What Influences A Character’s Traits? To add depth to character analysis, let's look beyond a character's traits and dig into what influenced them to have those traits.
Patterns In Writing: Conflict Discussing types of conflict is a great first step towards building a strong narrative. Although the term conjures up images of ninja battles for many of our students, conflict can take on many more sophisticated forms than physical fights.
How To Run A Novel Study When you read a book with students, avoid getting bogged down with the nitty-gritty. Just pick one big idea and have fun reading! No quizzes, no memorizing, no essays. Just develop your students' love of reading.
Inductive Thinking in Spelling and Vocabulary Let's look at a couple ways to bring inductive thinking into word studies. We'll examine simple plural rules all the way up to etymology of foreign words in English.
Finding the Fun in “It’s” vs “Its” How do we differentiate a dull lesson like "its" vs "it's"? I decided to push it to an extreme (and include some unexpected novelty).
All About Character Archetypes Another example of "structure that increases creativity" is character archetypes. An archetype, according to Wikipedia, is "an original model of a person, ideal example, or a prototype upon which others are copied, patterned, or emulated." Let's use an inductive lesson to teach our students about these literary tools.
Creating Better Research Questions Once students have a topic they'd like to research, how do we help them form more interesting questions?
Using A Classic: Charlie Chaplin Integrating a classic is a great way to pump up an otherwise simple lesson. It seems like a black and white movie is the last thing a kid would want to see, but classics are classics for a reason!
