HOW would you rank "important" languages? If asked to rattle them off, many people start with English, but after that are reluctant to go further. Important how, they ask. One approach would be to look at people and money: surely a language is important if it is spoken by lots of people, in countries with great wealth (and presumably, therefore, power).
Gaming is the newest trend in education, but what resources are there for teachers? This website is a storehouse of gaming resources and research to support this popular way of learning.
The reading process involves two separate but highly interrelated areas - word identification and comprehension. It is well established that difficulties in automatic word recognition significantly affect a reader's ability to effectively comprehend what they are reading (Lyon, 1995; Torgeson, Rashotte, and Alexander, 2001). Even mild difficulties in word identification can pull attention away from the underlying meaning, reduce the speed of reading, and create the need to reread selections to grasp the meaning. Many students who struggle to learn to read are able, with appropriate instruction, to compensate for initial reading problems by becoming accurate decoders but fail to reach a level of sufficient fluency to become fast and efficient readers. Thus, the development of techniques for improving automaticity and fluency is critical. Although the research is clear that a systematic alphabetic approach to teaching beginning readers is more effective than a whole word approach (Adams, 1990; Chall, 1996; Snow, Burns and Griffin, 1009), the most effect ways to develop fluency are less well understood.
Mainly for younger children but I think it would work for middle school. The good thing about it is that each step has a link that explains the step in more detail.