Having taught your students how to PROPERLY EMBED QUOTATIONS it's now time to jump into the actual process of writing an essay. There are a number of ways to demonstrate this process. The most helpful of which is to give students a clear exemplar of the essay writing process. A Step by Step guide to … Continue reading Teaching how to go from Text, to Outline, to Essay
The Five Paragraph Essay is an artificial construct that does not exist in the wild. No one will ask you to write a five paragraph essay outside of high school. No author sits around writing five paragraph essays. It doesn't matter if you call them hamburger essays, or nacho essays. The five paragraph essay does … Continue reading The Problem with Five Paragraph Essays: Understanding they do Not Exist in the Wild
Having already taught your students how to write a FIVE SENTENCE COMPARISON PARAGRAPH you have the base materials required to construct a Five Paragraph Essay Outline. While the Five Paragraph Essay is far from the best form for students to express their ideas, the organizational skills learned while writing a five paragraph essay will built the … Continue reading Teaching How to Write a Five Paragraph Essay
The first thing students need to know, as you teach them essay writing skills, is what mistakes they're most likely to make. Only after being explicitly taught common essay writing problems will they be able to identify and avoid them. This three-part lesson plan will guide you through the process of getting students writing, teaching … Continue reading Identifying and Avoiding Common Essay Problems
Having looked at a number of ways for students to take their work outside of the classroom, it's important to give them something that they will want to strive towards. A project based task that encourages them to discover and work to solve an issue in their own community is a great way to engage … Continue reading Creation and Publication Project
The best way to demonstrate that you understand something is to explain it to someone else. Allow students the opportunity to demonstrate that they understand a concept by flipping expectations and allow them to create assignments rather than complete them. Introduction This lesson focuses on having students READ A SHORT STORY and then break into small groups (I … Continue reading Teaching Literacy Skills through Assignment Creation
Literary / Poetic devices are used throughout both fiction and non-fiction to add depth, understanding, and beauty to otherwise dreary prose. Students need to have an understanding of the devices, as well as how they're used, before they develop the ability to appreciate the author's careful crafting. The Top Ten Devices Metaphor Simile Alliteration … Continue reading Top 10 Key Literary Devices
Students need to be empowered to become agents of change in the world. Digital communication and social media are powerful tools that our students are already familiar with; showing them how to utilize these tools to enact real change allows them to reshape the media landscape that surrounds them. Having already looked at targetted writing … Continue reading Gender Lesson: Reshaping Gender Normative Roles
Advertisers constantly push messages at our students. Our students need to learn how to push back at the advertisers. Having already presented on the importance of creating better advertisements, this lesson will encourage them to take on a Role, select an Audience, choose a Format, and finally select a Topic as they write a piece … Continue reading Gender Lesson: The Gender R.A.F.T. Assignment
It's important that students know how to identify and name problematic messaging in the media they consume. From Facebook to Twitter to Television and Websites, our students view hundreds of advertisements a day. Having already seen how problematic messaging exists in the media we consume, in our past lesson, this lesson will arm our students … Continue reading Gender Lesson: Using the Media Triangle to Annotate Advertisements
