Student writers—especially reluctant ones—often struggle with choosing the most fitting words to create an appropriate tone or mood in their writing. As a result, their essays end up with a lot of words like “nice” or “things” or “people.” These words are fine (another less-than-stellar word), but...
I just finished my tenth year teaching high school English and let me tell you, teens like to read… well, most of them. Some of you might be doubting me, but hang on!
Although our middle school ELA students should have been capitalizing words like "I" since they were in early elementary school, many either just don't do it or don't take the time to proofread their work to make sure they did.
For some reason, students always struggle when teachers ask them to incorporate sources. It is a process that takes practice to do seamlessly, but when done well, it can boost your credibility in any argument. The thing that is so puzzling about our struggle to incorporate summaries, paraphrases...
In this lesson, students are asked to consider how they are situated within the world around them–locally, nationally, and globally. Students will identify contemporary issues, being sure to define them as controversial contemporary issues, happening locally, nationally, and globally. Students will...
The goals of ELA instruction in middle and high school range from developing basic reading comprehension and writing skills to reading and writing critically and analytically. National standards for middle and high school ELA include objectives targeting lower-level skills like explicit text...
In a 2004 Gallup survey, history and social studies ranked as the least popular subject for teenagers. Why is this? Many adults recount history class as being forced to memorize names, dates, and events without a connection to one another. Acronyms like SOAPStone (Speaker, Occasion, Audience,...
With summer either starting or just around the corner, you probably have a growing TBR pile. Well, make room, we've got more books to add to that stack!
This lesson introduces students to Bansky’s graffiti art, its impact on pop culture, its reflection of different societal, cultural, and political values, and the mystery behind the man who creates the art (and how this anonymity might engage us in his art and his story further). Students are...
One of the most common tasks I see in the social studies classroom is the use of primary sources. The power of letting people choose their own story and bringing diverse perspectives to the historical narrative is essential and worthy work. After all, teaching with textbooks, for a wide variety of...
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