If you’ve read any of my posts this year, you might notice a theme: I feel like I am constantly referencing Sarah Zerwin’s Pointless, which I read over the summer. I ordered it immediately upon reading the title, thinking, This is great! Maybe it will give me ideas for reducing the time I spend assessing […]
Teaching grammar is my instructional nemesis. I’m sure I am not alone in feeling this way. For nearly twenty years now, I have worked at teaching grammar in the context of writing, without skill-and-drill worksheets, and every year I tweak my approach, often some variation of Harry Noden’s creative Image Grammar approach. But it’s still […]
The image of the braid is powerfully suggestive of attempts to reconcile threads that are sometimes difficult to reconcile. In this way, the braided essay can be a helpful teacher: an exercise in creative nonfiction that encourages non-linear storytelling. Three narratives are brought together by connecting words or images that puts the threads into conversation […]
It’s funny how a few things in school remain mostly normal despite everything else feeling so strange this year. Like the annual arrival of National Honors Society nominations– it was a nice reminder of “normal” when a student in my Zoom last week asked if we could set up a breakout room so he could […]
I started this blog post two weeks ago when the big internet drama of the day was Bean Dad. That was just two weeks ago, my friends. I almost scrapped this whole post when I opened it up to finish it today because I’m certain he is long forgotten. BUT…the parallel I was drawing to […]
ESSENTIAL QUESTION: How do we provide students with the opportunities and space to write “sin miedo”? ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS FOR REFLECTION: What does it mean to write without fear? Where does fear come from in the context of writing in the classroom? What kinds of classroom traumas create or worsen this fear? How do we help […]
Welcome to 2021, dear readers! We hope that this new start finds you managing the stresses of this unique school year and getting vaccinated very soon! At Moving Writers, we are continuing to brainstorm ways that we can support you + put tools in your hands that will make you feel more effective in your […]
I’ve been on a journey this fall to think about ways to move students toward increasing writing independence. We know mentor texts benefit writers of all ages. We know that isolating the moves writers make helps newer, less-experienced writers demystify the writing process and take their own work to new heights. But we also want […]
With a new year comes that familiar and distinct habit for many: profound reflection on the last 12 months. We swap out our calendars for new ones, we declare sentiments like new year, new me (partially in jest, partially in earnestness), and we commit ourselves to learning from our mistakes in pursuit of self-improvement. […]
I am proud that under normal circumstance I can choreograph a lot of “movement” into a single class period, but for this year, I am learning to embrace the fact that I cannot. I need smaller, simpler moves in a writing workshop that we can learn together and execute well. Otherwise, frustration will prevail.
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