Very Interesting Article Alert! A Warning from College Profs from a High School Teacher

I found this article by The Washington Post's Valerie Strauss while perusing the web and thought it was very interesting. I like that Kenneth Bernstein, a retired teacher and the author of the original text, is straight-forward and brutally honest, something that those of us currently in the trenches of today's educational landscape are sometimes hesitant to be.

I'd love to hear some feedback about it from fellow educators...

Click HERE to read the full article and please do come back to comment.

From the New York Times: Teaching Macbeth in Middle School

My literary agent recent sent me the link to this article. Knowing that I'm a middle school teacher in an urban school district, she thought I might find the article interesting - and I did. Knowing that you guys are educators, as well, I, in turn, thought you mind find it interesting, too. At least I hope you do. Clink on the picture to go to the article, which was featured in the New York Times, and check it out. Of course, comments are always welcome.

Be(ing) a Pro-Change Teacher

Many teachers (especially experienced ones) suffer from what I call “change phobia.” And if not carefully monitored, even new teachers can be inflicted with this the career-ending disease. What is “change phobia” you ask? It’s exactly what you may think it is; it’s an unhealthy fear of change.

As teachers, we can’t afford to be “change phobics”; the nature of our job dictates that we must remain open to change (sometimes at a moment’s notice). But what if you’re not used to it or don’t know where to start? Well, I’m glad you asked, because here’s something I want you to try.

I want to you to do an exercise with your class I call “Teacher for a Day.”The effectiveness of this exercise depends on the maturity level of your class (and your receptiveness). I would think 4th grade and above would work fine, but I’ll let you make the call.

Have your students take out a blank sheet a paper, and then I want you to write this question on the board:

“If I was teacher for a day…this is what I would do to make our class more fun and educational?”

Have each student write down at least one to three ideas on their sheet of paper and turn it in with their names on it. It doesn’t have to be written in narrative form; it could be written as a list of items, as long as it’s legible. This shouldn’t take more than 10 minutes.

After they turn in their papers, take them home with you, and see what ideas make the most sense and are the most realistic to implement. Then simply determine how you can (and will) incorporate those ideas (i.e., changes) into your lesson plan.

I must warn you to prepare yourself to be shocked by the creative (even weird) ideas you’re going to receive from your students. Also, as an added (and optional) bonus, announce which students came up with the best and most creative ideas, and give them some special gift, treat, or prize.

Trust me, after you implement a few of these ideas, I guarantee you’ll reduce the chances of ever becoming (or return to being) a “change phobic.”

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Joe Martin is an award-winning national speaker, author, professor, and educational consultant. His mission is to help students, teachers, and administrators learn, lead, and live with purpose and passion. To find out more visit his official web site. 

** Middle School Marm Side Note: I'm going to try this! Will you or have you? If so, please share! **

"For Teachers, Middle School is a Test of Wills!" says the New York Times

Even though its around four years old, this article by the New York Times is sooo on point, especially for us middle school teachers who are in the trenches in urban school districts. Click on the picture or HERE to visit the NYT website and check it out! Then come back and weigh in. Agree or disagree?

Bringing the [Bronx] Masquerade to St. Louis!

My seventh-grade students are about halfway through reading Nikki Grimes's Bronx Masquerade and they're really enjoying the story line and the characters, especially "Tyrone", who emerges as the main character early on in the book.

For those of you who aren't familiar with Bronx Masquerade,  the story is reminiscent of the movie Freedom Writers, in that it features a class of high school English students who are essentially strangers and who ultimately become more tolerant of each other's differences through writing. Primary differences between the Freedom Writers and the students in Mr. Ward's English class in Bronx Masquerade are that Bronx Masquerade is nowhere near as gritty as Freedom Writers and there are no worries about censoring parts of the text because it's completely family-friendly and violence-free. Also, the students in Mr. Ward's class express themselves and their individual growth via various types of poetry. And I would be remiss in my comparison if I didn't mention that Bronx Masquerade was published well before the Freedom Writers Diary was.

I like to introduce this book to my students because, not only are they able to relate to many, if not all of the characters' conflicts, but its also an excellent text (I think) to read in conjunction with a unit on poetry exploration. While we read, we write poetry and even hold Open Mic Fridays in class. My students look forward to this just as much as they look forward to Tyrone constantly putting in his two cents throughout the book. We listen to the audio book during some parts and whoever the narrator is for Tyrone is hilarious!

But...I'm digressing again, LOL!

Because Bronx Masquerade is a story about the "masks" that people wear, the roles we play in life, and the conflict that these concepts can often have with our true selves, I always have my students explore these concepts for themselves by revealing a little bit about the masks they wear and their true inner-selves. The corresponding activity is two-fold and it plays out as follows...

About halfway through the book, we pause reading to really hash out the characteristics and conflicts that each of the characters we've met so far are experiencing. Now, this isn't an out-of-the-blue discussion, because we've been tracking this the entire time we've been reading and discussing it as a class. But at this point I take my students a little deeper into it by circling the discussion around to them and me and the masks we wear everyday. When I'm certain that we're all on the same page, I introduce the "Mask" Project.

For part one - the Outside Mask - my students illustrate a "mask" that represents who they are on the outside - the "me" that everyone sees and knows; the expectations or stereotypes that are placed on us by others; the information about us that we're comfortable sharing with others and/or that others can easily see or find out about us.This usually includes hobbies, interests, roles we play, favorite things/foods, etc.

For part two - the Inside Mask - I ask my students to compose several different types of poems that reflect who they are on the "inside" and/or who they really want to be. Their poems should expose, in some way, things about themselves that they keep hidden, for whatever reason, from others. This is also a great way for me to assess what they've learned during our poetry exploration, because I typically don't introduce this part of the project until right after we've finished reading Bronx Masquerade and have also concluded our poetry unit.

As I mentioned earlier, we're still reading Bronx Masquerade, so we haven't quite gotten to part two - the Inside Mask - but I did snap a few pics of the Outside Masks that my students created - today, as a matter of fact.

Take a look...

This student says that everyone knows she loves her cell phone; enjoys warm weather; considers herself a "star"; likes money, but is a little cheap; likes to laugh; loves springtime; and has a big heart. I like that she added the fast-moving clock because she's "slow to get moving" and the two-tone face because she's "moody."

This student is a proud member of our school's Science & Robotics Club; a talented basketball player; and, I know for myself, a rather entertaining person (she calls herself "goofy"). She likes music and doesn't watch much T.V., which she says everyone knows about her. I would've liked a few more details about her other likes and dislikes, but she swears that there "isn't much else" to her. Which means...that I'm really looking forward to seeing what she does with part two.

Feel free to leave comments and/or feedback. I'm always open to enhancing this project so that my students get even more out of it. And, by chance, if you happen to do a project like this with your class, please come back and share!

Coming soon to a blog near you - part two of the "Mask" Project! Stay tuned!

Freebie! Book Review "Stickies" Template

To celebrate my joining the Teachers Notebook family, I've listed my product - Book Review "Stickies" - for free!

When my students hear the words book review their eyes roll to the ceiling and the classroom is filled with "oh my gods" in all different timbres. It's really quite comical, the sounds they make. But I digress...

I came up with this quick and easy way to find out what my students think of our reading selections without having to torture them with writing full-out book reports about each and every one of them. Sometimes I want to focus on other instructional concepts and not so much on book reviews, so we do this instead.

These "stickies" are also great for creating book posters that tell everyone who visits your classroom what you're reading and your thoughts on it. A collection of them also makes a great bulletin board design or enhancement. All you need to do is print out the template (colored paper looks snazzy!) cut the "stickies" apart, and pin, tape, or staple them wherever you like! Simple, right? Sometimes the best stuff is!

So go ahead, click the image below to mosey on over to Teachers Notebook, sign up for a free account to access all the great tools and resources on the site, and then visit my store to download your free Book Review "Stickies" template. When you land in the Middle School Marm's Shop, you're in the right place!

Be sure to share your students' thoughts on using the Book Review Stickies and maybe even send me a pic to post, showing how you've used them in your classroom!

Informally Assessing with "Literature Portraits"

My seventh grade students recently finished reading a selection of short stories from Sharon G. Flake's book, Who Am I Without Him?. I always begin the school year for my seventh-graders with a review of story elements and I use Flake's book of short stories to do it with. For one, I teach in an urban school district and I encounter a great many students who profess - loudly and passionately - that they don't like and even hate to read. And, for two, I think it would be a loooong semester of dragging students, kicking and screaming, in between the covers with me if I didn't.

The thing I like most about Flake's Who Am I Without Him? is that the stories are short enough that I can secretly ease my students into reading without them really realizing (at first) what I'm up to. Soon enough, we delve into full length novels and hover there for the duration of the semester, but starting out with short stories seems to lessen the shock a little. Another thing I like is that the stories feature urban settings, characters, and situations, which my students really love. The characters, situations, and settings very closely mirror their own lives or the lives of people they know, so once we get into the first story, getting them to come along for the rest of the ride is easy schmeezy. They come into class wanting to read and protesting when I tell them that we're doing something a little different that day. We don't read all twelve stories from the book, only about six or seven of them, so a couple of them actually go the library and check out the book so they can read the ones we didn't read in class on their own time. Too, some ask if the author has other books out and want to know the titles of them. How cool is that?

While I do use literature circles with some of the stories, graphic organizers with others, and a whole host of other strategies to increase text-to-self and text-to-world connections while we're reading, I couldn't possibly conclude our short story unit without introducing the concept of Literature Portraits to my students. Not only do they really enjoy creating them, but it's also a quick and simple way for me to informally assess whether or not they've grasped a few of the story elements that I've taught or reviewed.

I ran across the idea of Literature Portraits some time ago, online of course, and immediately began using it in my classroom. There are four key elements to the type of Literature Portraits that I currently use (drum roll, please) and here they are:

• Border of Significance: Students must create a border around the sheet of paper that they are crafting the portrait on, similar to a picture frame, and the design of the border must have some significance to the story. The border can consist of illustrations, symbols, words, etc.
• What is the Theme? Students must identify the central theme of the story and write it someplace inside the frame, in the "picture" space. It should take up about a fourth of the picture space.
• Support the Theme: Students should select a text excerpt from the story that supports, backs up, or proves their thematic statement. This, too, should be written someplace inside the frame, in the "picture" space, and should be copied exactly as its written in the text and placed inside of quotation marks, if you like. Again, about a fourth of the picture space.
• The Focus of the Portrait: This should be an illustration that occupies the lion's share of the portrait space and conveys to viewers the main idea of the story. Alternatively, I sometimes have students focus on a particular character in the story for the portrait space, depending on the story.

Of course, anytime that I pull out the crayons, markers, and colored pencils and announce that we'll be creating works of art, my students are game. Who doesn't like to color? I want them to have fun in my class, so I pull out crayons, markers, and colored pencils (old magazines, newspapers, scissors, and glue sticks, too!) quite often.

I wonder if they know that they're actually completing a sort of quiz while they're indulging their creative sides?

Check out a few of my seventh-grade students' Literature Portraits below.

Freebie! Three Middle School Creative Writing Prompts

Getting them is easy! Just visit my TeachersPayTeachers Store by clicking on the TPT icon below, sign up to access all the wonderful teaching resources and tools on the site (registration is free, simple, and easy), and download the creative writing prompts freebie from the Middle School Marm's store (that's me).

Each creative writing prompt features a different theme for students to reflect on and respond to. There's an "If I Were the Teacher" prompt, a "Take Your Own Advice" prompt, and a "Teenage Movie Star" prompt included.

Please be sure to come back and let me know what your students thought of the prompts. Happy writing!