Tools to Help You Teach Middle School ELA
Ready to use mini lessons in your writing workshop, but not sure how? This post will take you the entire process from choosing your lessons to teaching. Let’s get started! What’s a mini lesson? A mini lesson is a short, 10 – 15 minute lesson that you teach by modeling a skill for your students. […] Read more…
Looking for writing workshop tips? Ways to make it easier? I’ve got you covered! Teaching writing is challenging! But this post will help you! I’ve written several articles about it – and collected them here to help you find the answers you need. Let’s get started! Let’s start at the beginning If you’re not sure […] Read more…
Congratulations! You’ve decided to adopt a writing workshop class! Now, you might be wondering: now what? Here are some tips to get you headed in the right direction. Let’s jump in! How Are Your Class Management Skills? Let’s be honest. One of the most important skills for a teacher is to know how to effectively […] Read more…
Middle school students love options! By providing choices during writing workshop, you will increase student excitement and engagement about the writing process. Here are ways to do just that. The difficulty of teaching writing Well, let’s be honest. Teaching writing is really, really hard work! All of our students are at different levels. In one […] Read more…
One of the most rewarding and impactful aspects of writing workshop is the writing conferences your students will have with you and their peers. How can you make the most of this time? Here are some ways to make your conferences more powerful: Start with the Ideas Ever collect a stack of completed essays, sit […] Read more…
Where do you find your assessments? Even when your writing workshop is humming along beautifully… Students are working, you are conferencing, and life is grand…until you look in your grade book. Gotta get those grades, right? But where are those assessments going to come from? Read on to find solutions to this problem… Here’s the […] Read more…
What are your writing workshop expectations? Writing workshop is a great way to teach writing, but you probably still have questions. Let’s get them answered! Here’s the big question: You’re ready to get started with writing workshop, but you have one nagging question looming in the back of your mind: What is the rest of […] Read more…
If you’re thinking about structuring your class to include writing workshop, you might be wondering what the writing workshop format looks like. Let’s take a look! What does writing workshop look like? The most important part of writing workshop is to make it YOURS. There isn’t a “one size fits all” method. Adapt and adopt […] Read more…
If you’ve decided to teach writing using the workshop method, you probably have some questions. Here are seven questions and answers to help you get started. 1. What exactly is writing workshop? Remember the story of the elves and the shoemaker? I think of that story when I think of a workshop class. The heart […] Read more…
Writing workshop can transform your classroom! Sounds magical, doesn’t it? I believe it’s true — and here is why: 1. Real Writers & Real Work Often students feel like they write something, it gets corrected, and…end of process. In a workshop, students grapple with the entire writing process: revision, determining what they really want to […] Read more…