What’s Working?
In a stack of papers called Reading.
- Mar
- 17
- 2010
Every Tuesday and Thursday are read days. Students bring in their outside reading book and we read for a spell. It was ten minutes at first. In English 3, we’ve stepped that up slowly to twenty minutes and they are doing fine. We’re about ready to bump up to twenty-five minutes, actually. In English 2, we’re anywhere from... read more
The National Standards
In a stack of papers called Reform.
- Mar
- 15
- 2010
The Common Core State Standards Initiative released draft K-12 standards, open for feedback until Friday, April 2, 2010. While you may have your concerns about the notion of moving to national standards, focus on the standards you’ve been given in your feedback. Probably nothing... read more
Like It Never Even Happened
In a stack of papers called Instruction.
- Mar
- 09
- 2010
You have a student that’s rough. If you’re unfortunate and like the majority of us, you have more than one. This is a student who just keeps pushing your buttons and making life difficult for you. Or maybe this is a student who doesn’t do anything. That kind of passive aggressive behavior is taxing, too. This could be a student who is obnoxious, acting far younger than she should.... read more
Commercial Poetry
In a stack of papers called Instruction.
- Oct
- 11
- 2009
I mentioned the VW commercial that uses a Dylan Thomas piece (not a poem, but it’s rather poetic prose) a while back. There are also these Levi’s commercials with some Whitman poetry. I’m not exactly sure what to do with them, but there’s a connection between these commercials... read more
New Test Items
In a stack of papers called Testing.
- Oct
- 10
- 2009
Every time you create a new test item, a new way to assess knowledge, what do you do? How do you step kids into that new item type, one they may not have seen before, in order to make sure you’re assessing exactly what you want to assess (content-area skill) and not something accidental (test-taking prowess)? I spent about two hours on Wednesday figuring out how to handle this situation. What... read more