NM PED 2026 Literacy and Humanities Summer Conference

Implementing meaningful literacy change is rarely easy. When challenges arise, competing priorities, limited resources, staff turnover, or implementation fatigue, schools need more than commitment. They need systems, structures, and a clear framework for sustaining improvement.

This session introduces school, district, and state leaders to the research-based systems, infrastructures, and principles of implementation science required to build and sustain a successful Multi-Tiered System of Support (MTSS) for literacy. Participants will explore the critical components that move initiatives from intention to impact, even in the most challenging contexts.

Through three compelling vignettes drawn from real elementary schools facing significant obstacles, participants will see how strong implementation systems led to measurable improvements in reading and writing outcomes. These stories demonstrate what is possible when leadership, structure, and persistence come together to support effective practice. Attendees will leave with a clearer understanding of how to persevere through implementation hurdles and the confidence that meaningful, lasting literacy improvement is achievable.

In this session, you will explore the why, the what, and the how of strong fluency instruction specifically for the secondary grades. You will discover how science-based instructional routines can provide middle and high school students with the necessary support to access and succeed with grade-level complex texts.

Designed for teachers, coaches, and instructional leaders, this session provides you with research-based, ready-to-implement fluency routines that fit the unique needs of the secondary classroom. You will walk away with practical strategies to help your students build the automaticity required for deeper comprehension, ensuring they have the tools to navigate challenging content across all subject areas.

Presented by Dr. Linda Cavazos and Severo Martinez, this session explores the impact of the Structured Literacy Initiative on student achievement in New Mexico since 2022. You will examine the evidence demonstrating how systematic, explicit instruction has successfully improved reading proficiency for all students across the state.

During the session, you will look closely at data and outcomes with a particular focus on English Learners across all instructional settings. You will discover how the initiative’s frameworks have shifted the landscape of literacy in New Mexico and what these results mean for your own classroom or district. You will leave with a deeper understanding of the evidence base supporting structured literacy and a clear view of how these state-wide efforts are effectively closing achievement gaps and fostering long-term reading success.

Students struggle with comprehension not only because of decoding challenges, but because texts assume knowledge they may not yet have. In this interactive workshop, participants will examine the role of background knowledge within Scarborough’s Reading Rope and experience a classroom-ready routine for Grade 3–5 literature and informational texts.

Using a grade-level excerpt, educators will learn how to implement a structured 10–12 minute “Build Background Knowledge” sequence prior to reading. The session demonstrates how to intentionally teach essential context and concept vocabulary while integrating culturally responsive connections and structured academic discourse routines that ensure equitable participation.

Participants will leave with a one-page planning template and a knowledge-builder menu that can be applied immediately to upcoming reading lessons. This session bridges structured literacy and equity by showing how explicit knowledge instruction strengthens comprehension and access for all students.

In this session, you will focus on the exploration of Generative AI tools to create effective materials for planning interventions. You will begin by defining and understanding the difference between AI inputs and outputs, ensuring you have a clear grasp of how these tools process information.

Using a specific protocol, you will learn how to craft high-quality inputs that lead to precise and useful results. You will also explore how to critically analyze the quality of the output from the AI tool to ensure it meets the rigorous needs of your students. By the end of the session, you will leave with a practical framework for leveraging AI as a time-saving partner in your instructional design, allowing you to generate targeted intervention resources that are accurate, engaging, and aligned with student goals.

Strengthen student comprehension and content achievement through the power of intentional academic vocabulary instruction. In this session, you will explore Marzano’s Six-Step Process for teaching academic terms and examine how systematic vocabulary routines can be implemented across math, science, and social studies.

You will engage with practical strategies for selecting high-leverage Tier 3 vocabulary, supporting student discussion, and reinforcing learning through structured review activities and games. The session places special emphasis on using student vocabulary notebooks as a tool for building conceptual understanding, promoting equity for multilingual learners, and monitoring growth. Throughout the hour, you will collaborate to apply a menu of research-aligned practices and develop SMART coaching or classroom implementation goals. You will leave with a clear plan to support consistent, cross-disciplinary vocabulary instruction that ensures all students can access complex content.

In this engaging and interactive session, you will explore how to build capacity for disciplinary literacy in grades 6 through 12. Grounded in the science of reading, this session provides practical routines and strategies that support student comprehension, vocabulary, and knowledge building across all content areas at the middle and high school levels.

You will experience and examine examples of discipline-specific work being done in classrooms across New Mexico and leave with tools you can use immediately. Additionally, you will be introduced to the Reading Apprenticeship framework, which is an approach that supports student reading, thinking, and learning in every discipline. You will also learn how your school or district can access free training for teachers and administrators during the 2026–27 school year. By the end of this session, you will have a clear path for empowering your secondary students to master the complex texts of their specific subjects.