Blog posts
Sandra Cisnero’s “My Name” is a wonderfully short vignette, and I knew the moment I read it that I wanted to put it in front of my reading class. I love my reading class to death, but as the name suggests, sometimes getting them engaged in reading and writing can be difficult. These are students that have been burned by education before or just have not been able to focus on school for one reason or another.
Teaching Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet does not have to be a headache. There are a few things I have learned make teaching this timeless classic easier for both teachers and students, like chunking material with workbooks, using rap battles, and gif dialectical journals.
Teaching grammar using an English textbook can be dry and dull. If you want to engage students while improving their grammar and challenging them to try more creative elements, using mentor texts is perhaps the best approach for both the teacher and the students.
1. As soon as you can, write down your timeline.
2. Figure out what skills students need to learn
3. Determine what skills students need already have to learn grade level skills
4. Create an essential question
5. See what articles or texts you can use to teach skills
6. Determine if you can fold everything into one unifying idea, like a project or novel
Student-led discussions are the unicorns of teaching and the end goal of gradual release of responsibility (where teachers start with leading in teaching, and then slowly responsibility for teaching and learning the material shifts to students). We all want students to be leading the charge in discussions so we can put our feet up and finally drink that coffee that started out hot but is now ice cold. We need students to be engaging with material in a way that makes their learning visible and absolutely shows what a kick-ass teacher we are. But how do you get there?
I started off this year bright eyed and bushy tailed, excited to return to the classroom after having a baby, but what I am seeing now in schools is concerning: teachers are burning out.
Parent communication is the bedrock behind good classroom management. If you have a parent in your corner when you are trying to help get little Jimmy on track, then you will be going. School is all about a team of stakeholders coming together to facilitate the education of students, and with that comes involving the people who raised students or who are their guardians.
If you are thinking of adding House of Hollow by Krystal Sutherland to your classroom library, read this book review…
Interviewing for a new English teaching position can be equal parts scary and exciting. In this blog post, I go over how I prepare for interviews.
Philosophical chairs are an activity that gets students to take a stance on a blanket statement and try to convince their peers to move to their side. For example, a topic might be “Water is wet” and students must decide if yes, water is wet, or no, water is not wet. They use argumentation and reasoning skills to sway their peers.
