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Showing posts from November, 2020

Embedding #OwnVoices into the Definition Essay

Teacher (/ˈtēCHər/) Noun - 1. a person who teachers, especially in school. 2. A person who opens windows for students to explore. 3. A person whose day extends before and beyond the 7am-3pm work day. 4. A perpetual student. Definition essay is one of the main essay types we teach in English 9 at Horace Greeley. Over the years, the types of definition essays I taught and explored evolved. In the last two years, we explored what it means to be a protagonist using The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams.  But call it restlessness or boredom or changing with the times, my definition essay was in need of an overhaul. Enter: Stamped by Jason Reynolds, This Book is Anti-Racist by Tiffany Jewell and nearly a dozen different titles from an #OwnVoices unit. This year, my English 9 team and I are gearing up to teach  Stamped for the first time. We talked about starting the year with it but decided talking about systematic racism on the first day of high school might prove overwhelming. Now, as

Podcast Episode 4: The Secret Lives of Teachers

This year, more than any other year, feels exhausting. As such, this blog has been on a hiatus of sorts. Hopefully, I'm back with just a bit more regularity. I recently started a podcast project with my students, so I too re-engaged with podcasting to go through the process and learn a little bit more about splicing interviews. Today I bring you a brand new episode about hybrid teaching and tired teachers, and what these teachers do at the end of the day to destress. Thanks for listening! Tails32x · ETC Episode 4 - The Secret Lives of Teachers These teachers were interviewed, be sure to follow them on Twitter: Valerie Brunow Allison Mitchell Lauren Nero Brett Steinberg John Tobin Music from the podcast c/o Kevin MacLead. You kind find more of his royalty free music at  incompetech.filmmusic.io/ I talk about my card making. You can see my cards on my blog DannysCards.com For more Episodes of English Teachers check these out: Episode 3: NCTE 2019 Episode 2: LGBTQ Books Episode 1: L-