You’re a 6’6”, 240-pound high school senior – all muscle. You’re a favorite on the football team, you just won an athletic scholarship to Boston College, and your coach says you’re built for a career in the NFL. There’s just one problem – you’re terrified of being hit. That was comedian Gary Gulman’s teenaged life […]
Note: This is an updated repost.
You’ve wrapped your last major unit and final exams are still a week or so away. You could spend five days on Review Jeopardy (um…no, thanks) or you could grab some of these tried-and-true resources that’ll keep kids focused until finals. Continue reading
A few years back, I noticed something weird – kids sometimes, maybe even often, learned more when I did less. One unexpected side effect of our spring semester 20Time experience was that I saw kids taking more ownership of information when they were the ones doing the research. This started me thinking about, and changing, how I present all sorts of material. Continue reading
Note: This is an updated repost featuring some of my favorite end-of-October lesson ideas.
In 7th grade, my friend Sarah plugged her older brother’s copy of A Nightmare on Elm Street into the VCR at a sleepover and I haven’t been okay since. Scary movies? Nope. No, thank you. I’m such a chicken, I shut my eyes during commercials for horror flicks. I mean, you heard the new Halloween movie opens this weekend, right? Count me o-u-t.
Books, though, are different. Somehow, the images in my mind aren’t as gory as those on the screen and good short stories don’t rely on cheap jump-scares; instead, there are heavy things to actually think about and I suppose that’s my favorite kind of terrifying. Continue reading
Note: This is an updated repost featuring some of my favorite end-of-the-year lesson ideas.
You’ve wrapped your last major unit and final exams are still a week away. You could spend five days playing Review Jeopardy (uh…no, thanks) or you could grab some of these tried-and-true resources that’ll keep kids focused until finals. Continue reading
We went to the corn maze this weekend and an actor (I hope) chased my family with a chainsaw. On Saturday, I was shopping at the farmers’ market when a college kid in zombie makeup jump-scared the crap out of me. And hubs and I just decided on our front porch Halloween night decor – a single red balloon should get the job done.
In the spirit of this pre-Halloween scarefest, here are my 10 favorite lessons to bring The Creepy into our classrooms: Continue reading
Last week, I shared five easy ways to help you celebrate National Poetry Month in your classroom. Today, I’m adding a sixth solid (and free!) resource. Continue reading
