Read Kittle's stories of teaching and learning. Then write your own. I plan to.
Tom Romano, author of Crafting Authentic Voice

For twenty years Penny Kittle has woven together artful teaching and a love of language, celebrating the written word with classes from elementary school through graduate school. Now, she shares the stories of students with whom she's celebrated, struggled, and learned. More than a teaching memoir, The Greatest Catch is a close-up look at how to teach powerful lessons and how to learn powerful lessons from teachingespecially from teaching writing.

Kittle teaches her students that writing is a tool for developing their intellectual, academic, and emotional selves, and in these essays, she shows how both she and her students' lives have been profoundly influenced by writing. You'll look over her shoulder as she tries to win over a mischievous third grader, works with a fifth-grade alcoholic, and attempts to make sense of her profession as she watches secondary students drop out of school. And in each instance, you'll see how writing can provide an outlet for difficult feelings, build connections and community, or foster resiliency in writers of any age.

Best of all, The Greatest Catch is a model for your own professional development. In addition to her inspirational and pragmatic stories, Kittle includes Craft Notes that demonstrate how she composed her essays so that you can use the same strategies for your classroom life. You'll find these tools immediately useful for structuring reflective writing that helps you uncover the many layers of meaning in your work, just as Kittle, herself, has.

Join Penny Kittle in the journey of a teaching lifetime and learn from her experience. Begin with any essay in The Greatest Catch or read it cover to cover. You'll find that no matter where you start you'll end up at the same place: inspired to teach, write, and learn.

Penny Kittle teaches freshman composition at Plymouth State University in New Hampshire. She was a teacher and literacy coach in public schools for 34 years, 21 of those spent at Kennett High School in North Conway. She is the co-author (with Kelly Gallagher) of Four Essential Studies: Beliefs and Practices to Reclaim Student Agency as well as the bestselling 180 Days. Penny is the author of Book Love and Write Beside Them, which won the NCTE James Britton award. She also co-authored two books with her mentor, Don Graves, and co-edited (with Tom Newkirk) a collection of Graves' work, Children Want to Write. She is the president of the Book Love Foundation and was given the Exemplary Leader Award from NCTE's Conference on English Leadership. In the summer Penny teaches graduate students at the University of New Hampshire Literacy Institutes. Throughout the year, she travels across the U.S. and Canada (and once in awhile quite a bit farther) speaking to teachers about empowering students through independence in literacy. She believes in curiosity, engagement, and deep thinking in schools for both students and their teachers. Penny stands on the shoulders of her mentors, the Dons (Murray & Graves), and the Toms (Newkirk & Romano), in her belief that intentional teaching in a reading and writing workshop brings the greatest student investment and learning in a classroom. Learn more about Penny Kittle on her websites, pennykittle.net and booklovefoundation.org, or follow her on twitter. Penny's students make a statement about how student choice in reading has affected them.