Using Urban Legends to Engage Struggling Readers
After teaching high school reading intervention courses for many years, I know that starting with a novel is a mistake—it’s too long... Then I tried Urban Legends...
Writing
Expressive Writing on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation
I moved to the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation as a naïve 22-year-old teacher in 2009, with high hopes and big plans to instill my love of writing in my 80 incoming middle ...
Teaching the Real Purpose of Writing
As teachers, we know that students need to be motivated in order to learn. Especially in English where it requires students to sit and read for an extended period of time, I ...
“But I’m just not a good writer”
As soon as I utter the words “writing assignment” a look of panic appears on my students’ faces.
How to Teach Like a Fool
One of my most influential teaching mentors is a secondary character from a sixteenth century Shakespearean play. I was introduced to the “wise fool” from King Lear in my last ...
Practical Tips to Prevent Plagiarism
Students plagiarize. But they don’t create the problem. Often, teachers do. Some assignments are easy to plagiarize. Teachers need to create assignments that require more than ...
Cursive Writing: Beneficial or Lost Art?
Want to build your students’ minds or bodies, or just need something new to add to your art lessons? You might want to consider re-introducing handwriting.
Teaching With Google Drive
In today’s world we experience so much technology that it has become a mainstay in our lives. Often our students know more about the digital age than we do, and are eager to ...
Let’s Do Haiku!
Through careful observation and crisp language, haiku draw attention to phenomena that might otherwise go unnoticed. For the writer and the reader, haiku presents things in a ...
Effectively Completing a Writing Task
Great activity for completing a writing task.