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The Power of Similes
If you want stronger poetry from students, a good starting point might be to explore how to write a powerful simile. Gretchen Schroeder explains how she helps her high school students play with and create better similes.
The Third (or More) Time Is the Charm
Gretchen Schroeder finds helping her students see the value in rereading poems is all about helping them pay close attention to imagery.
Hunting for Textual Evidence
Gretchen Schroeder finds just telling her high school class to include textual evidence when making points and arming them with sticky notes leaves many students bewildered. She regroups and comes up with activities to scaffold their understanding of what makes for valid evidence.
Teaching Tone: Deal Me In
Gretchen Schroeder’s high school students are surprised to see a deck of cards on their supply list. The cards are a tool for teaching the vocabulary of tone in creative ways.
Fear of Reading
Gretchen Schroeder reflects on why some of her students have developed a fear of reading by the time they reach high school.
When One Door Closes
Gretchen Schroeder finds new routines in her high school workshop means letting go of old expectations.
Flipping Negative Teacher Emotions
Gretchen Schroeder struggles to understand the meaning and value of her teaching when two former students overdose and die in separate incidents, and another is indicted on murder charges. These events lead to deep reflection on how teachers can move beyond feelings of sadness, apathy, and envy.
A Community Reads “Wonder”
Katherine Sokolowski had a dream — her whole community reading and celebrating the same book. She explains how she helped coordinate, organize, and purchase hundreds of books for a community-wide reading of Wonder.
Spoken Word Poetry
Gretchen Schroeder uses online videos as resources to teach her high school students to appreciate spoken-word poetry and write their own.
Choose Your Own Grammar Adventure
Gretchen Schroeder shares a quick exercise she’s developed for her high school students to hone grammar and editing skills using online video resources and individual Chromebooks.
Using Podcasts as an Alternative to Article of the Week
Gretchen Schroeder adapts the popular "Article of the Week" activity with podcasts as an alternative in her high school classroom, and shares some of her favorite podcasts to use with students.
Focused Revision: Introductions
Gretchen Schroeder focuses solely on revision to introductions in her high school classroom with three fun activities to teach students new possibilities for beginnings.
Writing Effective Conclusions
Anadiplosis, tricolon, syntax and such — when Gretchen Schroeder's high school students are stuck in rhetorical ruts, she teaches them some new rhetorical tricks for crafting conclusions.
Quick Vocabulary Practice and Assessment
Gretchen Schroeder finds any vocabulary routine eventually gets stale in her high school classroom. She shares a couple of favorite options for reinvigorating word learning.
When a Book Doesn’t Work
Gretchen Schroeder is frustrated when a novel that has worked well for many years doesn’t appeal to her current high school students. Letting go of it is hard.
Humor Writing with Teens
Gretchen Schroeder develops a unit on humor writing that engages and delights her high school students.
My Five Objectives for the Start of the School Year
Gretchen Schroeder winnows many competing demands at the start of the year down to five clear objectives in her high school classroom.
Small Solutions for Big Problems with Classroom Discussions
Gretchen Schroeder shares some conversation fixes for when talk goes awry in her high school classroom.
Mentors for Process and Habits
Ruth Ayres shares some of her favorite mentors and mentor texts for developing good writing processes and habits.
Tweets in the High School Classroom
Gretchen Schroeder finds that tweets are a terrific quick assessment tool for analyzing student understanding of everything from nonfiction texts to character development in classic literature.
Amazing Race
Gretchen Schroeder uses the format of the Amazing Race television show to help her high school students master materials for final exams and get moving throughout the school for a fun break.
Getting Teens Out of Reading Ruts: The Sampler
Carly Ullmer describes the activity she's developed for getting her middle school readers out of reading ruts by sampling different authors and genres.
The Case for the Sonnet
Gretchen Schroeder makes a case for teaching the sonnet to teenagers in the age of texts and Twitter.
Vocabulary Instruction: Where to Start?
Gretchen Schroeder looks for new ways to help high school students learn words.
Slow Down
Gretchen Schroeder has three strategies for slowing down with her high school students and savoring literacy learning.
Extended Inquiry with Article of the Week
Gretchen Schroeder finds the article of the week activity is an excellent vehicle for learning about content literacy gaps in student background knowledge and how to fill them.
Mentor Texts and Memoir Writing
Gretchen Schroeder finds one mentor text has many uses as her high school students explore memoir writing.
Invitations for Narrative Writing
Kim Campbell suggests activities and prompts to energize narrative writing with teens.
Reading Pictures in High School
Gretchen Schroeder melds famous artwork with literacy instruction in her high school classroom.
“Are We Gonna Watch the Movie?”
Gretchen Schroeder finds her high school students are always eager to see the movies related to the novels they are reading in class. Yet it rarely makes sense to show the entire film. She explains how to choose clips judiciously.
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