“On Summer”

Thanks to Emily Wessel for sharing thoughts from this year’s reading. You can find the prompt and poem here: 2024 FRQ Set 2 Exam Questions This was my first year reading for Q1 and I really enjoyed it. This poem was accessible and allowed students to explore many different literary elements and techniques. I will … Continue Reading

“It’s a hit! A palpable hit!” Teaching Hamlet

True confessions of an English teacher: I am not a Shakespeare lover. Shakespeare is not on my syllabus yearly, but this year when I took Frankenstein out of this year’s curriculum, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I needed to bring back Hamlet. This was confirmed when I got a call from Peggy O’Brien at … Continue Reading

Elevating Discussion with TQE

This post is written and shared by my friend Cindy Dixon who could not stop raving about how amazing her class discussions are. I begged her to share with me – with us – her method and she generously agreed. Thanks, Cindy! – SB I’ve always had big hopes for my students to discuss texts … Continue Reading

Storytelling and Personal Narrative Unit

Today’s post is written by Brian Hannon. If you’re familiar with Brian through LMS Curriculum, you already know the quality of his resources are AMAZING, and this unit is no exception. The entire unit is linked at the end of his reflection on it. Thank you, Brian!! Pretty much every year prior to this one, … Continue Reading

“The Rock Eaters”

As Susan said about Q1, the operational Q2 passage, “The Rock Eaters,” and prompt were definitely accessible for most students this year. I still looked at a few drawings, read a few song lyrics (“In the Heights”), and even saw one person who wrote out the numbers from one to one hundred (!), but for … Continue Reading

Poetry March Madness 2023

As a basketball coach, March is one of my favorite months. Anytime I turn on the tv, there is a great college basketball game. Duke-North … Continue Reading

Teaching Sonnets and Disrupting Sonnets

This post by Adrian Nester originally appeared on APLitHelp.com in March of 2019. I’ve added some additional resources at the end. When I received my copy of Terrance Hayes’ book American Sonnets for my Past and Future Assassin I decided that I wanted to freshen up my sonnet unit to look beyond the traditional sonnets. … Continue Reading

The Counterintuitive Ways to Improve Test Scores

I teach a course that ends with a big standardized exam at the end. The first few years I taught it, I used to do test prep by the book. I gave my students a sample exam each quarter. They had 42 minutes to complete 40 of the 55 multiple-choice questions and I counted the … Continue Reading

Planning Like a Pro

I am the first to admit that sitting down to plan lessons is not my favorite part of teaching. I love spinning my wheels waxing creative about how I can make literature come alive for my students, yey all that energy takes place in my head rather than on paper. Almost every year I vow … Continue Reading

Choice Reading – One…

We’re finishing our first choice novel in class, and I always have questions from teachers about how I run choice reading. How do you know … Continue Reading