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Long gone are the days of teachers asking to borrow binders, and pulling multi-generation photocopies from clear plastic envelopes.
Here, I hope to help increase classroom engagement and student learning through the use of technology, project based learning, and unique high interest topics.
Feel free to use these materials with your students, and join the conversation by commenting on posts, or following along through Facebook, Twitter, YouTube.
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Latest Posts
Highlights
Literature Circles 2.0
The use of Literature Circles in High School and Elementary English Classrooms encourage students to take ownership over their own education by providing them with choice for both what they…
Overview of the Ten Key Literacy Skills
These ten key literacy skills are used in every classroom, regardless of subject or grade area. Using these, or slightly modified, headers on your assignment sheets will help students understand…
Teaching Gender Representation in the Media
There are few things more important than teaching students to view the world through a critical lens. “How individuals construct their social identities, how they come to understand what it…
How to Teach Essay Writing Skills
If you’re a new teacher you’re probably wondering how to teach essay writing skills to your students. If you’re a seasoned teacher, you’re still probably wondering how to teacher essay…
Making Projects Meaningful
Student work so often dies on the teacher’s desk. A project that took dozens of hours, and led to the creation of a beautiful artefact is handed in, given a…
Homeschooling your Child: Free Teachers' Guide
Nobody ever said it would be easy. At least, no one who was telling the truth. Being a teacher is difficult at the best of times, but being a teacher…
Features

Teaching with Comics
Prepare your students to put their Key Litearcy Skills into practice by downloading free classroom-ready lesson plans for hot Graphic Novels.
“The reading program should include a wide variety of literary, informational, and graphic texts that engage students’ interest and imagination – for example … comic books.“
(The Ontario Curriculum Grades 9 and 10: English 2007, 16)
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About Me
Hi! I’m Michael Barltrop, and I’ve been teaching since 2006, integrating Comics, Video Games, and TTRPGs into my classroom. I’ve acted as the head of English, Literacy, and Universal Design. Read more