Remix Poetry: Christmas To Thanksgiving Let’s remix a famous Christmas poem, give it a Thanksgiving theme, and teach our students advanced poetry concepts at the same time
Going Beyond “Challenge Words” In Spelling Many students blow past grade-level spelling and vocabulary at a young age. Unfortunately, a common technique to "challenge" them is to find harder and more obscure words for their spelling list. Instead, let's take advantage of the built-in complexity of common words with multiple-meanings.
Going Beyond “Identify a Story’s Problem” My students were stuck telling me a story's problem and solution. Let's get thinking!
Books with 700, 800, 900, & 1000 Lexile, Recommended By Teachers A reader was looking for examples of high-quality books for gifted/talented 4th and 5th graders, but she was constrained to a lexile range of 900-1000. Here are the recs I received...
Studying Ambiguous Sentences This type of sentence has great possibilities for classroom application because of its two different interpretations. It's a perfect tool to: demonstrate careful reading, showcase the need for editing while writing, and encourage creativity and divergent thinking.
How *Not* To Ask Questions About A Novel These "discussion questions" highlight so many of the problems we've been looking at.
Remix the Song “Help!” Students took the classic song, Help!, and rewrote it to be about their collective summers.
Don’t Just Paraphrase A Poem! What if, instead, we re-wrote the poem in the style of a different poet?
