Reflections on Teaching High School Readers and Writers
TEDx Battle
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For months now, our team has been planning a TEDx event at my school. This Friday is IT! While it's been A LOT of work, it's been so worth it. The twenty-one students who are speaking are amazing! Check out my blog post here.
My transition from being a middle school teacher to being a high school teacher was bumpy. I took a job in a brand new high school to teach a reading intervention class and 9th grade English at the very last minute (a week before school started) two years ago. I was thrilled and terrified at the same time - what did I know about teaching HIGH SCHOOL kids? Would I be too babyish for this job? So I marched in ready to be a REAL high school teacher. I would follow my colleagues and learn the ropes. Armed with Lord of the Flies , I began my first literature unit. It was a dismal, flat-out, fall-on-your-face failure. Most kids did not read the book. Most could not read the book. And most were not thinking at all. They were waiting for me to tell them, lead them, to "discuss" the book. Year one was SO educating and enlightening. And oh so wrong. My students did not read until we got independent reading going for real. The problem was that I had left most
It's December and that means the end of the semester is rushing at us, faster than Joe Rantz's boat in the 1936 Olympics in Berlin (sorry, just reading The Boys in the Boat ...fabulous, by the way). Despite the fact that I allow retakes on every assignment all semester, somehow the realization that it's December wakes up many of my students, and now the work pours in. There are also final projects, conferences, revisions, book groups, portfolios, grading (and more grading), study sessions, finals ... and stress. DID I MENTION STRESS?! Students are stressed. Teachers are stressed. And parents are definitely stressed. This is the time of the year when I wonder why I didn't take a sabbatical this year. I could be in the English country side, curled up next to 17th century stone fireplace that's hung with fresh pine boughs and ribbon, sipping a steaming mug of coffee, the snow softly falling outside the window, all while writing that book I've talked about for
Sometimes you just have to know you are part of a tribe, a tribe who cares and supports your vision. This weekend I'm at NCTE in Atlanta. And I am with my tribe. I am surrounded by people who love books, who love writing, who care passionately about kids and authentic learning. I have run into authors - I met and HUGGED Jason Reynolds...JASON REYNOLDS!! I have gone to sessions and listened to Penny Kittle, Kelly Gallagher, Kylene Beers, Bob Probst, Linda Rief. I sat in the main hallway charging my iPad and watched Ralph Fletcher and Tanny McGregor walk by. And that, friends, is just Day #1. I have two more to go. (Insert squeal here!) I so needed this infusion of energy, this swaddling in the comfort of my people. I needed to be part of a community where I feel taken care of, pumped up and nurtured, like I am in good, safe hands. I needed to be around people that made me feel like I'm on the right track, like they've got my back. And, like if I get lost in thi
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