In Part 2 of her article on conferencing with student writers, teacher-author Marilyn Pryle tells how she manages multiple conferences with each student during a class period. The key: give students small manageable tasks they can do on their own.
Moving beyond the five myths of rigor to incorporate true instructional rigor in the classroom is critical in light of the Common Core, says expert Barbara Blackburn, who advocates scaffolding and differentiation to help all students achieve more.
Mark Gerl, a school-based technology coordinator in Atlanta GA, reflects on the key role of language arts & storytelling in successful video games — something he & his students have learned in chats with a team of Canadian adventure game designers.
Working Draft / Writing and Coding
by Kevin Hodgson · Published 01/05/2014 · Last modified 11/24/2019
If our English Language Arts students don’t learn the basics of reading and writing computer code, asks middle grades teacher Kevin Hodgson, how can we be sure they will grow up to be creators of ideas and not just users of information created and managed by others?
This is a must-read book for teacher leaders, says our reviewer, offering the stories of 8 educators who seek a new kind of teacher role in America’s schools.
Media literacy consultant Frank W. Baker considers some of the ways that media arts intersect with STEM and present STEAM learning opportunities.
Book Reviews / Mentor Texts / Nonfiction
by MiddleWeb · Published 11/11/2013 · Last modified 11/15/2019
Heard helps teachers consider the potential of mentor texts and the creativity that nonfiction writing skills can encourage, says reviewer Kevin Hodgson.
Working Draft / Writing with Students
by Kevin Hodgson · Published 11/03/2013 · Last modified 11/17/2019
ELA teacher Kevin Hodgson often joins his students during freewriting time and sometimes shares his own messy work, as a way to model what writers do.
Middle school advocates have long championed thematic curriculum design & project learning. Now is the time to actually do it, say Nancy Doda & Mark Springer.
Teachers working to build complex texts into classes will welcome the framework for teaching comprehension in Laura Robb’s book, says reviewer Linda Biondi.
