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Where English teachers go to help each other

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Valerie A. Person

Hula Hoops, Empty Egg Cartons and Containers of Colored Foam

Closet English teacher is back. Confession: I'm a terrible packrat, but part of me thinks that goes along with being an English teacher. I…

Started by Valerie A. Person

5 May. 12, 2009
Reply by Lorraine Kellner
Catherine Quittmeyer

Censorship - Bless me Ultima

The Superintendent of our district pulled Bless Me Ultima from our curriculum for this year and we have to defend it next week if we want i…

Started by Catherine Quittmeyer

11 May. 11, 2009
Reply by Annie
Teresa Bunner

Literary Mothers

Mother's Day is this Sunday (just a friendly reminder in case you lost track of time!). In honor of the day, share your favorite literary m…

Started by Teresa Bunner

9 May. 11, 2009
Reply by Teresa Bunner
Brenda Smith

Book titles For Alternative Education

My students are those who avoided dropping out by coming to our alternative high school. Most of them have goals of graduating with a diplo…

Started by Brenda Smith

25 May. 11, 2009
Reply by Brenda Smith
Joseph Scotese

Why are parents who are teachers often the most difficult to deal with?

Of course this is not always true - in fact, some of the most gratifying conversations and relationships that I have had with parents over…

Started by Joseph Scotese

18 May. 9, 2009
Reply by Kim McCollum-Clark
Neil Hepworth

New Science Fiction Unit

Our English 10 curriculum was changed this year to include a six week unit on Science Fiction. Unfotuanatly, this change was made without a…

Started by Neil Hepworth

26 May. 9, 2009
Reply by James Miscavish
Dan Holden

Does anyone have fun?

This is mostly about my sons education. He has fallen little behind the curriculum of his kindergarten class. In an effort to make sure tha…

Started by Dan Holden

23 May. 8, 2009
Reply by Teresa Bunner
Nancy Devine

Using professional reading to inform teaching

How do people using professional reading to guide their teaching? What professional reading has helped your teaching?

Started by Nancy Devine

2 May. 8, 2009
Reply by Joseph Scotese
Jim Burke

Summer on the Ning: What Should We Do?

I am all to aware that summer is not as close for some as for others. In my case, we begin in mid August, so school ends May 31st. Others,…

Started by Jim Burke

32 May. 8, 2009
Reply by Alan Sitomer
Vicki Spandel

Thoughts on rubrics

As a person who's worked with rubrics for about 25 years, I have been interested in this provocative discussion, and agree with many of the…

Started by Vicki Spandel

20 May. 7, 2009
Reply by Jim Burke

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Latest Activity

Michael writes: Most often it's [constructivism in practice] not that extreme, but usually it tends to share in the general progressive antipathy to "mere" knowledge and hostility to the "sage on a stage" or any sage anywhere. This is mere caricat…
4 minutes ago
It seems like a lot of kids don't care for details. Spelling, anyone? I have had the same problem especially with the transfer. You would think that after teaching students how to use parenthetical citation and then correcting their mistakes on thei…
4 minutes ago
I believe comedy is underrepresented. My students often complain about the depressing works we read (12 grade, but they also say that about previous English courses). We added Much Ado About Nothing a dozen years ago as something of a balance to Ham…
5 minutes ago
Hi Pat, I have never done these myself, but there are some great examples at VocabAhead Vocab Videos which also contains links to digital resources to help students create their videos. While most of the videos are done professionally, there is at l…
8 minutes ago
Hi Pat, I have never done these myself, but there are some great examples at VocabAhead Vocab Videos which also contains links to digital resources to help students create their videos. While most of the videos are done professionally, there is at l…
12 minutes ago
Thanks for your reply -- it was very helpful. I think I understand what you are saying -- kids do try to craft a dazzling sentence, rather than one with insight. And something simple can be insightful. But my concern is really the thinking behind th…
20 minutes ago
I would say comedy is underrepresented. My students have nicknamed my class "AP Sex & Death" as we tend to go to the dark side. I do try to use some comedy in preparation for a Q3 comedy prompt. We do use A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Color Purple…
22 minutes ago
Your "rambling" is fantastic. So much good advice. You know, I'm actually looking forward to writing now. I feel like I've got a handle on it. Thanks for all of your comments.
25 minutes ago
I really like "Out of the Dust" by Karen Hesse. It is short and I think very accessible for struggling students. It won the Newberry Medal. Not only did it help me understand what the big deal was about the duststorms of the time, I thought it told…
33 minutes ago
And what about the fact that often writers don't know what their thesis is until they begin reflecting in writing about a subject or occurrence? Happens to me all the time.
40 minutes ago
Ryan Rish Inviting my pre-service teachers @OSU to join Bill Kist's ECN book club as part of our class, Laboratory Experiences in English Education.
55 minutes ago
Thank you so much everyone! I definitely have a better feel for how essential questions work. I've been able to brainstorm a few and included a few here. Feel free to tell me if I am way off base. What does it mean to be an “Outsider”? What makes…
55 minutes ago
Judith-- One opportunity is Teen Ink (http://www.teenink.com). This is a publication for teens only, ages 13-19, to submit and publish their work. The one draw back I found is that once accepted, Teen Ink keeps all rights to the work. This means ki…
1 hour ago
Bill, You have it wrong. I didn't say the theory has not had wide influence. I never said anything like that. I agree that it has had wide influence. What I said was I've never heard of teachers labeling themselves as constructivists or nonconstruct…
1 hour ago
Alan Sitomer added a blog post
The Ugly Truth is that my number one goal for my students right now has to be to raise their 2010 standardized test scores. I find it disturbing, off-base, heart-wrenching, and almost something shameful to admit. However, NCLB has my entire school'…
1 hour ago
Kathy added a discussion
I am in search of a novel set during the Great Depression/Dust Bowl era. It will be used in a 10th grade history class; most of the students are struggling readers. The teacher would like to stay away from the "big name classics." He wants something…
1 hour ago

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