As English teachers, we get asked a lot about our reading lives. People assume that we are well read, and I often joke that if reading Frankenstein or Fences 100 times defines well read, then yes, I assume I am. Truthfully, reading can be difficult for teachers. Teachers often take work home, find ourselves mentally … Continue Reading
We’ve all seen the gifs and memes of teachers running out the door on the last day of school and trust me – I’ll be leading the way! But before I do, I am building in some time for reflection while the year is still fresh in my mind. (I recognize we’re all at different … Continue Reading
Some days feel like a mad dash to the final bell. When that happens my colleagues can read it on my face, I am surviving day-to-day. It is a huge source of stress for teachers when the day owns them, they don’t own the day. And it leads to all kinds of complications like low … Continue Reading
Happy National Poetry Month! One of the single most transformational things that has happened in my classroom over the last decade is working with poetry collections instead of picking and choosing poems to read. Whether reading a collection as a whole class or students exploring them on their own (as in our poetry blogging assignment), … Continue Reading
This post written by Matt Brisbin originally appeared on APLitHelp.com and has been updated for this repost. “The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.” – Albert Einstein I want to tell you about an idea that has the potential to completely … Continue Reading
What does it mean to be a successful master teacher? I can remember first hearing someone labeled a master while watching episodes of This Old House with my father when I was a boy. When the credits rolled, Norm Abrams was listed as master carpenter. It added an aura to his skills akin to Jedi knighthood. But what … Continue Reading
When Gina Kortuem asked if I would be interested in a crosspost about summer work, I immediately answered yes because my summer work has slowly morphed over the last few years. I was not at all surprised when I read Gina’s post Why I Ditched Summer Reading to see that she and I have been … Continue Reading
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
A couple of weeks ago I outed myself as having an UnInstagrammable classroom by posting these pictures in the FB group and received c the response. Like minded souls followed up with pictures and comments of solidarity from their classrooms with stacks and piles of who even knows what all. Shout out to the few … Continue Reading
There is a super-simple way to get students to recognize tone, understand character, and experiment with voice all at the same time. This year I had my students assume the identity of characters in the novels we were reading and write fake Tweets from the perspective of that character. I instructed them to think of … Continue Reading
