Share #yourEdustory, week 2: Inspired by MLK: how will you make the world a better place? It’s too easy to assume that because I’m a teacher, I make the world a better place. Everyone from Einstein to Steinbeck, Aristotle to Andy Rooney, Lee Iacocca to Steve Jobs to Bill Gates to Dr. Seuss has given us reason to believe that simply by being teachers, we are … Continue reading It’s not enough to #teach
Share #yourEdustory, week 1: What is your #oneword for 2015? In spite of the ongoing attacks on public schools and teachers; in spite of too many students in my room; in spite of too many papers to grade; in spite of never enough time or resources, my one word for 2015 is this: POSITIVE There are so many factors beyond my control that affect my … Continue reading #oneword for 2015
The first time I introduced National Novel Writing Month (a.k.a. NaNoWriMo) to my 8th graders, I was terrified. One of my teacher friends had said, “They’ll run screaming from the classroom in tears!” Some students did later confess to a brief moment of panic (“I almost lost my lunch!”), but the end result was resoundingly the most powerful and successful writing project I have ever … Continue reading It’s beginning to look a lot like #NaNoWriMo!
“If you want to build a ship, don’t drum up the men to gather wood, divide the work, and give orders. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.” ― Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Programs like the Independent Project at Monument Mountain Regional High School inspire me to keep looking for ways to give my students as much control over their own learning as I can. In my 8th … Continue reading They need to learn to yearn
This was my very first blog post, written in 2011, in response to my growing frustrations and fears over NCLB. I had met and spoken with Stephen Krashen, who encouraged me to start blogging, to get my voice of experience out there for others to hear. Although our ongoing battles in education may not compare to the historic (and ongoing) struggles for civil rights, we … Continue reading Fighting for the dream, continued
Asking middle school students to write (and share) book recommendations isn’t new. It gives them the opportunity to write about literature they have enjoyed, be inspired to check out books that their peers have loved, and demonstrate their growing reading and writing skills for their teacher. But move those book recommendations to the students’ own blogs, and suddenly they are learning a whole hard drive’s … Continue reading Oh, the skillz they will learn!
If your students are feverishly writing novels as fast their little fingers can fly across the keyboards, anxious to meet their NaNoWriMo word goals by the end of November, you may be wondering how best to assess their work during this glorious month of literary abandon. Since it may be unrealistic for you to read the complete texts of their novels (I have 98 students … Continue reading Assessing your WriMos
If your students are participating in NaNoWriMo (in T – 3 days), then they are probably chomping at the bit to start writing. There’s nothing like telling students they CAN’T write until a certain date to get them begging for permission to write! If they have created their characters, crafted their conflicts and plotted their plot, then they are probably more than ready to start … Continue reading #NaNoPrep – are your WriMos ready?
Today starts Digital Citizenship Week in the middle of Connected Educator Month, and thanks to tech-happy teachers all over the web, I am quite happily connected. Just a few minutes on the English Companion ning or Google+ or Pinterest or Twitter and I’m sure to find a wealth of ideas quite literally at my fingertips And with a nod to tradition, I still garner great classroom ideas from hard copy magazines that … Continue reading Who’s in charge here?
We teachers of young adolescents learn early on to grab our students’ gratitude when we can: their glee over a clever assignment, their pride in a hard-earned grade, their bashful “thanks” as they hand over a holiday gift probably bought and wrapped by a parent. It’s a rare treat indeed when our students communicate their gratitude to us in writing. Even better is when a … Continue reading A pro-choices classroom
Laura Bradley 