Motivate Students by Making Learning Visible

 

I've been hearing a lot about student apathy lately. And I know it's real. There are a lot of reasons outside our control that are contributing to this (like viruses, and other adults that don't get it), but there are a few things we can do to get students engaged. And one the most effective ways is to motivate students by making learning visible.

This is also a strategy that can help you with differentiation. That process doesn't always mean you have to create multiple different activities and assignments. Often, it can be done by following the strategies I'm about to share.

Bear with me a minute while I give you some important background - there are some great strategies and freebies coming! 

We all want to feel like we can be successful

Imagine that you were taken to a golf course, handed a club, and told, “go play golf.” Some of you would know exactly what to do and excitedly get right at it. Some would have a rough idea of the game and would pick up the club and try your best. Others, would be completely lost – either because you don’t know the rules of the game, or you feel like you just don’t have the ability to do well.

For those in the second and third group I mentioned above, things would seem less mysterious if we were told that the object of the game is to get the ball in the hole – and that there’s even a little flag waving off in the distance that shows you where it goes. Those of you with a sense of adventure and willingness to try would start swinging and hope for the best. The game would get played, but it may be messy.

Now, imagine the difference if you were told not only the rules of the game, but you were given an instructor who walked you through the process. She explained the difference between an iron and a wood, a chipper and a putter. Not only that, she demonstrated how to use each one, then asked you to try. While you were swinging awkwardly with the putter, she told you to grab the wood instead, and then gave you feedback on your swing. She let you try it a few times until you got the hang of it.

This final scenario may not create the next Tiger Woods, but it will allow the novice golfer to play the game. Instead of being totally lost, he will have the confidence to make his way through the course. The instruction and feedback he received allowed him to feel like he had the power within to do it.

Conversely, if he was just handed a bag of clubs and told to play – even if he could see that tiny flag fluttering in the distance – he may feel powerless, unsure of what to do and how to do it. He may get frustrated and try to take some power back by slamming an iron on the ground and stomping away.

It’s no different in school. When we give kids a target, show them how to get there, give them time to practice, and provide feedback to help them improve, we empower them, and so they are more likely to engage and learn.

Students need to see the target and know how to hit it

Let me step off the golf course, where I have no business being, and draw this analogy to a close. I used it to make a point. I find golf an incredibly frustrating experience, and only my good manners keep me from pounding clubs, swearing and storming away. However, I’ve only ever played during end of the year staff parties. I know which club is which because I grew up with a golf fanatic; I also know all of the terminology and the rules of the game. But no one has ever shown me how to actually play. Therefore, I feel powerless and frustrated with a club in my hand.

You all know where I’m going with this, right? When our students come to us, some of them have mastered the game, some are cruising along, trying their best, and some are completely lost. And yet, so many times, we just tell them to ”go play” (close read this article, analyze this poem, write this essay); often, we’ll “show them the flag” with a mentor text. But we don’t always let them watch us swing. We don’t guide them all the way through the course.

Visible thinking and learning leads to success and engagement

When the path to learning is visible and obvious, students are much more willing to engage in the work because they can see the path to success. They know what to do and how to do it.

And, when our students' thinking and learning is visible to us, we can give them more effective feedback, the kind that helps students feel like they can be successful.

So, let me make a few things "visible" to you now with some of my favorite learning activities.

Make the thinking process visible

I spend a lot of time explicitly teaching thinking and writing processes and one of my most successful activities is one I do when we start essay writing.

Early in my career, I gave students outlines and told them to complete them before they began their essays. I mean, that’s what I always did, and it worked for me. But I knew how to make an outline work because somewhere along the line, someone showed me, or my desire to do well pushed me to figure it out myself.

So, I thought that giving my students a piece of paper with OUTLINE on the top of a whole lot of empty lines would help them too. But it didn’t. Their essays were still unfocused and disorganized and underdeveloped.

I decided to spend more time on this stage of the process and the first few times I did, I felt a little guilty, like I was wasting precious time in a semester that never had enough of it.

However, I soon discovered that spending more time on the prewriting stage resulted in better writing on not only that assignment, but on other ones throughout the semester.

That’s because writing is a thinking process as much as it is a writing one - and I needed to show my students how that worked.

Now, we do an interactive human outline that shows my students the process of thinking their way through an outline, one where they get instant feedback from me on their work. It takes a good portion of a class, but the focus and organization of my students’ essays have gone up exponentially!

If you’d like to try this visible learning exercise, click here. And you can read all about the whole process we follow with essay writing on this blog post.

Making literary analysis visible

Those of us who love to dive deeply into discussion and analysis understand how it's done. But, as with my golf analogy above, kids don't always know how to go about it. So I build in tons of opportunities for them to map out the thinking process.

One activity that is always a hit is hexagonal thinking. Whenever I want my students to connect ideas in a text or to work to figure out a theme, I group them and give each group a series of hexagons filled with all of the significant elements from the text - characters, symbols, ideas, events, etc. Next, they have a discussion to decide which ideas are connected and then choose their favorite connection and create a poster that illustrates and supports it. 

You can read more about this (and my other favorite visible thinking activities) on this blog post and get your copy of the hexagonal thinking exercise here.

Another visible thinking exercise we do involves "analysis cards." Students record their thinking on the cards I created, and this allowed them to visualize how all of the symbols worked together in the story we were working on. You can get more info on this strategy and grab a card template here.

With all of these activities, not only are students able to see their thinking process, I can also see it too, making it easier to give them good feedback that helps them get that metaphorical ball in the hole. When I can see the work a group or individual is doing (without having to read something) I can quickly tell if they are on track or not. I can walk by their desks, take a quick look, and know exactly what they need help with - or not.

Fill your classroom with learning visuals

Anchor charts and learning cues should be the basis of your classroom decor (but not so much that the room is too visually distracting). Recently I created some posters that can cue students when they are discussing their texts, and help them focus on analysis.

I've been on a mission to help my students write better analytical statements, so we are working on speaking and writing in "literary terms." To remind them of this, they have a handout copied in a bright color that they can easily find, and posters scattered throughout the classroom to remind them how to talk about literature.

When they are having class discussions, they just need to glance at the wall for a quick reminder of ways they can frame their sentences. Read more about that strategy here.

If you would like to motivate students by making learning visible, most of my resources have a component of that built into them. Here is a selection for you to check out:

🔴 Persuasive & Argumentative Writing: a journey through the process

🟦 Active Learning Activities & Exercises

🟣 The Word Choice Challenge

🟩 Reading and Writing Unit: Extended Simile, Metaphor, and Analogy

Social Justice Ideas for Middle-High School English

As the world struggles to deal with a myriad of issues from the global pandemic, to racism, climate change, women's rights, and more... students need help unpacking it all.  Many students are overwhelmed as they directly experience it, or they are bystanders watching it all unfold in front of them.  Students may struggle to understand the how and the why of inequity and may wonder how they can help.  As educators, it's so important to help students understand social justice issues.  

Social justice topics can be taught through reading fiction, exploring song lyrics, watching a slam poem, viewing a TED Talk, listening to a podcast, digging into some incredible online resources, visiting a museum, and more.

The ladies of the Secondary Coffee Shop are happy to share how they include social justice topics in their ELA classrooms and we hope you find inspiration in our ideas.

Presto Plans: To state it simply, kids need stories that reflect their own experiences, but they also need literature that allows them to see the perspective of others.  The concept of making sure the literature you share in your classroom are “mirrors and windows” was introduced by Emily Style.  A text that is a mirror reflects your own culture and identity. They allow the reader to feel a connection and also see that their culture is not only being reflected but that it is valued. A window, on the other hand, allows you to view and consider someone else’s experience.  They allow students to develop a deeper understanding of the world we live in and to provide windows into someone else’s culture and identity.  For some students in your classroom, this might be the first time they are able to learn about differences in culture, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.  I would recommend doing a library audit to ensure that your classroom library includes books for all students.

Tracee Orman: Sometimes it’s much more effective to hear from an outside expert. Don’t be afraid to reach out to local organizations to see if someone would be willing to speak to your class about their experiences. Hearing another person’s story first-hand is going to be much more impactful than you trying to share their story yourself. You can do a Google search for social justice organizations in your area to find groups to contact. Also, a local college may have organizations with students willing to come to speak to your class.

 Nouvelle ELA: Have you checked out Learning for Justice’s Social Justice Standards? This is a great way to make sure your students are learning skills like self-advocacy, empathy, and standing up for others. For example, one standard is “DI.6-8.8 I am curious and want to know more about other people’s histories and lived experiences, and I ask questions respectfully and listen carefully and nonjudgmentally.” We can build a whole lesson around asking respectful questions (or building skills like “Googling first.”) We can also draw in a fun video like this one.

The Daring English Teacher : Another great resource for teaching social justice that all teachers should know about is the Anti-Defamation League. The ADL has an educators section on its website that has dozens of prepared lessons, activities, and resources for educators to use. You can filter your search by grade level and topic to make sure that you are providing your students with meaningful content. And if you teach in an area where you need to tie social justice education to the standards, you’ll want to check out the ADL’s lesson on social justice poetry.

Addie Williams - I love to weave social justice themes through my entire English class and there are some great resources on CommonLit that are free and include everything you need for a lesson. A quick search for "social justice", or a more specific topic like "racism" yields some excellent resources on their free platform. If you're looking for a film to show in class the National Film Board of Canada has some free and fantastic resources - again use the search bar to find specific topics. Many of the films can be streamed for free. Lastly, I've recently discovered Imaginaction - a partnership between the Canadian Federation of Teachers and the Canadian Museum for Human Rights. They have over 350 resources and ideas for a wide range of topics - they span a wide range of topics and cover the globe. I also really love this free lesson on How to Be An Upstander from the Canadian Museum for Human Rights.

Room 213

“People like us in situations like this become hashtags, but they rarely get justice.” This is a quote from Angie Thomas’ The Hate U Give, one I have my students reflect on and discuss. Our students are more socially aware than ever before and so we have the amazing opportunity to move them from awareness and hashtag activism to actually doing things that can bring justice to those who need it. One way we can do this is by showing them examples of ordinary people doing simple actions that make a difference. Download this PDF to get some videos of Ted Talks that you can share with your students. 

Teaching Poetry before Winter Break

By Nouvelle ELA

Teaching poetry is a great way to use fragmented class time before winter break. November and December can be a wild time: spirit days, holiday concerts, and family vacations that start early. If you’re not sure how many students will be in your class on any given day, teaching poetry is one way to keep kids learning.

Here are six ideas for teaching poetry that are winners in the weeks leading up to winter break. 

1. Use Poetry Bell Ringers

These bell ringers are short poetry tasks that students can complete in 5-10 minutes. Some of them ask students to identify figurative language in a small excerpt, some ask for a short analysis, and others involve a short creative task. 

Before Winter Break, these can be a good way to get students to focus. If we open class with a ritual, like bell ringers, we can calm the chaos of “it’s almost vacation!”

2. Do an Independent Poetry Analysis

This independent poetry analysis is a scaffolded analysis of Emily Dickinson’s poem, “I Died for Beauty.” Students move from concrete skills (identification and description) to abstract ones (analysis and creativity). 

Before Winter Break, this activity provides you freedom. If you need a work day, you can set your students to work on this. It’s totally scaffolded, so they can complete the steps on their own. If you have a surprise snow day before break, this is a great activity to send home. If you have absent students, this can be completed just as effectively out-of-class as in. In fact, this is one of my emergency lessons that I leave with admin. 

3. Listen to Slam Poetry

Slam Poetry is a great engaging activity for teaching poetry. Since it’s got such a storytelling feel, it really hooks student interest! Here’s a YouTube playlist with some slam poems that are appropriate for middle and high school. You should definitely preview the videos before you share them with students. 

Before Winter Break, Slam Poetry provides a big impact for short attention spans! Most of the poems on the playlist above are 3-5 minutes long, so you can even play them twice. Then, students can discuss what worked from each poem in small groups. You can even host a poetry slam, if you want. :)

4. Organize Poetry Challenges

I like to give my students four poetry challenges, and then give them a couple days to work on them at their own pace. They write a limerick, create a blackout poem, write a haiku, and make an illustration inspired by Neil Gaiman’s poem, “Instructions.” 

Before Winter Break, student workdays are a lifesaver! Yes, you’re giving students these four tasks. More than likely, you’ll also have students who need to catch up on work in your class. Why not let them work on what they may need your help with, and work on the poetry challenges at home? However you want to manage it, students are always grateful for independent work time. It definitely gives them space to take a breath.

5. Set up Poetry Speed-Dating

In this poetry activity, I literally just pull out my poetry books and spread them on tables. Then, students spend about a half an hour looking at whatever poems they want. I don’t have my 9th graders take organized notes, but you could add that element. I do have them write down poems and poets that grab their attention. During the last fifteen minutes of class, students write personal reflections on poems they found and what stuck out to them. 

Before Winter Break, this activity is a great way to let the inspiration flow! Students get to decide what paths to follow - which poets to read more of, which type of poetry appeals to them - and that sort of ownership is fun!

6. Play the Elements of Poetry Escape Room

If you’d like a totally different idea for teaching poetry, play an escape room! In this escape room, students identify figurative language, analyze poetic devices, do a close reading, and decode a secret poem. This is another day where students “go” and you get to observe.

Before Winter Break, this is a fun way to channel the chaos. Students already want to be up and moving and talking to their friends, so why not leverage that? 

Have fun :)

If you haven’t noticed, these ideas also give YOU a break! We’re all tired and just trying to make it through… so why not use the flexibility and fun of poetry to help you out?

What are your favorite ideas for teaching poetry? Let us know in comments.

Happy teaching!

Other Coffee Shop resources for teaching poetry:

Teaching Poetry Online and in Class (blog post) by Room 213

Poetry Analysis Collaborative Poster (blog post) by Daring English Teacher

Acrostic Poetry Writing - Snowball Activity by Presto Plans

Poetry Analysis - Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening by Tracee Orman

Pet Peeve Poetry by Addie Williams

Reframing Peer Editing in the Secondary ELA Classroom

by The Daring English Teacher

When it comes to teaching writing, incorporating all elements of the writing process into your lesson plans helps students build essential writing skills. Whenever I assign a formal essay, I make sure I dedicate classroom time to brainstorming, outlining, drafting, editing, and revising. One key component of the writing process is peer editing. However, I’ve started to notice that it is time to reframe our thinking about peer editing and why we include it in the classroom.

Writing is a fluid, ever-changing process, and unlike mathematical equations that have a clearly defined start and endpoint and one correct answer, there is always room to edit and revise writing. Peer editing is not and should not be viewed as a means to an endpoint in writing. Rather, it is the process that we should focus on as teachers.

When I walked my students through their first formal essay of the school year, I recently noticed this shift in how students viewed peer editing. They were looking at the end product as the goal when they should have looked at the process as a way to learn.

The sole purpose of peer editing is not to free a paper from grammatical errors. Instead, peer editing aims to help students become stronger writers by getting them to think like editors.

Introducing Peer Editing

When I introduce peer editing to my students, I want to make sure that they understand that even after peer editing, their work will not be perfect. I have them think about published writers with teams and editors, and sometimes, there are still errors in the published work - and those are the professionals. So I tell my students that the goal is to use this process as a way to become stronger writers themselves and that a stronger essay is just the byproduct of the process. 

Goals of Peer Editing

• Have students read multiple peers papers
• Help students learn to think like editors
• Help students apply their editing skills to their own writing
• Have students think critically about their peer’s edits

Facilitating Peer Editing

When I conduct peer editing in the classroom, I want to make sure that my students have manageable, focused tasks for each part of the essay. In doing so, students feel less overwhelmed.

My favorite way to facilitate peer editing is by using these peer editing rotations. In this process, students will read four other student papers, and with each paper, they focus on editing the paper for just the tasks at hand.

In the first rotation, students look at the introduction and organization of the essay. They check the thesis statement and topic sentences. In the second rotation, students look at how the evidence is incorporated in the body paragraphs. They check to see if it is relevant, properly introduced and fully explained. In the third rotation, students read the papers looking just for grammatical errors. To help make this rotation more successful, I teach a series of mini-lessons on grammar beforehand. And finally, in the fourth station, students use a comment bank to write one compliment and one suggestion.

After reading four different students’ papers, I find that my students have a clear idea about my expectations. Seeing their peers’ writing helps them gauge their own writing. Furthermore, completing the peer editing process also helps students begin thinking like an editor. Once they’ve read through four other papers, they then receive their paper and start the process of evaluating their peers’ comments, edits, and suggestions. Another helpful way to conduct peer editing is to have students complete a peer editing checklist. 

For more on facilitating peer editing in the classroom, you might be interested in reading this blog post entitled "Five Ways to Foster Effective Peer Editing."

Focus on the Process

As we begin to reframe our thinking on peer editing, it's important to stress to students that they aren’t just doing this to fix their friend’s essay or to have their table buddy fix their essay. Instead, it is essential to stress the process and how completing the process benefits the student.

More Resources on Peer Editing:

Teaching Peer Feedback in ELA 

FREE Essay Writing Peer Editing Activity

Persuasive and Argumentative Essays

5 ELA Substitute Lessons That Leave No Grading

By Presto Plans

We all know the struggle of having to prepare a lesson for a substitute teacher, especially when you’re doing it on short notice. The last thing you want is to spend your time away thinking about whether students have enough to do, only to return to a huge stack of papers waiting to be graded.

 

Whenever I leave a lesson for a sub, I try to choose something students can complete from beginning to end while I’m away. I still want them reading, writing, thinking, and practicing meaningful ELA skills, but I also want the lesson to wrap up before I return. Here are five of my favorite ELA substitute lessons that do just that!

Lesson 1: Solve a Substitute Teacher Mystery 

One fun way to keep students engaged while you’re away is to turn the entire class into a mystery. In this substitute teacher reading mystery, students learn that Mrs. Harper has arrived for her first full day as a substitute teacher only to discover that the emergency lesson plan has mysteriously disappeared from the teacher’s desk. Someone took it, and students have to figure out who!

Students work in small groups, first reading the backstory and then examining a collection of evidence connected to different suspects. They’ll encounter an attendance record, email, sticky note, text message conversation, faculty memo, student petition, suspicious paper airplane, and more. Each new piece of evidence gives them another opportunity to make inferences, connect details, and eliminate suspects based on what they can actually prove.

I especially like this type of activity for a sub day because students are practicing close reading, finding text evidence, and inference skills, but to them, it feels like they’re trying to crack a case. A graphic organizer helps groups keep track of the clues and suspects as they work, so there’s also plenty of structure to keep everyone on task while you’re gone.

Once groups have made their final predictions, the substitute uses the presentation to reveal the culprit and go through the evidence that proves or eliminates each suspect. Everything gets reviewed before the end of class, and students get the satisfaction of finding out whether they solved the mystery!

Lesson 2: Investigate the Missing Teacher

Another way to have some fun with your absence is to make it the entire premise of the lesson! With this Missing Teacher Substitute Lesson, students arrive to discover that their teacher is mysteriously absent. The principal needs help figuring out what happened, so your students have officially been put in charge of the investigation.

They begin by creating a Missing Teacher poster. Along with drawing a picture of you, they include details about your appearance, places you might be found, things you often say, what you’re likely doing, and what someone should do if they find you. You may discover when you return that your students have been paying much closer attention to your habits and favorite sayings than you realized.

Next, students make a major “breakthrough” and complete a police case file. They imagine evidence that could have been collected, write witness testimony, consider possible suspects and motives, and develop their own theory about your disappearance.

Since this one is all about creative writing and imagination, there aren’t right-or-wrong answers waiting to be graded. Instead, you get to come back to some pretty entertaining theories about where you’ve been! Teachers who have used this lesson often say that reading and sharing the responses afterward is one of the best parts.

Lesson 3: Try a Grammar Challenge

Grammar is another great option for a substitute lesson because you can focus on one specific skill and build the entire class around it. Rather than leaving students with a traditional grammar worksheet, I like pairing a short mini lesson with a collaborative challenge where they immediately put what they’ve learned into practice.

For example, in my Free Commas in a Series Grammar Challenge, students first learn or review the comma rule and then find themselves trapped inside a Mayan pyramid. To escape, they work in teams to find and correct comma errors in a passage. Their answers reveal the path they need to take through the pyramid without setting off any traps!

The setup is pretty simple:

1. Teach or review the skill. Have the substitute use a short mini lesson to introduce a grammar concept, such as punctuation, sentence structure, parts of speech, or fragments.
   
   
2. Give students a challenge. Once students understand the concept, put them into small groups and have them use what they learned to complete a related grammar challenge.
   
   
3. Review it together. At the end of class, the substitute can go through the challenge with students so they can check their work and clear up any misunderstandings.

I find that adding the challenge makes a BIG difference. Students are still getting meaningful grammar practice, but now they have a problem to solve, a reason to work together, and maybe even a little friendly competition thrown in.

Want to try one out before leaving it for a sub? You can grab one of my grammar challenges for free below!

This free challenge comes from my Full-Year Grammar Challenge Program, which uses this same general format with 40 different grammar concepts. You can also browse all the individual challenges here if you want to choose one that lines up with a skill your students are currently learning.

Lesson 4: Explore the History of Emojis

If you want to leave your students with some nonfiction reading while you’re away, choosing a topic they already have some connection to can make the lesson much easier for a substitute to jump into. And it’s pretty safe to say most middle and high school students have some experience with emojis.

 

For this History of Emojis Lesson, I use a nonfiction article about the history of emojis that explores where emojis came from and how they have evolved over time. After reading, students complete a response assignment that has them work with the text in several different ways, including finding text evidence, making inferences and connections, summarizing, examining figurative language, and sharing their own opinions.

The included presentation helps guide the lesson, and an answer key makes it easy for the substitute to review the reading responses with students before the end of class. Have students correct their own work during the review, and you won’t have to come back and mark every response yourself.

 
There’s also a creative extension that works well if you have a longer class or students finish early. Students write a short story but replace as many words or emotions as they can with drawings of emojis. Then, they swap stories with a partner to see if someone else can decipher what they wrote. It’s a fun little challenge, but it also gets students thinking about how we communicate meaning through symbols as well as words.

Lesson 5: Review Figurative Language

Sometimes you don’t need an elaborate lesson for a day away. A straightforward review of something students have already learned can be just as useful, especially when you need a sub plan you can pull together quickly.

This figurative language substitute activity gives students practice identifying six common literary devices: simile, metaphor, personification, alliteration, oxymoron, and onomatopoeia. The assignment includes 18 sentences, all centered around substitute-teacher scenarios, and students identify the type of figurative language used in each one. I typically direct the substitute to have students work in pairs and have them compete to get all the answers correct.

I like this one for those truly last-minute absences because there isn’t much for the substitute to explain or manage. Students can work through the examples independently, and then the substitute can use the included answer key to review each one with the class. Students check and correct their own answers, and the lesson is completely wrapped up before they leave.

 
I hope these ideas take a little work off your plate the next time you need to prepare for a substitute. A sub day doesn’t have to mean leaving busywork for students or coming back to a mountain of grading. With the right activity, students can still get meaningful ELA practice, and you can return to an empty desk.

8 ENGAGING ELA LESSONS TO HELP YOU THROUGH THE SEMESTER

 

Secondary Sara: If a class is ever in a slump and needs better engagement, it’s a perfect time to whip out a FAST research project on a topic that students actually care about. It’s a great antidote to the traditional research paper while still assessing use of credible sources. The quick turnaround increases student focus and is a perfect way to get energized between bigger units.

 

Nouvelle ELA: If engagement is running short and tempers in your classroom are running high, integrate some intentional team-building with these Collaborative Trivia Bell Ringers. Students work together to solve ELA-themed puzzles and riddles each day, and it’s amazing to see their energy as they work on critical thinking and collaboration. You can even keep an ongoing score throughout the month or semester. Try a free week! :)

 

The Classroom Sparrow: Review is never a bad thing in English class. Students can always use additional practice when it come to things such as, grammar, spelling, figurative language, etc. Whether you're looking for a new way to teach new concepts, review material or have a resource that your students can reference at any point in a semester, check out my full list of ELA Mini Flip Books. The bundle is packed full of ideas for your English Language Arts classes. 

 

Room 213: Ever since I began teaching three decades ago, I’ve been fine-tuning my lessons so that they can keep students engaged and learning. I’ve thrown out what doesn’t work and constantly tried to improve what does - and I’ve packaged all of my favourites in this resource: Active Learning Exercises and Activities. You can choose from one of over THIRTY activities that will get your students thinking critically as they collaborate with their classmates. Just download, choose an activity, and get your students excited about learning.

 

Presto Plans: When I first started out in the ELA classroom, I always dreaded teaching grammar. I felt like the way I was teaching it was old-fashioned and unexciting. I knew if I dreaded grammar, students definitely dreaded it too. Over time, I realized I needed to change my entire approach to the topic if I wanted to engage my students. The Grammar Challenge does just that: it makes grammar fun and keeps students totally engaged through 40 weeks of creative stories, instruction, escape room-style challenges, and assessment.  Students work together each week to solve mysteries, get secret codes, find mystery words, or escape a risky situation all by using their grammar skills!

 

The Daring English Teacher: One of the best ways to get students engaged in the lesson is get to them moving and engaging in hands-on activities. Ever since I started incorporating mini flip books into my instruction, I’ve noticed that students learn and remember the content more. My favorite mini flip book is my literary analysis with sticky notes flipbook. It combined the fun of sticky notes with flipbooks to create a memorable end-of-unit literary analysis project.

 

Addie Williams: It can be hard to keep up the momentum as you move through the year. I love to give students the opportunity to be creative and to sometimes just write for fun rather than a serious writing piece like an essay or formal paragraph. I enjoy injecting poetry writing activities like this Pet Peeve Poetry resource - it allows students the chance to vent, write about a pet peeve, and be creative. And I love to read their poems!

 

Tracee Orman: At this point in the semester, keeping students engaged is key. I love using shorter texts that offer both flexibility and interest. My Short Stories Bundle has a great blend of engrossing stories, fun activities, and standards-based learning opportunities. You can pick-and-choose from the collection of stories, and it also includes several engaging activities that can be used with ANY text

 

We hope these resources will help get you (and your students) through the semester!