1 min read
My Red Pen Is Dusty, and I’m Glad
Over the course of my career as a middle school ELA teacher, I’ve graded more writing pieces than I can count. I’ve graded late into the night, on...
Analyzing complex characters in a novel or a short story requires students to look at many things such as how they’re described physically, but also their motivations for their actions and events that happen, their reaction to external factors, and the relationships they have.
This graphic organizer provides students with two things: the artistic visual of the character dependent on the descriptions in the text, and then analysis-level questions looking at the relationships, motivations, and reasoning behind the character’s actions.
This four-side graphic organizer strategy has great benefits for students because it doesn’t leave a tone of white space to be filled, but also allows them to analyze four separate questions, which gives the teacher lots of data to see where the students’ strengths are with topics and which they need to model or teach more in-depth.
1 min read
Over the course of my career as a middle school ELA teacher, I’ve graded more writing pieces than I can count. I’ve graded late into the night, on...
1 min read
Back in my hometown, it was a rite of passage at the age of twelve to get a paper route. There was no status associated with it, nor did it come with...
1 min read
"The “Words of Doom” were an addition to our spelling instruction in middle school ELA. They could easily be adjusted or modified for upper...
1 min read
In this creative writing activity, secondary ELA students will use what they overhear in the hallways to write poems! Download the lesson template...
1 min read
During Pride Month, everyone expects coming out stories or rainbow flags to take over their social media profile pics–and honestly, I love those...
1 min read
For this activity, students are tasked with creating an Instagram post imagining that their assigned vocabulary word was a person posting on social...
1 min read
In a season of mistletoe and merriment, the only thing missing from the holiday is mutant bugs.
1 min read
For some reason, students always struggle when teachers ask them to incorporate sources. It is a process that takes practice to do seamlessly, but...
1 min read
Given that lately I am as burnt out as they come, I found myself wanting to do something unusual.
1 min read
This resource is designed to provide a guided lesson on close reading, specifically imagery, figurative language, word choice, tone, and tonal shift...
1 min read
In high school, many students spent their summer working, babysitting younger siblings, or playing video games. Others were at the pool, had their...
