Essay Writing

Student Writing Competitions for 2024 in Grades 6-12

Student Writing Competitions for 2024 in Grades 6-12

Calling all budding authors, poets, and storytellers in your classes. Writing competitions are a great way to motivate students to write. They give students a real world context for writing and also give students the chance to earn prizes.

Reading Like Writers: Effective Writing Starts with Effective Reading

Reading Like Writers:  Effective Writing Starts with Effective Reading

As reading and writing teachers, we’ve all witnessed the seeming decline of student writing ability over the past years. We find ourselves as teachers pondering what is happening to our youth as standards drop lower and lower. We can certainly place quite a bit of blame on technology as students read less than ever, so reading in our classes is incredibly important.

Grading Essays Online vs. Grading on Paper: Pros and Cons

Grading Essays Online vs. Grading on Paper:  Pros and Cons

I find myself dancing between grading essays online (via Google Spreadsheets and Doctopus/ Goobric) and printing out student essays to grade on paper. If you’d like more information on getting started with online grading using Google Spreadsheets, check out my YouTube tutorial for some helpful tips.

PowerPoint Party: A Fun Persuasion Game

PowerPoint Party:  A Fun Persuasion Game

In their pure sense, PowerPoint Parties started becoming popular due to COVID, and friends/ family members would get together (albeit virtually) to present a PowerPoint on a topic of interest. This eventually morphed into a fun game for high school and college-age students (is it ok for me to add “drinking game” in here?). Currently, PowerPoint Parties have become popular on TikTok, which provided the inspiration for this post. Head over to TikTok and search for “PowerPoint Parties” to find ideas… be forewarned that some of these ideas will not be “school appropriate” but still humorous.

The "Leads to" Thematic Claim Concept

The "Leads to" Thematic Claim Concept

The thesis statement is undoubtedly the MOST important sentence of the entire essay! It serves as the blueprint, or road map, for the essay, so it is crucial that the thesis statement is clear and logical before beginning the body of the essay. The caveat here, of course, is that a thesis statement can and often does change throughout the writing process, but in general, it is always helpful to begin with a solid argument.

5 Ways to Use Jamboard in Secondary ELA

5 Ways to Use Jamboard in Secondary ELA

Jamboard through Google has become a cornerstone tool in my virtual ELA classes because one of my go-to strategies when we had students in class was to use sticky notes on the board. You can read more about the Board but NOT BORING: My Go-to Collaborative Activity for Secondary ELA strategy here.

How to Build a Writer's Toolkit for Students

How to Build a Writer's Toolkit for Students

A writer’s toolkit is a resource for students to use as a reference guide during writing workshop. A writer’s toolkit can take the form of a digital folder or even physical folder. Both options can work for students depending upon the needs of your students— or your individual preference.

Literary Analysis Essay Boot Camp

Literary Analysis Essay Boot Camp

This year, I have decided to start all of my high school ELA classes with a Literary Analysis Essay Boot Camp. I have discovered over the years that all students in grades 9-12 at all levels need repetitive practice of the same essential writing skills, no matter the grade or level.


Starting the School Year with the College Essay

Starting the School Year with the College Essay

If there is one writing assignment that has real life and real world purpose, it’s the college essay. I have never seen my students more motivated to write and more motivated to work on writing than with this particular assignment. And the reason is simple: this writing assignment truly matters to students.

5 Things You can do with Google Slides in Secondary ELA

5 Things You can do with Google Slides in Secondary ELA

Google Slides has become my go-to platform for any type of distance learning or even for class activities. It’s a user-friendly platform that can be used for so many different purposes and lesson plans— from assessment to writing workshop!

How to Sequence a Literary Analysis Essay Unit

How to Sequence a Literary Analysis Essay Unit

Teaching literary analysis is key to teaching secondary ELA. Students need to be able to construct thematic arguments and prove them using textual evidence. But this process can be daunting for both students and teachers.

Board but NOT BORING: My Go-to Collaborative Activity for Secondary ELA

Board but NOT BORING:  My Go-to Collaborative Activity for Secondary ELA

Because this collaborative activity is so simple, it has become my go-to strategy throughout the school year to reinforce various skills and units. It’s an excellent tool to use for test-prep (see this post) and to scaffold reading, writing, and speaking skills.

Five ESSENTIAL Questions to Guide Textual Analysis

Five ESSENTIAL Questions to Guide Textual Analysis

Textual analysis can be very confusing when it is anchored or bogged down by esoteric terminology, jargon, and specific devices. This terminology can make textual analysis and close reading and intimidating process for students.

How to get Started with Mentor Sentences

How to get Started with Mentor Sentences

Mentor sentences are an excellent tool to use in the secondary ELA classroom to model essential skills from grammar to literary devices.  They reinforce quality writing skills from published in authors in a positive way rather than the traditional sentence correction method that modeled negative traits.  

8 Ways to Help Students Break Through Writer’s Block

8 Ways to Help Students Break Through Writer’s Block

Writer’s block is real.  It can be the brick wall that stands between success and failure.  And it can be the force that prevents students from completing writing assignments.

Plagiarism Escape Room: A High-Interest Way to STOP Student Cheating

Plagiarism Escape Room:  A High-Interest Way to STOP Student Cheating

You’ll be kicked out of college!  You’ll never be able to have a well-defended argument!  It's just dishonest!  Each of my writing units begins with sharp warnings about plagiarism. 

The Five Most Important Argumentative Essay Topics of 2018

The Five Most Important Argumentative Essay Topics of 2018

As we kickoff 2018, the media is already reporting upon key issues that will define the new year.  These issues include women's rights, sexual harassment, DACA, the tax code, healthcare, unions, prescription drug abuse, cryptocurrency, and many others. 

10 Essential Writing Workshop Supplies from Amazon

10 Essential Writing Workshop Supplies from Amazon

Running an effective writing workshop can be a challenge on its own, but there are some supplies that can keep the writing process organized and effective for you and your students.  Here, I've compiled a list of my essential writing workshop supplies to get you through the rest of the year!

Thanksgiving & Abraham Lincoln: A Rhetorical Analysis Activity

Thanksgiving & Abraham Lincoln:  A Rhetorical Analysis Activity

For Thanksgiving this year, I decided to go back to the roots of our celebrated "Turkey Day" to address the fact that the original Thanksgiving had nothing to do with pilgrims or turkeys at all.

The Logline: A Screenwriting Tool that Helps Students with Textual Analysis in both Fiction and Nonfiction

The Logline:  A Screenwriting Tool that Helps Students with Textual Analysis in both Fiction and Nonfiction

In screenwriting (writing for movies and TV), the logline is key to brainstorming story ideas and also selling them or "pitching" them to buyers.  Crafting loglines can help the writer to flesh out new plot ideas before writing the entire script.  It's much easier to revise the logline rather than an entire hundred page script!