About the Author

Lucy Calkins is the author of the best-selling grade-by-grade Units of Study for Teaching Reading, Grades K-8, Units of Study in Opinion/Argument, Information, and Narrative Writing, Grades K-8, and Units of Study in Phonics, Grades K - 2 series, which have quickly become an indispensable part of classroom life in tens of thousands of schools around the world, the Up the Ladder: Accessing Grades 3-6 Units in Narrative, Information, and Opinion Writing series, and classroom essentials such as the groundbreaking TCRWP Classroom Libraries and the Workshop Help Desk series. Lucy is also the author or coauthor of numerous foundational professional texts with Heinemann, including Leading Well, The Art of Teaching Writing, Writing Pathways: Performance Assessments and Learning Progressions, Grades K-8, Pathways to the Common Core: Accelerating Achievement, and One to One: The Art of Conferring with Young Writers. She is also the author of The Art of Teaching Reading. In her role as the Founding Director of the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, a New York City - based organization that has influenced literacy instruction around the globe for more than thirty years, Lucy has developed a learning community of brilliant and dedicated teacher educators who have supported hundreds of thousands of teachers, principals, superintendents, and policy-makers in schools that bear their distinctive mark: a combination of joy and rigor in the classrooms, and entire school communities - teachers, principals, parents, kids - who wear a love of reading and writing on their sleeves. Lucy is the Robinson Professor of Children's Literature at Teachers College, Columbia University where she co-directs the Literacy Specialist Program - a masters and doctoral program that brings brilliant teachers and coaches to TCRWP schools everywhere and to the Project itself. She and her husband John are the parents of two sons, Miles and Evan. Visit UnitsofStudy.com

Laurie Pessah is a Senior Deputy Director at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project, where she has responsibility for staffing the Project's work with several hundred schools in New York City and around the country. Coauthor of the DVD A Principal's Guide to Leadership in the Teaching of Writing: Helping Teachers with Units of Study (Heinemann 2008), Laurie has special responsibility for leading the TCRWP's work with school leaders and supporting staff developers. In this capacity, Laurie leads study groups, institutes, and a calendar of conference days for superintendents, principals, and assistant principals. She also has a longstanding special interest in primary-level reading and writing workshops.