I’m going to walk you through what happens in a testing room to help demystify your child’s test taking experience.  

First off, I’m told to take down anything from my walls that might help kids out.  That means they are now emerged in a neutral testing environment.  No Word Walls, no prompts, no student work.  The room is either stripped to the bare walls or paper is stapled up over everything.  This is so every school and every class has the same disadvantages.  It’s also very depressing.

OK, so the day of the test, I walk down to the farthest place on the other side of the world and pick up a box that has all my testing materials in it, signing away my firstborn should I lose a pencil.  (...)
Read the rest of Dear Parents: What happens in the testing room? (1,010 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 9 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: ELA, funding, middle school, testing

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I’m the new English Department Chair for my middle school, and I’ve been set to lead a group of teachers who are very gifted, very diverse in their teaching styles, and very outspoken. (...)
Read the rest of Advice for a Future Department Head (992 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 7 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: budget, Curriculum, department head, ELA, funding, middle school, Title I

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I think the public believes that education should also be like that.  Every person in the classroom should be able to order his or her own specialized education.  And it should come delivered with a smile and the certainty that your journey is more important than anyone else’s. (...)
Read the rest of Standards Conversation #1: Should Education Take a Tip from Starbucks? (497 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Curriculum, differentiation, ELA, middle school, national standards, standards

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Pride and Prejudice and Zombies combines two very different genres from the farthest poles of the bookshelf.  It smooshes together Empire waists with half-eaten brains.  And, gosh darn it.  It works.(...)
Read the rest of Book Review: Pride and Prejudice and Zombies (576 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: book review, Curriculum, ELA, genre, k12, middle school, teaching, tween, Writers Project, writing project

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© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 6 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: collaboration, curriculum design, curriculum development, differentiation, ELA, k12, Language Arts, middle school, tween

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Every year my nemesis rears its ugly head: the epic paragraph.  Epic paragraphs are those essays comprised entirely of one mega-paragraph with no indentations to indicate transition from thought thought.

I bet you thought your kids were the only ones doing it, eh?  But the fact is that tons of students are recruited into its child army.  It’s like the swine flu of writing: tons of kids catch it, and authorities freak out when they see it.  And it’s our job as educators to battle this plague on our educational houses.

At the beginning of every year, there is a percentage of kids who have had severe cases of knowledge leakage, and we rail at their prior teachers as if they hadn’t noticed the problem, or had chosen not to tackle it.  (Don’t pretend you don’t blame the last teacher sometimes.  It’s our default reaction when we see silly errors. But fight this urge, because we know this isn’t true).

What is true is that the students sometimes loose the lessons.  Sometimes this happens over the summer, sometimes over a mere weekend.  And this phenomenon results in the loss of every rule of writing, even something we consider as simple as paragraphing.  Which begs the question: maybe paragraphing isn’t so simple.(...)
Read the rest of How to Battle Epic Paragraphing (882 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: 100% accountability, 6 traits, ELA, grammar, Think Aloud, TLN, UCI, Writers Project

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I was reading through my Digg headlines this weekend, and I happened on this article of the top 10 most extraordinary Twitter updates.  I also did some digging (no pun intended) and found articles that range in claiming that there are anywhere from 4 million to over 14 million current Twitter users.  If true, then Twitter has a greater population that Greece.  Or, if you would rather think in cities, twice as large as London.

So today, my class is going to start Twittering.  I’ve been thinking about using Twitter as a tool for Thinking Aloud for some time now.  I always pictured it on the LCD projector as I taught, entering thoughts as I simultaneously taught, so as to model my own reasoning and processes for my classes.  

I also think it will be a powerful 21st Century (hate that term) tool for them to use to give me a snapshot of what they are thinking.  So I’ve been tackling the issue of how to Twitter online and offline with students.

Here’s what I’m just now deciding on.  You know how you sometimes get your best ideas in the shower or in the rear-view mirror?  Well, I got mine brushing my teeth.  Just a little share for all you readers out there.

Here’s how I’m setting up the unit and how I’m helping to control their safety while creating a transparent and open-door environment in my classroom.(...)
Read the rest of Twitter as Think Aloud (368 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 4 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Curriculum, curriculum design, Ed Tech, education, ELA, Think Aloud, tween, twitter, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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OK, don’t tell my husband, but I have a fictional crush.  That is, I have a crush based on a fictitious character.  I think I’ve always had one, but the object of my literary love has always changed with my own chapter in life. (...)
Read the rest of Fictional Crushes (543 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: achievement gap, blog, book review, classroom library, ELA, k-12, k12, middle school, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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It’s Step 1 of my Top Secret New Teacher Handbook.  Hope it creates some shortcuts, a machete even, through the education jungle.

-Tweenteacher

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | No comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: achievement gap, blog, classroom library, classroom management, collaboration, common language, critical thinking, Curriculum, curriculum design, curriculum development, differentiation, Ed Tech, education, ELA, employment, free, fundraising, internet literacy, jobs, k-12, k12, Language Arts, learning, life long learners, merit pay, metacognition, middle school, NCLB, new teachers, peer teaching, performance pay, professional development, technology, test prep, Think Aloud, Title I, TLN, top 10, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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There’s been so much talk lately of deep-needed reforms for education, but we neglect just how powerful a simple makeover can be.  I’m lucky to currently work at a school that has a patch of green, which fixes the broken windows and washes off the graffiti when it happens.  But I’ve worked at the schools that smell of urine, at the sites that lay forgotten by funding, yet are still expected to succeed. 

According to What Not to Wear, a makeover does wonders for your confidence, your pride.  According to Extreme Makeover, it can renew your hope in life.(...)
Read the rest of Extreme Makeover: Classroom Edition (248 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | One comment | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: Ed Tech, ELA, ELD, extreme makeover, fundraising, k-12, k12, middle school, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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I believe a classroom library is the heartbeat of a teacher’s environment.  It is the window into their own personality, and it reflects the importance of literacy in the classroom.  I believe every teacher, no matter the subject taught, should have one.

 Access to books should be thought about with the same differentiated approach as any other lesson, assessment, or activity.  It seems to me that there are four kinds of library-learners:

1. THE BRASH BIBLIOPHILE:  These are students who are well versed in the language of book choice and seek out what they want, avidly asking questions or using learned or inherent strategies to find the book that will make them sigh into their bed with a flashlight in hand.  They will find their way to their local bookstore by any means necessary, and look through the stacks until their parents pull them away.  

(...)
Read the rest of The Importance of The Classroom Library (923 words)

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 5 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: assessments, blog, book review, classroom library, classroom management, education, ELA, Golden Lines, How To, k-12, k12, Language Arts, learning, middle school, new teachers, school funding, teaching, textbooks, Title I, TLN, tween, UCI, Writers Project, writing

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-Tweenteacher

© heather for tweenteacher.com, 2009. | Permalink | 2 comments | Add to del.icio.us
Post tags: assessments, data, education policy, ELA, test prep, Title I, tween, UCI, Writers Project

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