Freaking out over how in the world can you actually use centers and stations in your classroom without being completely overwhelmed? Concerned that you don’t have enough time, don’t know how to enforce student accountability, don’t know what the stations should look like, or panicking that you simply can’t keep up? These are absolutely valid

I’ll admit, when I first began using stations the main reason was so I didn’t have to make copies for 200 students. The copy machines at my school were frequently broken, out of toner, and often inaccessible due to high need from other teachers and the lack of regular and predictable planning periods. If I wanted to make copies, I either had to get to school around seven or stay well after the final bell rang. Even then I might not be able to print what I needed for my students because the paper might be locked away to save the district some money. Stations were a perfect solution to my copy machine dilemmas. However, once I began using stations I found many more reasons to keep using them in my seventh grade science classes. Perhaps most importantly, students love stations and are motivated simply because they can be out of their seats and be more in charge of their learning (more on that later). Stations are super easy to differentiate and can be used to meet the needs of all of your students. Also, they are easy to use and quick to set up. If you’ve never heard of stations, ever considered using stations, or if you currently use stations and they aren’t quite as effective as you’d like, keep reading. Students practice identifying variables and writing hypotheses with these Scientific Method Stations. What are stations? Stations are a way for students to practice lesson content while moving around the classroom instead of being seated at desks. (That might sound scary when considering certain classes—believe me, I’ve been there. However, I’ve used stations with even my most rambunctious, out of control classes of 35+ seventh grade students. It can be done successfully.) Stations can be questions or short tasks posted on the perimeter of the room. In my science classes I typically used questions that could be answered with students’ notes, textbooks, knowledge, or skills. I included a variety of question levels—some easy and straightforward and others rigorous and challenging. I have also set up measurement stations with tasks to complete such as finding the volume of an object using the water displacement method or predicting the mass of an object and then using a balance to see how close their predictions were. When I noticed students had a hard time finding information in textbooks, I had stations where students had to find a specific piece of information using glossaries, tables of contents, or indexes. I’ve even cut up a worksheet and posted it around the room as stations. Answering the questions on a worksheet can be tedious, but when that same worksheet is in station form it becomes more engaging and meaningful. When students are up and around the room doing stations they’ll need to record their answers. This can be done on notebook paper that they hand in when they’re finished or in their interactive notebooks. How do I set up stations in my classroom? Start off by writing the questions or tasks you want your students to answer. Use fairly large font so they are easy to read from a distance of several feet. Then print them out and cut them up. If you want, you can laminate them so they are in good condition by the time the last class of students goes through them. I personally did not laminate them, so I always had some rips or pencil marks on the papers by the end of the day. Instead of laminating I just used extra tape to prevent the majority of damage. Once you have your stations printed, cut out, and maybe laminated you can tape them around the room on walls, windows, or tables. Finding space in my classroom was always easy because my room was ginormous. I also had countertops bordering the walls of three-quarters of my classroom. The space you leave between stations obviously depends on how many stations you have, but whenever possible try to leave at least a yard between them. This helps the students stay focused on their task instead of socializing with nearby groups. It also helps the teacher spot misbehavior earlier and sprout fewer gray hairs. When should I use stations? There were two purposes for using stations in my classroom: practice or review. If I was using the stations as a way to reinforce the material we learned, I scheduled them after taking notes and doing a whole class practice. Basically, I wanted my students to have the fundamentals down and the ability to be decently independent before beginning stations. If students needed to review material, I typically used stations as a review activity the day or two before a test. I’ve also had luck using stations before big breaks like Thanksgiving break, winter break, spring break, or summer vacation. Whenever students are especially squirrelly, stations are usually a good choice because students can move around the room and still engage in the material they need to learn and understand instead of wasting learning time. (Stations have kept me sane on more than one occasion before a break.) What behavioral expectations should be established before beginning stations? Before beginning stations, you MUST go over your behavior expectations. Otherwise, the students have a 95% chance of turning feral within three minutes. Here are the station expectations I went over every time we did stations. Students will have no more than three students to a station at any time. If there is already a group at that station, then they must go to another station. Students do not have to go in order. They may skip around to any station as long as they write their answers in the correct location on their own papers. As long as students are on task and working, students may pick the student(s) they want to work with. Students may also work individually. Students will receive only one warning for off task behavior. If they are off task a second time, they will have to complete the assignment individually in their seat using a worksheet form of the stations. Students may only visit the answer sheet twice during the stations. When students finish the stations they need to check all of their answers and return to their seats. How do I monitor behavior during stations, and what do I do about misbehavior? If you aren’t directly supporting a group of students, walk around the room and monitor behavior. Keep an eye and ear out for horseplay. Whenever students misbehave or don’t follow a station expectation give them a warning. If students have a second problem, direct the offending students back to their seats and give them a worksheet form of the stations to complete individually. Remind students they cannot get out of their seats for the remaining station time, otherwise you might find them messing with their friends and wandering around the room “working on the stations.” Depending on whether your stations consist of questions or tasks, your students might not be able to do every station on their worksheet. In that case instruct them to skip the station or complete it individually later on. Biggest advice here: don’t let small misbehaviors get out of hand. Immediately give the warning/consequence and briefly explain to the student what they did wrong and why it’s a problem. Here is an example of how that might sound: “Billybobjoe, you were visiting another group again. When you do this it is distracting to other students and you can’t learn. Because you didn’t follow the station expectations, now you will finish the stations at your desk by yourself on this worksheet.” How can I use stations to meet the needs of all of my students? Stations are excellent for differentiation purposes. Students can choose what works for them. For example, I let my students determine if they wanted to work independently, with a partner, or in a group of three. They also determined the order in which they completed the stations. They could skip around or go in numerical order while working at their own pace. Posting an answer sheet gave my students support by allowing them to check their work or get help with a problem they were struggling with. While my students were working, I was free to meet with a small group of students who needed extra support. Sometimes I determined ahead of time who should be in that day's support group and other times I left it up to the students to come to me for assistance. Consider posting answer sheets (like I did with the Changes in States of Matter Stations) so students can check their work and get assistance if needed. Another way to differentiate is by arranging the stations from easiest to hardest. For the most part, students are pretty good at determining their levels of understanding. Whenever I arranged the stations this way, I explained it to my students and let them choose where they needed to be. Providing the right context and reasoning is important for this. Don’t just say: left is easy, center is medium, and right is hard. Then you’d have a flock of students on the left with no one really benefiting. Explain that the stations on the left side are for students who feel they are having difficulty with the content and need to build up their knowledge and skills first. The stations in the center are a medium level of difficulty for students who feel they have a fairly good understanding of the content and are ready for reinforcement practice. The stations on the right side of the room are for students who feel they understand the material very well and need a challenge. When I explained it this way, my students didn’t feel bad if they were on the left side. As for the right side, many were eager for a challenge and would start by looking at the questions to see if they were ready or needed to go more towards the center. When arranging by level of difficulty, give your students a number of stations to complete. If there are 30 stations, maybe have them choose any 10. Having students complete all of the stations can defeat the purpose of arranging them this way. What do I do when students finish the stations at different times? There are several solutions to this. You can set a timer and have students complete as many stations as they can in 20 minutes. If there are a small number of stations or if the questions/tasks are relatively quick to get through, you can start a five-minute timer after the first five students finish; then announce that everyone needs to be done in less than five minutes. You can have students begin their homework or an individual class assignment at their seats. They can read a book. I’ve tried all of these methods in my class and switched it up depending on the student or lesson needs. What stations do you use in your own classroom? I'm so glad you asked. :) In my Teachers Pay Teachers store you can find many of the stations I have used in my seventh grade science classroom. Currently, these are the stations in my store: Scientific Method Stations: These can be used in a variety of ways. Most often my students used these stations to identify independent and dependent variables and write hypotheses. Changes in States of Matter Stations: These stations give students practice with the key points of melting, freezing, vaporization, condensation, and sublimation. Genetics and Heredity Stations: These stations give students practice with a variety of genetics topics. They are great to see what students know or to review key concepts. Human Body Organ System Stations: Students practice the important characteristics of the skeletal system, circulatory system, respiratory system, muscular system, digestive system, and nervous system. Properties of Matter/Physical Science Review Stations: I use these stations to review physical science concepts before the unit test. They go over atoms, states of matter, changes in states, physical and chemical changes, law of conservation of mass/matter, homogeneous and heterogeneous mixtures, elements, and compounds. Measurement in Science Stations: These stations are all about the tools and units used to measure metric length, volume, mass, and density. Density Stations: My students always need extra practice with density before things really sink in. These stations help them understand. Volume Stations: These stations focus on finding the volume of solids and liquids and measuring correctly. Mass and Weight Stations: Students get practice with the difference between mass and weight with these stations. If you haven’t already, try using stations in your classroom. With the correct implementation, they can really benefit your students. Plus, you don’t have to make a bazillion copies ;) Are you a middle school science teacher? You might be interested in my newsletter. Sign up for my newsletter here. Just for signing up you'll receive an exclusive freebie that you can't get anywhere else.

A blog about teaching middle school ELA and math.

You don't have to spend hours finding theme activities for middle school. Check out my ideas and resources for teaching theme!

Use Mentor Sentences in your ELA middle school classroom to improve student writing! Find practical ideas to teach writing skills.

I recently assigned a one pager final project to my sophomores for their culminating Night project. I wanted to combine as many rigorous ELA content ideas as possible, while also designing a fun project for students that provided them with a bit of choice. This Night one pager project was the perfect way to finish the memoir!

Teaching English with songs is a great way to boost student engagement. Check out these 17 ideas for activities using music and songs!

My favorite school days are the ones that find us in a bit of a routine, when my middle school students are to the point where they are energized and enthusiastic while knowing procedures and classroom expectations. One project that has exemplified this glorious balance has been our reader's notebooks.

Looking for games to play with a classroom? This list of English games in the classroom is exactly what you need to engage students!

Hey guys! It's Erin from I'm Lovin' Lit and I'm so happy to be a part of this wonderful new blog! Today I'm going to talk about my feelings about the first day of middle school. Whether you're a new teacher, new to middle school, or just pressing the reset button for the year, I hope you find some new and different things to think about because, well, I'm somewhat opinionated! :) What to Do (and What Not to Do) on the First Day of Middle School Let's start with what NOT to do, shall we? Do NOT: 1. Spend the entire 50 minute period discussing your rules, expectations, and telling kids about what they'll be doing this year. *YAWN* 2. Do that "elementary thang" and have your class (community of learners) collaboratively come up with a list of rules and expectations and discuss the meaning and need for rules, blah blah blah. DON'T. You really don't need to do that. Third grade? SURE! Middle school? NOT. 3. Spend over half of your time doing some really complicated and/or awkward ICE BREAKER type activity where the students are forced to completely leave their comfort zone by speaking in front of the entire class or even making a fool of themselves in front of a hand full of not-familiar classmates. Seriously. Have you NOT been a middle schooler before?! 4. Ask students GENERICALLY to a) write a paragraph about or b) tell the class (EVEN WORSE) about "what they did" or "where they went" on summer vacation. RESIST THE TEMPTATION. DON'T DO IT. Now that you're not doing those things above (you're not still thinking about it, are you?) here are *MY* suggestions on what to do the first day of school. These numbers will coordinate with and complement the numbers above. DO: 1. Spend a reasonable portion (definitely half) of the class time introducing yourself (briefly, you can tell more later) and laying out the expectations that are most important to you. Keep it simple for the first day. The students need to know especially these things: a) How to enter and leave my room. (Wait at the door/line up in hall until invited in; leave only after *I* dismiss, not the bell.)b) What to do when you walk in the door every day. (bell ringer, DOL, sponge, daily, whatever you like to call it - you should have SOMETHING but keep it SIMPLE and SHORT)c) What supplies you'll need to buy (if a list was not provided) or which supplies should be labeled for your class and any instructions on using supplies or storing any of them in locker for later use.As far as I am concerned, most of the other stuff can wait. These kids are being bombarded today by 7 or 8 different teachers. Take it easy. Give them the most important information ONLY. 2.TELL THEM your expectations. They don't need to formulate them with you. These kids know why there are rules, and they don't need to come up with 8 different "community" rules for each class. Can that stuff and just tell the kids what you want/expect from them. Consequences/rewards/etc. You know, just the most important stuff for now. 3. Do something ACADEMIC. Teach a little bitty mini lesson. Give students a PREVIEW of how you teach. Isn't that better than just telling them about it? Just a little tiny lesson. Ten minute quickie. This is important because it SETS THE TONE for the rest of the year. You know I'm all about hidden messages, right? Doing something academic on that first day carries the message "We are here to learn about literature (insert your subject) and we are not wasting any time getting there!" And save those group activities for another day. These middle schoolers are overly-concerned about whether or not their hair is still "just right" or how their shirt looks from the back or WHATEVER. Give them a break and save the "in front of the class" stuff for later. Those ice breakers are totally lame. Yes, even that one you found on Pinterest. If you can SOMEHOW mesh that icebreaker with something academic, I *might* approve. But be careful. Pointless ice breakers are.. well.. pointless. 4. OK - Let's review. Now that you've outlined your most important procedures and expectations and done something ACADEMIC, you really, really want to do something summer related? OK. Fine. You can - just be careful how you word this. Some of your students toured Europe over the summer. Some of your students spent the entire summer walking two miles a day in the heat to participate in the free lunch summer program. Some of your students didn't leave the neighborhood. Some of your students went to Disney World AND Schlitterbahn. Get my drift? Let's not outline these differences on the first day. If you want to do something about SUMMER, word it in a better way. Here are some suggestions: Who did you enjoy spending time with the most over the summer? or What did you do on the FIRST day of summer (or the LAST day) - {more likely to NOT be one of the things mentioned above} or If you had one extra week of summer, what would be the perfect way to spend it? All of these are, of course, my own opinions, and we all know what opinions are like.. everyone has one, right? I honestly hope I've at least given you some things to consider before you start your year, whether it's your first or your tenth. Some of my opinions might not mesh with your style, and that's okay. Some of yours might not mesh with mine. Thanks for reading, and get to planning that PERFECT first day!

Have you read this book by Gail Boushey and Joan Moser?The Daily 5: Fostering Literacy in the Elementary Grades

The pencils are sharpened, your classroom is clean and the bell rings…gulp…here they come! My feelings on the first week of school are conflicted. On one hand, it’s one of the most important weeks. Explaining and practicing the class procedures and expectations sets the tone for the rest of the school year. Success is vital. On the other hand, I’m so excited to start teaching my historical content that waiting until all the expectations are explained requires a lot of patience! Every teacher has their own plan of action for that pivotal time. Here are 5 things I can’t live without during the first week of school: One: An Icebreaker. I aim to try and make kids feel comfortable in my classroom on day one. One of my favorite little activities is Fact or Fiction. Each student receives a small slip of paper and they’re instructed to write one fact and two fictions. Then each person (including myself!) introduces themselves and we all try to guess which statement is the fact! It’s a great way to quickly learn about each other. Two: Classroom Information and Expectations. This is every teacher’s staple, I know, but it had to go on the list because it’s a must-have! When you’re making your own, spell everything out – from the obvious grading procedures and late work policy to how to pass back papers and when to sharpen pencils and go to the bathroom. Trust me, leave no stone unturned. Your classroom will function much better if you set the tone from day one. (Oh, and don’t forget a seating chart!) Three: Fun and Games. On the second day of school, I love to start class with a little game. It’s a great way for the kids to start practicing our classroom procedures and expectations while getting familiar with their teacher and classmates. Here are some of my favorite games that I use during the first week of school: (P.S. Some of these activities can be found in my Back to School Activities resources! Click the grade level you’re teaching to check them out: Sixth, Seventh, Eighth) InstaFriend: This activity gets students moving around the room and interviewing fellow classmates! Their InstaFriend paper has a series of descriptions and characteristics. When they find a student who matches the description, they write their name in the box. Each name can only be used once! Right or Wrong: I love skits. LOVE THEM. I like to introduce students to the idea of skits during the first week by allowing them to create their own based on our class expectations. I first divide students into small groups of 2-3. Each group then randomly receives one of our class procedures or expectations. As a group, they have to work together to create two mini skits – one showing the RIGHT way to follow the expectation, the other showing the WRONG way. They get to be silly and I get to reinforce my class expectations. After each skit I happily point out all the positive behaviors as well as each time a class policy was violated. It’s a light-hearted way to grab their attention and create a positive atmosphere all while practicing the laws of the land. Classmate Bingo: I love to play this game at the end of the first week. I give each student a blank bingo board with a large selection of personal characteristics, hobbies, etc. at the bottom. The students choose 16 off the list and create their customized board. Then, I randomly select characteristics from the list. If a student has that characteristic on their board, they have to write down a student’s name that matches the characteristic – but no cheating! They have to use what they’ve learned about others during their first week of school to try and win the game. Four: A Pre Test. After a few days of class information and fun, it’s time to start getting down to business. Each year, I make a short pre-test on the information they’ll learn about that year. It gives me a chance to see what the kids already know and gives them a feel for what subject matter they’ll be learning about in the coming weeks. FYI: Your pre-test probably won’t take the whole class period. Make sure to have plans for other activities, too, on the day you give your pre-test! Five: A Writing Activity. True fact: when I tell kids they’re going to do a writing activity, they groan every time. It’s a signal that the “real work” is about to begin. Luckily, they’re always relieved when I assure them that this activity will require very little research because it’s about a subject they’re experts in – themselves! I have a few different activities to choose from each year. Here are some suggestions: Student Survey: What are your strengths? Weaknesses? What do you hope to learn in this class? These are just some of the questions I ask students in the survey. The more I know about my students, the better I can help them achieve success in my class. Write Away: A staple of many: write a letter to a future you! I ask students to write goals for the year, dreams they wish to see realized, and questions they want to ask their “End of the Year” self. I tuck these letters away and revisit them during the last week of school. I’m Ready: Like every middle school history class, we do a lot of writing and students always have to back up their reasons, statements, etc. with evidence to support their claim. In this writing activity, students have to identify which class rule or expectation they believe is most important and provide evidence to support their claim. This activity both reinforces my classroom policies and secretly gives me a preview of their writing proficiency. Have I left anything out? If you have any fun plans for the first week of school, share them in the comments. I’m always looking for new ideas for my classroom!

Context clues worksheets and activities don’t have to be boring! Your students will love working on this important skill with these fresh strategies.

With so many of my BIG KIDS struggling with fluency, I worked to make it a part of my daily work with students, a Tier 1 intervention that the majority of the class could benefit from. Reading fluency incorporates three main components: speed, accuracy, and prosody, which directly impact comprehension. While I have shared a great deal about incorporating 6-Minute Solutions, here are a few other ways I worked to make fluency fun for my 6th graders.

Teaching middle school is like no other teaching assignment - like no other task on Earth for that matter. As a teacher, you need to be just the right mix of cool and strict - but most important, calm. You need to have a good relationship with your students overall based on mutual respect. But that's much easier said than done. Here's the thing about middle schoolers in particular: They want to look good in front of their peers. What their peers think of them is of utmost importance to them (whether they are in touch with that reality or not). Therefore, they will "save face" if they think you, the teacher, are criticizing them or making them look bad in any way. (Meanwhile, you meant no harm; you were simply calling them out on a behavior they clearly exhibited). The thing is you can't call them out in front of their peers. I mean you can, but you shouldn't. Whenever possible, call out their less-than-stellar behavior one-on-one, without their peers hearing it. This could mean going to their desk and whispering, or waiting for a good time to call them to your desk ever so calmly. It's easier to call them out from wherever you are, but if you want your class under control and to maintain respect, somehow arrange a private convo instead. The Goal is this, which is my #1 Rule for Teaching Middle School: No Power Struggles Have you ever noticed how some kids act so differently when their peers aren't around? Let's say a kid in your class before lunch was really pushing your buttons and disrupting class, but then he forgets his lunch in your room. He comes back to get it. You two talk. He's really nice and respectful! You have a pleasant conversation. You're wondering if this is the same person or perhaps a twin brother you weren't aware of. What is going on? IT'S BECAUSE HIS PEERS AREN'T THERE! I'm using a boy as an example, but the same thing applies to girls. Do NOT try to address a student's behavior in full view of his or her peers (a.k.a. the audience). You could get yourself into a full-blown power struggle before you know it. At first, by drawing attention to his or her behavior in front of his or her peers, you may inadvertently say something or suggest something that makes the student, from his or her perspective, look bad or uncool or different in some way. If you're not careful, you might find that the child you're disciplining escalates the situation, essentially trying to look good at any cost, even if that means receiving a negative consequence. For some kids, receiving a negative consequence is just more attention (and even negative attention is attention) and the whole situation will most likely make most of the students in the class think you're the bad guy and he or she is the good guy. You don't want that. There should not be a bad guy or a good guy, just you the teacher calmly in control. What you want to do is simply find a way to calmly speak to the student one-on-one. Keep your voice calm, logically explain everything, follow through on a fitting consequence OUT OF VIEW OF THEIR PEERS and most likely you'll avoid the full-blown power struggle. And, whenever possible, DO POINT OUT POSITIVE BEHAVIORS IN FRONT OF THEIR PEERS. Give them the good attention they want deep down inside. Say something like "Hey everyone, I really like how Alex is using his notes to write his essay. Wow, he's almost done." I heard you are supposed to give five praises for every one disciplinary comment. I say I heard that, because I need to work on that lol. GOOD LUCK! Here's another trick I learned. When you provide your students with high-interest learning resources they feel are relevant to them and interesting in some way, they will actually behave better. They will get sucked into whatever you are trying to get them read, write, or do and forget about misbehaving. So, that's why I created these high-interest informational texts and tasks. I went out of my way to make the articles super interesting to middle schoolers by writing about things that interest them. And, guess what? It worked. I keep hearing from teachers how kids get so into these passages. They actually want to answer the questions. They even want to discuss the articles as a group. And teachers keep reporting how much time and hassle I have saved them. I did that by aligning every text and task to a specific Reading Informational Text Standard and did that 10 times to cover all 10 of them individually. Now teachers don't have to go searching for the right articles that bring out the right skills. Try both volumes and use them all year long! Your students are actually going to behave better because they won't be bored! I even made them in both PDF and interactive Google Slides in case you want the easy distance learning option! And don't forget to pin this so you can read it again or share it with a friend. Best wishes to you this year! You got this!

This post explains how teachers can use an academic version of the highly engaging Spoons game to review concepts. Free games included!

This Annotating Text-Teach, Model, & Apply activity will encourage your students to learn how to annotate properly and efficiently.

Unsure of how to teach inference? These fun and engaging inferencing activities for middle school will excite your students!

These 6th Grade “I Can” Checklists are designed to easily track standards taught in the classroom. This is another free “I Can” Common Core resource from The Curriculum Corner. Add these 6th grade I Can

So, are you itching for winter break to get here or what?!? I am drowning here, people! Between report cards, conferences (for my students and my own kids!), shopping, baking, parties, wrapping... DROWNING!Don't get me

Four high-interest nonfiction passages are included for seventh grade ela and eighth grade ela.

Choosing homeschool curriculum can be hard. Here are 6th and 8th grade homeschool curriculum picks that may help get you started.

Pokemon Go was all the rage in 2016. Fortnite in 2017. You get where we are going with this! Getting back into the swing of things of a new school year can be tricky, but we can help! An easy way to connect with your students is to make your back-to-school lessons relevant and relatable. How can you do this? We have compiled a list of several ways that you can easily incorporate teen trends into your back-to-school lessons for the first few weeks (or anytime!) of the year. Most teens love music and connect with it on a personal level. You can bridge that connection by incorporating music into your daily routines. For example, play an upbeat song between bell work and discussion time to motivate your students. If you struggle to know what's popular with your students, just ask them! The beginning of the year is the perfect time to find out more about them and their music preferences. You can give them a writing prompt asking what their favorite songs are or be even more specific; ask them: Which song makes you want to get up and dance? Which song could you listen to over and over again and never grow tired of? Once you have compiled a list of their favorite songs, search the lyrics of a few. You can often find the best examples of figurative language in song lyrics. If the lyrics are appropriate, print them off and play the song in class and ask students to find examples of figurative devices. This activity can be done anytime, but it's for great back-to-school to review figurative language and to gauge your students' learning levels. Another way to incorporate music directly into learning is to compare popular music artists with writers or subjects you are reading. During poetry and Shakespeare units, I love challenging students to see if they can guess whether the line or phrase is from a song or a poem. I created an entire series with various poets and musicians that you can download here. I'll start out with a presentation and a student handout so the as whole can engage in the activity. It's so much fun to see their reactions when they swear there's no way the line came from an old poet, but it actually did! The next day, I'll display the bulletin board (below) so students can continue to interact with the lines of poetry and songs. One way to grab the attention of your students is to explore books that may have been released since school has been out and/or sharing some titles of books that will be released in the coming months! Talk about anticipation! :) Here are a few YA books that came out recently: Girl Gone Viral by Arvin Ahmadi The Haunted by Danielle Vega We Walked the Sky by Lisa Fiedler Here are a few YA books that will be coming out soon: Frankly in Love by David Yoon The Beautiful by Renee Ahdieh You can also see what your students are interested in by displaying these Genre Reading Cards around a few tables in your classroom (or in the library). Simply, set out the different genre cards, select a few books that fit within each genre, set a timer for 2-3 minutes and let your students explore the various titles. Follow-up with a brief discussion on their favorite books they may have already read (or discovered) through the stations. This is a quick and easy way to see what genres they are interested in or may be interested in exploring this school year. Whether it's the World Cup or the Super Bowl, chances are many of your students are fans of sports or are familiar with at least one sport. Using this FREE survey at the beginning of the year, ask your students which sports or teams are their favorite. (Click HERE to get an editable digital copy of the survey ready for distance learning!) Once you have an idea about their favorites, you can incorporate them into your lessons. For example, if you are writing a sample sentence for a grammar lesson, name-drop a player from one of their favorite teams. My students are usually divided between being either a Chicago Cubs or a St. Louis Cardinals baseball fan, so a sample sentence may be: "Anthony Rizzo and Dexter Fowler sat down together to have pizza after the Cubs defeated the Cardinals last night." Every two years, you can integrate the Olympics into your lessons. Re-word the titles of your activities or assignments by using Olympic-themed names. Instead of calling it a class discussion or a "think-pair-share," call it the "Opening Ceremony" or "Passing the torch of knowledge." A quiz can be called a bobsled competition or a vault competition for gymnastics. Award the top three scores with gold, silver and bronze medals. If you teach multiple sections of the same class, have your classes compete for the overall winner. Awards points for the class with the fewest tardies, the highest scores on quizzes or assignments, and/or the liveliest discussions. Better yet, have your students create the areas for competitions and what they'd like to call them. They can even pick which country they would like to represent (or create their own country). Some students may not like traditional sports, but love video and online gaming. The popularity of videos such as Minecraft and Fortnite paired with the rise of schools adopting eSports as official extracurricular activities indicate that our students still love gaming. Instead of fighting it, try to embrace it by giving students opportunities to utilize both the skills they learn through games with academic skills. For example, I asked my students to recreate a scene from Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Julius Caesar. One group built Rome in Minecraft and reenacted one of the scenes live as the class watched. My head was swimming a bit, but it was pretty amazing to see what they created together and how they adapted it to the text. They learned more about the play from that one assignment and had so much fun doing it. This particular assignment may not work with other games, but if you allow your students the possibility of incorporating their favorite game into a project, you may be amazed at the ideas that they come up with. I don't know about you, but one of my favorite things as a student was when we were able to follow-up a book with a movie. As a visual person, I always appreciated when I saw a book come to life after reading it (even though most people prefer the book over the movie). Watching the movie after reading the book can lead to a lot of fun class discussions. Here are a few fun prompts that you can use to follow-up after your are done reading and watching! What did you like better, the book or the movie? Why was the book better than the movie? Why was the movie better than the book? What did the book have that the movie didn't? What did the movie have that the book didn't? A great way to grab the attention of your students would be to plan a unit around an upcoming movie release based on a book. This might be an older book or perhaps, a newer one. Regardless, your students will think it's pretty cool that they are going to be able to watch a movie. I realize it's not possible for all classes to be able to watch a movie in a theatre, but it's a fun and quick field trip if you can make it work! Movie theatres usually give a discount on larger groups and I usually try to work in a price that includes popcorn and a drink for everyone, too. If you think money may be an issue for some students, it does not hurt to ask your administraton for some assistance. They will, almost always, find a way to make sure everyone in your class is able to participate. You can also plan a unit around a particular theme of a movie coming out (or already in stores), if you're looking to take a break from reading for a few weeks. Once students gain a better understanding or appreciation about a particular theme, you can show them a movie where they can explore that theme even more. This way, if taking your students to a movie theatre isn't an option, then show a movie in your classroom instead! Note: You can ask your students which movies they may be interested in watching at the start of the year, then surprise them with the themed unit based around that film! One of the easiest ways to incorporate both social media and pop culture all at once is incorporating current events into your classroom. You can do this on a local, national or international level. You can simply ask your students to start talking about what's happening in your town, in the world, or even more specifically, with their favorite movie actors, singers, bands, etc. What's the gossip with their favorite celebrities? Once your ideas have been shared and topics have been listed, you can use this list as a means for an impromptu writing activity, as an essay topic, etc. The possibilities are endless. If you're interested in checking out more ways on how you can incorporate pop culture into the classroom, click HERE. You might also be interested in: Soundtrack of my Life/Playlist of my Summer

hold students accountable while they independently read with these easy to implement reading tips and tricks and strategies

Full year lesson plans provide huge time savings to busy teachers. It is important to have lesson structures and assignments in your classroom that can be used all year.

Find strategies for teaching ELA academic vocabulary with graphic organizers for students, a word wall, and engaging games from mixed-upfiles.com

Greek and Latin roots are sometimes the evil stepsister of vocab. Middle schools that use the Common Core (or any variation of it) must teach affixes, but high schools aren't required to, even though it’s valid vocabulary building. Affixes don't initially look glamorous to students, either; at first glance, affixes seem boring (a.k.a. memorization), and teachers are wary of how to teach them well (without just lecture and flash cards). Therefore, instead of viewing affixes as literary molecules - the building blocks to like, everything - classes often just go through the motions (or worse, ignore them completely). But what if you could teach prefixes, roots, and suffixes in a small amount of time, with higher student buy-in? Truth be told, I’ve done the full spectrum of bad to good with affix instruction: not enough of it, too much of it, successful flipped classroom, unsuccessful flipped classroom, too much in isolation, etc. Finally, I’ve got a balance that I’m happy with and that is starting to raise student awareness of the words they encounter while reading. Here's what that process currently looks like in our classroom. Yes, pretests are dry, but here’s the fun part: when my seventh graders bombed their pretest, they realized that they really DO need this instruction, and now they’re open to learning more about it. There are no egos in the way, and more students are willing to learn. (Steal my editable pretest here.) Side note: No, I don’t want students to fail or take a hit to their self-esteem… but many older teens and tweens assume they know or remember content that they do not. Next, we built flip books that contained essential lists of affixes AND practice for EACH chunk of them. Students rotated through stations to do things like… Complete the pages in their flipbooks Practice listing words that USE each affix Talk through how they could remember each one Play with a premade Quizlet set Pick up pre-made flash cards and start quizzing each other Yes, repetition is necessary, but practice can come from more than just index cards. Once students start to have a handle on some affixes, it’s time to do something creative (alongside your method of memorization) to make sure these meanings really stick. Start with an intermediate activity like this FREE puzzle challenge! The application level will look different, depending on your grade level and the extent of your students’ mastery. Here are a few ideas: Mixed Levels of Readiness: My 10-pack of application activities for affixes contains easier activities for students who are still acquiring roots AND more challenging ones for students who are ready, including pages about test prep and Harry Potter! (Try one for FREE here.) Embedded into Vocabulary: Start noticing the roots, prefixes, and suffixes in the vocabulary you assess elsewhere in your class. For example, in my Word of the Day program, we identify at least one affix and/or the language of origin for each word. Delve into REAL Latin: Don’t run from this idea! Do your students know common “English” phrases that are actually Latin, such as ad lib, per se, nota bene, pro bono, pro tempore, and status quo? If not, then maybe it’s time to build literacy with these common phrases. The REAL payoff... ...will come in that cute moment when a student raises her hand because she’s just noticed an affix in the text… or when a reluctant reader correctly zeroes in on what “agribusiness” means in a nonfiction article because he knows that “agri” means “farming”... or when a class tells you that they saw a root in their Science class and knew what the word meant. If students don’t get these affixes from us now, they never will, and it’s one of the best literacy graduation gifts we can give them. You Might Also Like... Tips and Activities for Teaching Vocabulary by Presto Plans Word Up Vocabulary Graphic Organizers by Tracee Orman

So you have 100 minutes, but how exactly do you plan and schedule your language arts block for the junior grades?

The first day of school doesn't have to be boring! This blog post explains what to do for the best first day of school!

Find ideas for teaching middle school with these full year lesson plans for middle school ELA.

Have you been looking for the perfect project based learning curriculum? If you've been on the lookout for a game-changing approach to captivate your upper elementary students and ignite a passion for learning, you're in for a treat! Buckle up as we dive into the world of project-based learning (PBL) – the secret sauce to turning mundane lessons into exciting adventures.

data:blog.metaDescription

Looking for even more short stories to read with your middle school and high school students? There are so many options out there, many of which can be used to teach a variety of literary elements and lead into interesting discussions and activities. Read on for 15 recommendations from secondary English Language Arts teachers.

When you teach simple probability, it seems like you have to strike a balance between showing students how probability works and getting them to understand the math behind it. This topic lends itself to a

Need tips for managing station work in middle school? Learn secrets that will ensure success for you and your students! TeachingELAwithJoy.com

If you are looking for some high-interest activities, try using animated shorts to teach inference. Free handouts focus on student learning.

Ways to teach literary elements - three engaging ways to teach the elements of literature with strategies and teaching tips

Since I don't have a vocabulary book or program that I HAVE to follow at my school, I used to always worry if I was doing enough vocabulary instruction. Even when I was theoretically following best practices or authentically investigating words as they came up in texts, I was concerned about if I was really helping my students become better readers. After a lot of trial and error, I'm now proud of what we do for middle school vocabulary, which falls into four main areas: Specific Words for Texts and Units Word of the Week Program (see this post) Vocabulary.com use for differentiation (see bottom of post) Greek & Latin roots instruction (see this blog post for details) This mix of interaction, instruction, differentiation, and assessment is working for my students better than ever before (and is showing up in their reading scores). Today, I'm going to share the details of my Word of the Day/Week setup (also known as the Word Nerd Challenge), which is essentially doing deeper instruction of 40 words (10 words per quarter). Here's How it Works: Because I teach middle school, I need the materials to be age-appropriate and easy to read, so I've made my Word of the Week resources minimalist and without clutter -- print-and-go materials with no need to add extra, unnecessary information. I want my students to learn the vocabulary terms with the definitions, synonyms and antonyms, Greek or Latin roots, and so on. Here are the steps for how I carry out the Word of the Week program in my class: Pre-test: Check initial understanding of the 40 words Bell-ringer: Use the PowerPoint visual display (or just stick the guided notes packet under your document camera) while students record information into their guided notes journal Guided notes: Fill-in-the-blank graphic organizer customized for each word Flashcards: Pre-made Quizlet sets (for each 10-word set AND overall) Quizzes: Students take a quiz every 10 words Bulletin board: Display the cumulative list of words learned this year Post-test: Assess growth over time I sometimes throw in some additional things, like these: Skills test: An optional assessment with 10 NEW words to practice the skills taught through the guided notes journal Certificates: Celebrate student victory from the post-test results Journal cover and extras for the guided notes, like student directions, growth chart, etc. Personally, the vocabulary terms that I use in my classroom are ACT/SAT level words, even though I teach middle school. This prepares them for high school and for those tests that they'll have to take eventually to help them gain admission to colleges and universities. Another benefit of using words at this level is that they commonly appears in real-world contexts, like the news! If you'd like a ready-made vocabulary program that will take a task off your plate, then you can purchase my Word of the Week Program here (Volume 1) and here (Volume 2) in my Teachers Pay Teachers store. I've taken all of the work out of it for you and created a ready-to-use but editable vocabulary program! How I use Vocabulary.com This is a paid program that my school purchased after I requested it. Here's how we used it last year (our first year of the program): Every student had an account, and I set them up into their class periods. Every student had a goal to "master" 10 words per quarter, at minimum. For some students, this was challenging (especially for those who struggle with reading or vocabulary and took a long time to get the several-questions-right-in-a-row needed to "master" a word). However, many students exceeded this goal - by the hundreds. At the end of the quarter, students logged their statistics as well as writing down a short sample of words they mastered and words they're currently working on. (This gave me, and their parents, a view of the difficulty level of the words that the program had given them.) I'm happy to say that the vocabulary.com program is their favorite online program (more than, say, IXL or CommonLit), and students were authentically choosing to play it in their downtime. (This review of vocabulary.com is not an ad and is my personal opinion.) What are some of your favorite methods for teaching vocabulary? Let me know in the comments!

This mini-lesson gives your students an opportunity to see the teacher model skill or term, and then the students practice this on their own.

If Montezuma had an Instagram account, what would he say when Cortez arrived in 1519? My fourth graders have some ideas. We are finishing our study of the conquests of the Inca and Aztec empires and have been reading about … Continue reading →