college who want to meet AI head-on—not as a threat, but as an opportunity to rethink what’s possible in our classrooms. This dynamic three-day workshop will guide you in your questions about AI and help us to think through ways in which we might use AI to enhance writing instruction without sacrificing authenticity, ownership, or student voice. 

Together, we’ll dig into essential questions: 

• Is it possible for AI to serve as a tool for deeper learning rather than a shortcut around it? 
• What does ethical responsible AI use look like? 
• How do we preserve student voice and originality in an AI-driven world? 

Through hands-on activities, thoughtful discussions, and practical applications participants will leave confident and ready to incorporate AI tools ethically and effectively. Workshop materials include a free copy of the book from the workshop leaders. 

In this workshop, we'll take a hands-on, inquiry-based approach to understanding AI’s role in a public school classroom, exploring both its possibilities and its challenges. The workshop will be led by authors and long-time UNH Summer Literacy Institute and Learning Through Teaching faculty Kristina Peterson and Dennis Magliozzi, authors of AI in the Writing Workshop: Finding the Write Balance (Heinemann, 2025). 

ENGL 920.03, CRN 920.M3, 8:15am-2:30pm in person (UNH Manchester Campus)

In the flurry of the school day, it can sometimes feel easier to assign writing rather than teach it.  

Let’s make time this summer, then, to revisit the teaching of writing together. In this course, we will work side-by-side—across grade levels and subject areas—to practice writing and teaching writing of genres, including personal, informative, argument, CERs, or research essays.  We’ll become writers and writing “coaches” (Gallagher 53), finding what’s working well in students’ writing and helping them navigate the surprising joy and challenge of writing well. 

During the class, we will 

• Collaborate, drawing on each member’s experience to develop a mini-library of go-to writing resources for teaching, writing, and sharing (possibly including inspiration from some uniquely Manchester resources) 
• Design assignments that offer students both challenge and choice 
• Analyze and consider best ways to use mentor texts for various genres 
• Practice writing [and grammar?] exercises that build writing and writing stamina over time, building on students’ strengths 
• Evaluate quick, helpful, and encouraging forms of feedback
• Celebrate our writing achievements 

Together, we’ll practice writing and teaching writing, seeing how student writing can flourish with collaborative planning and confidence.   

This course is an excellent follow-up for past and current S.L.A.T.E Institute participants.

Laura Smith, a Principal Lecturer in English at UNH, teaches courses in first-year composition, intro to literature, and English teaching, including Teaching Young Adult Literature.  She appreciates the welcoming and collaborative New Hampshire Literacy Institutes community and loves hearing your YA book recommendations!

Special Guest: Dr. Christina Ortmeier-Hooper

Christina Ortmeier-Hooper is an Associate Professor of English. She has been a student and teacher in the NH Literacy Institute prior to becoming the director of the program, and she began her teaching career as an English and ESL teacher in secondary schools.  She has also served as the director of First-Year Writing at the University of New Hampshire.

922.03a, CRN 70748, 8:15am-2:30pm ONLINE (3 credit)

Join Nawal Qarooni, a literacy educator who designs family literacy programming in schools, for a week-long course (3-credit, online) to grow community and family collaborations all year long. Nawal will share a collective care framework developed over decades of research and her work with multi-ethnic children and their teachers. In this course, we will work together to:

• Explore how classroom teaching of English language arts sparks and extends curiosity into students’ home lives, unearthing a deep appreciation for the rich nuance of human experience. 
• Determine what family engagement is and is not; unpack how understanding what constitutes family and engagement affects our communication methods with the students in our care.  
• Elevate the multitude of ways that all families grow their children’s literacy lives – in authentic traditions and rituals- and think through our responsibilities as teachers and leaders of literacy.  
• Discuss where the family intersects with our curricular work, and how we can communicate best with families about how to strengthen and continue their rich literacy legacies.  

Our class days together will be interactive, discussion-based, and tailored to participant input. Teachers and school / instructional leaders will leave with ideas to explore for their communities and schools to draw closer together in partnership to collaborate and support student literacy development. There will be ample space for creating cathartic texts together that will then be used to springboard classroom and family learning experiences. Classroom teachers will return to their classroom with text titles, suggested modes of connecting directly with families, and ways that all their students can see themselves and their fellow community members in the literature.

Registered participants will receive a copy of the professional text, Nourishing Caregiver Collaborations: Elevating Home Experiences and Classroom Practices for Collective Care.

Nawal Qarooni is a Jersey City-based educator, writer and adjunct professor who supports a holistic approach to literacy instruction and family experiences in schools across the country. Drawing on her work as an inquiry-based leader, mother, and proud daughter of immigrants, Nawal’s pedagogy is centered in the rich and authentic learning all families gift their children every day. She and her team of coaches at NQC Literacy work with schools and districts to collectively grow teacher practice and children’s literacy lives. She is the author of Nourishing Caregiver Collaborations: Elevating Home Experiences and Classroom Practices for Collective Care (Stenhouse/ Routledge 2024). She has worked as a classroom teacher, instructional coach, staff developer, researcher and professor.

In addition, Nawal serves on the Library of Congress Literacy Awards Advisory Board, which funds powerful literacy programming across the country and worldwide. Nawal was a member of the National Council for Teachers of English Committee Against Racism and Bias in the Teaching of English (2021-2024). She evaluates manuscripts for Reese Witherspoon’s LitUp program, which platforms historically underrepresented voices in publishing.

Four day workshop - July 28-31 (no graduate credits)
$300 registration fee

Register for Workshop

Fascinating stories about the history of African Americans in New England are now at our fingertips thanks to the work of scholars, librarians, and nonprofits organizations. But how do we integrate these powerful stories into K-12 language arts classrooms? Come join us for this workshop where we tackle how best to bring these stories into our classrooms and schools.

This four-day workshop explores storytelling, literature, and social studies amid the expansion of digital archival collections to illustrate how teachers can successfully bring these narratives into their curriculum and classrooms. We ask two central questions:

• What are the stories of freedom that we ought to share?
• How can we use archival material to enrich our reading and analysis of literary texts written by writers of color?

This workshop will bring together teachers and cultural leaders who will share best practices on incorporating archival materials in teaching language arts and humanities. We'll go on a walking tour of the Black Heritage Trail of New Hampshire and visit the historical site of novelist Harriet E. Wilson, the first African American to publish a novel in North America. Along with these field trips, we’ll share how to analyze documents, from poems to petitions with your students; and we’ll study excerpts from African American texts such as Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing and view documentaries like Shadows Fall North.

Following three days of immersion, we’ll spend a fourth day creating lessons and activities to use in our classrooms with curriculum experts Dr. Christina Ortmeier-Hooper and Amy Steinberg.