Mentor Text: ‘Super Mario Kart‘ from The Anthropocene Reviewed by John Green Techniques: Introduction Narrative Metaphor Review Background – How often do we set something aside, but never quite make it back to it? I tweeted, way back when I first read it, which was, admittedly, a while after it seemed like everyone else had, that […]
Mentor Text: Salvage by Hedgie Choi Techniques: Exploring the use of profanity Poetic form Building connections Background – I’m a recovering magazine addict. I’ve gone from snagging every magazine that slightly caught my eye, and subscribing to numerous publications to buying more selectively, and holding a single subscription. That preamble is just so I can talk […]
Mentor Text: Love by Alex Dimitrov Techniques: Editing and revising Using a seed line Background – I openly declare my great love of Best of the Year poetry collections. For a number of years, I’ve made a point of making sure I make my way through The Best American Poetry, and this year, I’ve added The […]
Mentor Text: “Can you hear the hum? How Jordan Tannahill’s The Listeners illuminated my experience with mental illness” by Alicia Elliott Techniques: Exploring and expressing personal connections Including research in a personal essay Writing a conclusion Background – If you’re a reader of Mentor Text Wednesdays, then you might do what I do – flag passages, […]
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 […]
moving writers 