In today's fast-paced digital age, where screens have become a ubiquitous presence, fostering a love for reading among high school students might seem like a daunting task. As educators, it's our responsibility to ignite the spark of literary passion within them.
End of the Year Note Ideas for Students
At the end of the school year, I always find myself wanting to convey to my students everything that they’ve meant to me over the course of the school year. I want them to know that I care— even if it was a difficult year for the student in my class. I want them to remember that they had an English teacher who believed in them and wants the best for them.
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.
How to Avoid the Summer Slide with Summer Reading Challenges & One-Pager Projects
8 Engaging ELA Lessons for Valentine's Day
12 Podcast Episodes for Secondary ELA
Prompt Sticks Reflection Game: An Interactive Way to Reflect Back on the School Year
The Art of the One-Pager
National Poetry Month: A WHOLE MONTH of Poetry Activities for Secondary ELA
Love it or hate it, poetry is unavoidable in the secondary ELA classroom. I, for one, am a HUGE lover of poetry but fully acknowledge that it can be annoyingly cryptic at times. Reading poetry reminds us that not all texts are meant to be beat "with a hose to find out what [they] really mean" like in the Billy Collins poem "Introduction to Poetry."
Satire Through Subtlety-- Using the Comics of Savage Chickens to Teach Satire in High School English
Engaging Secondary Students in Film Study with The Secret Life of Walter Mitty
The Five Most Important Argumentative Essay Topics of 2018
6 Christmas Commercials to Analyze for Literary Elements and Techniques this Holiday Season
Three Famous Christmas Speeches to Inspire Writing
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!
Writing is Recursive, NOT Linear: Free Task Cards Included!
Commentary for Literary Analysis: Four Square Strategy for Success
The Essay Shaping Sheet: Friend or Foe?
Essay shaping sheets are essentially templates for writing that guide students through the writing process. A shaping sheet can be as small as a sentence template or as large as an entire paragraph or even essay. But are these tools helpful, or do they ultimately hinder student development? Well, the million-dollar answer to this question is… it depends.
The Writer's Notebook in Secondary ELA: Introduction & FREE Guide
Setting up & Assessing Book Club in Secondary ELA: FOUR FREE GUIDES FOR SUCCESS!
Book club is now considered to be one of the “best practices” in English Language Arts. Book clubs differ from traditional literary circles in that they are less teacher-directed. The students take on the responsibility of selecting their roles, making their assignments, keeping track of their reading, and much more.