Learning, Laughter, and Love in Middle School English

I can’t lie. It’s been a challenging year so far. Tech Decks are back with a vengeance. Kids are ripping soap dispensers off the bathroom walls (thanks, TikTok). There’s also a lovely new game called foot tag where the objective is to step on the other person’s shoes.URGH! Those are just some of the highlights of the year so far! Gotta love middle school! Despite a rough start, kids do seem to be settling down a bit, and I am actually starting to look forward to going to school each day again! One of my favorite teachers on social media is Laura Randazzo. Not only is she brilliant, she is adorable and hilarious. I have followed her for years, and over the summer I decided to adopt one of her practices which has worked beautifully--table groups! I decided to use dogs as my theme--I mean, who doesn’t love dogs? I decided on nine dog breeds, found a picture of each one, and laminator to work. Then I used packing tape to attach the pictures to each table. I keep students in the same...

The last few weeks can be challenging. Keeping students engaged and learning is my mission! When I stumbled upon a post about hexagonal thinking, I knew I had to try it with my students. I am SO glad I did. Although this activity can be done digitally or on paper, I insisted that my students in class do it old school. My goal was for my students to have thoughtful discussions about what we read this year. Here's how it works! First, I came up with a list of key characters and ideas from The Giver, Animal Farm, and The Children's Story. I found this awesome generator on line where I could just type in my words, and it put them in the hexagons for me. Then I printed out the pages (there were three) for each group. I did a copious amount of research before embarking on this activity, and I was shocked by the number of teachers who cut the hexagons out for their students. That would have taken me HOURS. I simply gave each group scissors, and they were done in five minute...

In case you don't know, I love teaching. However, when most people describe why they love it they often explain how much the love watching the "light bulb" go off for their students. That is not what I love about teaching (not that I don't enjoy watching students "get it"), No, for me there are far more wonderful aspects of this job . 1) Watching students learn to advocate for themselves and communicate. I have received very few emails from parents this year. Instead, students are emailing me themselves. They are asking questions about assignments, requesting retakes, and requesting my feedback. They are the ones telling me they will be missing class for two days or that their internet will be down on Friday. This thrills me because I know how hard it is for them, but I know this is one of the most important skills they will learn.This is why my first lesson of the year was email etiquette. By the way, my students are TWELVE! They are amazing! ...