March 25, 2025 The college entrance essay: Should we teach it or shouldn’t we? This year, the guidance department of our high school, New Directions Secondary School in the Bronx, NY, asked me if I could teach a unit on the college entrance essay in our Juniors English class. In my career, the college entrance […]
Oct 8 2024 Ashley Anderson Source Shock-tober is just as much a thing for teachers as it is for students. I don’t know where y’alls students are, but mine are struggling. Struggling not only to make it to school on time but also to even write a sentence…correctly. Because the “struggle is real”, I knew […]
Use nature as your guide for writing. Come join Abigail in her beat this month which offers ways to get involved in the beloved Write Out event going on– and ideas to spark your students writing all year long.
This is why I love the leap into non-literal sense making that is Nancy WIlliard’s poem “Questions My Son Asked Me, Answers I Never Gave Him.” Each of the questions are lovely and from a child’s mind of wonder. But, the answers exceed that sense of childhood awe into a kind of riddle-world where wisdom […]
I heard Dance Monkey for the first time after watching the NYT analysis. My response was limited to “catchy and cool”. All my mentor texts are new to my ELLs and they read them for the first time when I bring them to class. Their response is similarly limited to “nice and good”.
There are so many wonderful eclipse resources out there but this month I wanted to put a resource in your hands of some pretty beautiful writing that you can invite in your own classroom. Being that it is April, what a time to celebrate our beautiful nature with poetry. And while nature is doing […]
This post is all out using students photography to generate writing juices in the classroom
When students are asked to introduce themselves in writing, it can be difficult figuring out the best way to stage this encounter between self and stranger, writer and audience. For my seniors who are drafting college application essays, the first attempt is often characterized by tentatively offered assertions about their motives for applying, or the […]
How do we get students to buy into writing? How do we begin to hear their stories. Oral storytelling is a way to engage your writers in a low stakes way and create a basis for a really strong writing community.
In this summer’s beat Abigail takes you through two strategies that you can discover in Liz Prather’s new book “The Confidence to Write”… two strategies to start the school year off right and a great starting place for teacher growth this summer.
moving writers 