Mentor Text: excerpts from The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman Techniques: Descriptive Writing Background – I’ve shared pretty openly that there are a few parts of my practice as an English teacher that have made teaching during a pandemic easier. One of those things has been the fact that at our school, each of our courses […]
Mentor Text: Hairy Legs and All by Stephen Graham Jones Techniques: Writing Horror Defying Conventions Editing Background – My pandemic “thing” was finally becoming a podcast listener. One of my favorites, as you’ll know if we’re Twitter mutuals is The Kingcast, a Stephen King podcast hosted by wonderful pop culture writers Scott Wampler and Eric Vespe. […]
Mentor Text: Denialist Glossary by Daniel Heath Justice Techniques: Critical thought about Word Choice Deconstructing language use Background – As I write this, a group of teachers at my school has been prepping a series of lessons to deliver to our student body around next week, as we recognize Truth and Reconciliation Week here in Canada. […]
Mentor Text: A Story About Tim Duncan by Shea Serrano (PDF/online) Techniques: Writing Memoir Introducing and Concluding Background – This is my May post. It’s close to the end of the year. Some of us are done already, some of us still have some time to go. Wherever we fall in that, it’s been an […]
Mentor Text: Song of My Speech Impediment by Dawn Macdonald Techniques: Multimedia Text Exploring Metaphor Background -It’s the last week of poetry month for 2021. Like many of us, I read a fair amount of poetry. I subscribe to two different daily poem a day newsletters, so I often wind up reading a poem first […]
Mentor Text: Various dystopian short stories Techniques: Social commentary Short story Background – I think I’ve shared this here before, but I teach all my core English courses thematically. There are many reasons for this, but at the heart of it, I love that it gives us a focus for our looks at literature. Each course […]
Mentor Text: ‘Vergence’ by Tracy Deonn From From a Certain Point of View: The Empire Strikes Back Techniques: Point of View Fan fiction as storytelling Background – In our house, it is a Christmas tradition that everyone gets new jammies and a new book on Christmas Eve. This year, as requested, I unwrapped the Empire Strikes […]
Mentor Text: Why Dolly Parton Doesn’t Deserve a Nashville Statue — Yet by Marcus K. Dowling Techniques: Expressing Opinion Using Evidence to Reinforce Opinion Critical Thinking Background – In this house, we believe in Dolly Parton. Her records are regularly spun, and we believe in her messages of kindness and compassion. If our daughters manage to […]
Mentor Text: The Poem Where I Lie About Everything by Rudy Francisco Techniques: Lying Making Your Audience Think Reflection Background – Let me start with a confession. December kicked my butt. We came into on the heels of report cards, and a heightened set of protocols in reaction to a second wave with record setting COVID […]
Mentor Text: Geek Wisdom edited by Stephen H. Segal (excerpts) Techniques: Using quotations Writing an Introduction Background – This year has presented many challenges hasn’t it? In the midst of it all, the work goes on, doesn’t it? I’ve actually found myself in a weird balance of developing new lessons and leaning on past planning, […]
moving writers 