Language Arts

Don’t just list examples of writing techniques. Let’s improve Shakespeare!

I stopped and started with “What 👄 special writing techniques does the author use? List examples.”

Over-Scaffolding Writing

Here’s what happens when we make a scaffold the final product.

How *Not* To Ask Questions About A Novel

These “discussion questions” highlight so many of the problems we’ve been looking at.

Taking A Zoologist Across Disciplines

All I did was ask students to list and explain three “disciplines.” Let’s take it a bit further!

Two Questions I Won’t Ask About A Famous Quote

Let’s do more than ask, “What did this person mean?”

What Makes An Antagonist Effective?

It’s really fun to take an already good sequence, tweak it, and get something even better!

Multiple Perspectives Gone Mad!!

Yes, I actually gave my students this question: “How could two experts’ 👓 perspectives regarding information from this reading selection differ from one another?” yikes.

Beyond “Describe How This Changed Over Time”

I want to go beyond just listing how a character changed. Let’s get students thinking about that change!

A Depth and Complexity ELA Worksheet with Problems

Here’s a Depth and Complexity worksheet I used to use with my students: I look at it now and shudder. I was making so many mistakes here. Let’s just zoom out and imagine that I asked the same questions at a book club with fellow adults. Me: What is this story’s main theme? Him: Oh, […]

Don’t Just List ⚖️ Ethical Issues

Let’s improve this “make a list” question to incorporate high level thinking.