About My Work
I center my work in the needs, identities, and humanity of children. Too often, our educational systems are designed in ways that silence students—especially those who don’t fit neatly into our expectations. I believe it doesn’t have to be that way.
From 2008 to 2022, I worked as an educator in Wisconsin, teaching in the U.S. public school system while learning, often alongside my students, what happens when we build classrooms rooted in trust, agency, and meaningful literacy rather than compliance. Those years continue to shape my thinking and my work.
Since returning to Denmark in 2022, I have worked as a primary teacher in the Danish public school system while continuing to collaborate with educators around the world. My work focuses on reading and writing identity, student engagement, classroom culture, and the belief that literacy becomes powerful when it is personal, relevant, and rooted in choice.
I am the author of four professional books for educators, the latest, Passionate Learners 3rd edition, most recently published in 2023, and I continue to invite educators into ongoing conversations about reading, learning, and school experiences that honor the whole child. My work is grounded in daily classroom practice and shaped by the students I teach.
I am also the founder of the Global Read Aloud, a free global literacy initiative built on a simple idea: one book can connect the world. Each year, students and educators from more than 85 countries read, connect, and learn together through shared texts and conversation.
My work has been recognized internationally and featured by The New York Times, The Guardian, Publishers Weekly, Literacy Today, Educational Leadership, and School Library Journal. Still, my most important learning continues to come from the children and educators I work alongside every day.
Connect
For school or organizational inquiries: psripp@gmail.com
You can also connect with me on Instagram or reach out directly here.
Pernille Ripp 
I want to order your book. I read your article this morning in Education Week and you are spot on, spot on, spot on. I am the director of education for Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race and the concepts in your article align with what I believe and what I try to inspire in educators that use Iditarod in the classroom. Diane Johnson, djohnson@iditarod.com
I would like to chat about a few things with you! Please contact me. Thanks!
Pernille, I would like to reprint your blog about the Mystery Skype call in our free bi-monthly TechNotes e-newsletter that is sent out to more than 36,000 people around the world from TCEA. TCEA is a non-profit association that helps educators integrate technology into the classroom to innovate teaching and learning. Would you grant permission to reprint your wonderful blog post with full attribution to you?
You absolutely have my permissions, thank you so much for deeming it worthwhile to share.
Heyyy og Tak, følger dig fra DK 😉
Ej, hvor hyggeligt! Rart med lidt dansk.
Hey there! I understand this is somewhat off-topic but I needed to ask.
Does operating a well-established blog like yours
take a lot of work? I’m brand new to operating a blog but I
do write in my journal daily. I’d like to start a blog so I will be able to share
my personal experience and views online. Please let me know if you have any ideas or tips for new aspiring blog owners.
Thankyou!
Yes, it does, however, I blog for myself and not for money or anything like that so it takes as much time as I feel like putting into it. I think my best advice is just to start if you want to, do it for yourself and make it yours. Good luck to you.
Pernille, I love your blog and can relate to your ups and downs in the classroom. We are enjoying the GRA, too, and love connecting with other classes. I am struggling with something in my classroom and would love your thoughts. I have one hour for literacy (reading and word work). Writing is separate with another class. (Don’t ask). My literacy class is a workshop model, where students have about 25 minutes of reading each day, after my mini-lesson, Then we have a few minutes of share. I am wondering how to squeeze in the much needed word work to my 4 different groups of learners. I know I can use homework to squeeze in extra spelling/vocab practice, but I need to make it meaningful. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thanks! Jennifer
We do it at the beginning of class for about 5 minutes and only every other week in 7th grade (we have 50 words (root or vocabulary)) to get through. However, in my 5th grade classroom we did root word study which really got most of the kids more excited – here is a link to what we did http://www.mrsripp.com/2014/03/new-spelling-words-and-program.html
It wasn’t perfect but it didn’t take a lot of time and the students got it more than any other typeI have tried.
It is a struggle whenever we have any kind of shortened time, however, I wonder too, how long is your mini-lesson?
Thank you for getting back to me to quickly. My mini-lessons are typically no longer than 15 minutes. I am using 14th goldfish as my read-aloud to tie into my mini-lessons on character study. When all is said and done, students (4th grade) usually have a good 20-25 minutes to read. One day a week (which may be every other week) students are writing me a response letter about what they’re reading (focus is on the mini-lesson unit). Every other week, students are blogging for HW (reading journals and blogs is a lot to manage, though). I haven’t been able to squeeze in guided reading groups yet, but soon I’d like to start book clubs. I will take a look at how you did spelling. Thanks for sharing, Pernille!
Pernille, you are amazing! I was at CESA1 to hear you speak yesterday and am so inspired. I have participated in the GRA the last two years and have read your blog often. Subtle changes in my classroom are in the works! My question for you is in relation to grading. Do you grade work often or just when checking for mastery? Any thoughts would be welcomed. I am a 5th grade teacher, so my students enter middle school next year. I continue with the struggle with the usefulness of handing out grades on their daily work. Who are the grades for? Are they encouraging or discouraging? I plan on doing a padlet today to get the student’s thoughts on how grades make them feel, but I would love your input as well!
Thank you so much, Shelly, yesterday was wonderful! I try to change the conversation that we have about grades so instead of focusing on the grades, the kids focus on their growth. I write a lot about how I do it here on the blog so it may be easier to choose some of these than writing it all out. https://pernillesripp.com/?s=grades&submit=Search I don’t know if grades are inherently bad or good but how we use them is not working for kids. They feel like they have little control over them and that it is something that is just done to them, so in our classroom, they reflect on everything and assess themselves on any longer projects before I assess it. We then talk about the constant growth they are trying to accomplish and how they will get there.
Hi Pernilles,
I have just attended the joint EARCOS/SENIA conference in Bangkok and wanted to say how VERY much I enjoyed listening to your keynote session…..and I then signed up for your ‘passionate readers’ talk – wow! I am gutted now that I didn’t also attend your session on passionate writers but had committed to something else at the time.
I’m sure you hear this all the time but you truly are an incredibly inspirational speaker! I have been reading and loving your email blogs for a while (having signed up for something a while ago!) and I was so excited when I realised you were actually going to be speaking at SENIA this year and that I would get a chance to hear you in person.
I have been teaching overseas in international schools for almost 30 years and during that time have been lucky enough to attend many conferences and workshops. However, I can honestly say that your presentation was one of the most honest, from the heart, meaningful talks I have listened to. Thank you!
I heard your keynote talk at NCSLMA and have been on a mission ever since to bring the joy back to reading for so many of my students who are burned out on AR. I am currently working on a group graduate school project (website) on the Debate about Accelerated Reader. May we (my group) have permission to use a few short quotes from one of your blog posts and link back to it for those who want to read more about arguments against using AR? Thank you!
Sure, and thank you for asking.