tengrrl’s thoughts & news on teaching writing, literacy, and literature
November 3, 2006
In this new ReadWriteThink lesson, students evaluate published children’s picture storybooks. Students then plan, write, illustrate, and publish their own children’s picture books. The lesson was submitted by Junius Wright of Charleston, South Carolina.
November 3, 2006
This writing activity integrates mathematical graphing with writing and can be used to generate a number of different kinds of writing activities, but lends itself well to biographical and narrative writing. Students interview other students, choose significant life events, rate them, graph them, and write about one or more. The lesson plan was written by Susan Spangler of Fredonia, New York.
November 1, 2006
A manuscript has been submitted. Deadline met. And now, I’m allowed to sleep.
October 31, 2006
National American Indian Heritage Month is recognized each November as a time to learn more about the history and heritage of Native American peoples. These resources provide strategies to explore Native American literature and heritage in your own classroom.
October 25, 2006
With Halloween and DÃa de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) in the next week, these resources provide seasonal activities that focus on language arts, literature, and writing.
October 20, 2006
SmartQuote from Yesterday’s ASCD SmartBrief:
“I’ll be more enthusiastic about encouraging thinking outside the box when there’s evidence of any thinking going on inside it.”
October 18, 2006
NCTE and the International Reading Association have created a Literacy Coaching Clearinghouse to build a professional learning community of literacy coaches and to provide the education community with information on literacy coaching.
October 12, 2006
This ReadWriteThink lesson eases students’ fear of interpreting complex poetry by teaching them an inductive strategy with which they determine patterns of imagery, diction, and figurative language in order to unlock meaning. Although the lesson uses Seamus Heaney’s “Blackberry-Picking,” this strategy can be applied to a variety of poems. The lesson was written by Lane Dye of the Kennesaw Mountain Writing Project (KMWP) at Kennesaw State University.
October 10, 2006
Next week is Teen Read Week! This year’s theme, “Get Active!” encourages teens to use the resources at their library to lead an active life. Students at any grade level can get active with these resources.
October 8, 2006
I’ve been puzzling on this overnight. Rereading. Highlighting the freewrite from yesterday. I just continues to feel as if there’s something wrong. I do think that my problem is the rhetorical situation of a rhetorical situation, and maybe the metacognitive nature of what I’m trying to do is just mixing everything up. I can’t figure out which situation I’m trying to work on at which moment. This really shouldn’t be that difficult. If it is just good old classic audience/purpose/voice, I should be able to figure it out blindfolded (which I may be eventually since my glasses STILL aren’t in, but I’ll post that later).
It all just feels absurd. I know all this stuff. Why can’t I write about it? What is causing all the roadblocks (other than pressure and stress)? Usually I can write under pressure, so I’m really not able to believe that that is the problem.
Maybe though this complexity is part of the reason that teachers have problems at times with what I’m talking about in the manuscript. It’s an awkward thing to think through. No wonder people have trouble with this. I need some brilliant observation to get this darned thing going :(