Sep 01
Seriously – stories both you and your students will laugh out loud reading. Humor varies from person to person, so I have two very different essays in the hopes that you and your students will at least be able to connect to one. To make sure this is actually useful for everyone, I’m only including …
Jan 28
Fake receipts are a great way to change up your worksheets and increase engagement. I mostly use them for creative writing and comprehension assessments, but I’m sure you’ll come up with a few ideas as well. 1. Reading Comprehension Create fake receipts for various characters and have the students guess which character they belong to. …
Apr 07
Help your students practice clear, concise, and organized writing by creating police reports. This real-world writing prompt helps keep students engaged and gives a specific focus to their writing. I often use this technique to have students summarize a character’s death or an important scene in a novel. Start with a Terrible Example I begin …
Jun 05
1. Students have something to do in case they finish their work early. Students work at different paces. Often I have a few who finish with five, even ten minutes to spare. With the writing contest bulletin board you always have something extra and meaningful for them to work on. Teachers can post flyers for …
Jun 04
Reading “Lamb to the Slaughter” by Roald Dahl always leads to lively discussions in the classroom about the culpability of Mary Maloney. So of course I’m compelled to create a lesson where students battle out her guilt or innocence “Law and Order” style. The Perfect Episode You can’t just ask students to imitate “Law and …
Apr 28
“Night” is a staple in most high school English classes because of Mr. Wiesel’s amazing ability to so eloquently describe the horrific circumstances he endured and witnessed as a Holocaust survivor. The content itself is critical, but his writing is what sets it apart from other historical accounts. This is why I always include a …
