I love the idea of having a signature English teacher marker. You know, 10 years from now when students are reminiscing about school and say “remember that teacher who always _______?” Well for me, my classroom signature was ambient media. I know this because I once had a student sleep over at a former student’s house and apparently my former student put on some Harry Potter ambient media to set ... Read More about 5 creative ways to use ambient media in ELA
Supporting LGBTQ+ Students in the Age of “Don’t Say Gay” Legislation
Cody Marx (he/him/his) (@codymmarx) is a queer, public high school English language arts teacher in New England. He is passionate about supporting LGBTQ+ students and educators alike, and he is currently pursuing a Doctor of Education degree to further that work. Read on to see how Cody addresses the needs of queer and genderqueer students in his classroom. Since the beginning of 2022, at ... Read More about Supporting LGBTQ+ Students in the Age of “Don’t Say Gay” Legislation
Make the most of your essay grading comment bank
If you have been grading essays online in Google Classroom, Canvas, or Turnitin, you have probably already discovered the life-changing magic of a feedback comment bank. If not, get ready for me to rock your essay grading world in just a moment. But for those already familiar with essay grading comment banks, are you making the most of their potential? With just a few simple tweaks, you will ... Read More about Make the most of your essay grading comment bank
English teacher mindset shifts for prioritizing revision over grading essays
As an English teacher, where are you spending most of your time during the writing process? If you are like most, it's the grading essays step. Is that grading time resulting in student growth? If not, it may be time to reevaluate your essay grading process. Fed up with spending my weekends grading essays that students barely looked at, I decided to shake things up and try a completely ... Read More about English teacher mindset shifts for prioritizing revision over grading essays
A Dolly Parton Retro Classroom Theme
If you follow me on Instagram, it’s no surprise that I love Dolly Parton. Not only is she the queen of my region, but she also leads an impactful book mission which speaks to my English teacher's heart. I’ve been seeing a lot of retro themed classrooms lately, so I thought it would be fun to put my own spin on it by doing a Retro Reading Dolly themed high school classroom. A Dolly Parton themed ... Read More about A Dolly Parton Retro Classroom Theme
Teaching Serial Podcast in High School ELA
It all started with Serial. As my long-time readers know, I’m a huge proponent of using podcasts in the classroom. You can read my reasoning and research here: Why You Should Be Using Podcasts in Secondary ELA and find lots of podcast posts on my blog, but it all started with teaching the Serial podcast season one. Update: A lot has happened since this was published. While this post is ... Read More about Teaching Serial Podcast in High School ELA
