CLASS MATTERS is Launched!

Just in time to be ready for a new year, but still kick back and enjoy summer.  Check it out!

CLASS MATTERS: Planning, Teaching, and Managing Secondary Classes includes handouts and printables to meet teachers' wants and needs in these three focus areas, and also offers posts that suggest how, when and why the various  focuses will be most useful to them.  Although some of the information here is self-explanatory to rookie and veteran teachers, other ideas become clearer with short discussions. And sometimes …sometimes we just need a heads-up on how to use a new item-especially during Teacher Week because of all of the meetings- when we just. don’t. have. a. free. brain. cell. to. think. about. it.

This 100-page teacher resource bundle is divided into sections: PLANNING, TEACHING, and MANAGING CLASS MATTERS. Within each segment I have interspersed blogs to show teachers how to efficiently create flexible lesson plans, classroom rules, and behavior standards. Numerous teaching ideas, handouts and classroom management forms will meet many of your wants and needs in ONE PLACE to save you searching time. In the final pages, I invite you to take a break from all of your planning and organizing, and to kick back and relax with two posts: A Labor Day Lesson: A Contemporary Tale, and In Defense of Teenagers.

This bundle includes Freebies and paid products from my TpT Store, posts from my website, and many new ideas and printables. Here is a summary of the planning, teaching and managing secondary classrooms that comprise this 100-page teacher resource:

PLANNING pages 3-22

·        Let's Begin- Classmart Lifesaver List

·        When Planning- The Rule of Three Rules

·        Plan Up! Getting Started

·        Common Core Anchor Charts Grades 6-12

·        Bloom's Taxonomy Wheel

·        Class Matters- Keeping Track: Assignments Form

·        Class Matters-Keeping Track: Grades Form

·        Plan Up! Creating the Agenda (Using Animal Farm, George Orwell)

ü  Teacher Notes

ü  Student Calendar-Animal Farm

ü  Unit Structure Sample Form

ü  Unit Structure-Blank Form

ü  Unit Structure Activities Plan-Blank Form

ü  Response Letters: Alternative Animal Farm Activity

TEACHING IDEAS pages 23-55

·        Quartet of Ideas – 4 Freebies from my TpT Store

ü  Ten Sentence Format

ü  Analyzing Novels using the Elements of Literature

ü  Reel in Readers with Magnetizing Hooks

ü  Just say, NO!" to Dull Writing

·        First Day Activities- 3 Freebies from my TpT Store

ü  First Day Writing Assignment

ü  First Day Activity- Four Corners

ü  Writing Activities (First Day)- What About Me?

·        Friday Night Lights- Hook Students with a football and fall Non-fiction Unit

·        Teaching Ideas- Teaching Tip #1

·        Teaching Ideas- Teaching Tip#2

MANAGING CLASS MATTERS- Proactive Prevails pages 56-93

·        Five Teaching Tips That Eliminate Classroom Chaos

·        Managing Student Behavior: Obligations & Expectations

·        Managing Student Behavior: Alleviating Off-Task Behavior

ü  UhOh Bag

ü  UhOh Bag Writing Consequence Form

ü  General Incident/Consequence Form

·        Managing Classroom Behavior: Proactive Prevails: 3 Teacher Survival Lessons

·        Managing Class Matters: Form, Function and Flexibility

ü  Getting to Know You: A Teacher's Back To School Assortment of First day Forms and Activities

ü  Teaching Lifesavers: Twelve Classroom Management Forms

1.      Lesson Launch: Writing Warm-Ups (Teachers)

2.      Lesson Launch: Writing Warm-Ups (Students)

3.      Honor Statements

4.      Book Sign-Up Sheets

5.      General Essay Grading Rubric

6.      Late Homework Request

7.      Tardy Sign-In Sheet

8.      Restroom Pass

9.      Hall Pass

10.   Completed Assignments/Graded Assignments Folders

11.   Incident Form

12.   Closure: Exit Pass

·       Class Matters: Oh No! I Need a Sub

Relax and Enjoy-Two Posts

·        A Labor Day Lesson- A Contemporary Tale

·        In defense of Teenagers

CLASS-MATTERS-Planning-Teaching-and-Managing-Secondary-Classrooms-Bundle-3935206

I sincerely hope that you are thrilled with these PLANNING,TEACHING and MANAGING CLASS MATTERS posts and printables. For more ideas, check out my products for the basic secondary English curriculum as well as for two of the most important electives –in my opinion- journalism and creative writing in my TpT Store -  Store/Connie. 

CLASS MATTERS

AND

CLASS MATTERS ALWAYS MATTER!

Enjoy a Teach It Now Day Every Day,

Connie

Kick off fall studies with H.G. Bissinger's 'Friday Night Lights'

Classroom Colleagues,

This is a revised post about H.G. Bissinger's iconic book about high school football, Friday Night Lights. I originally posted it a few years ago on this site, but wanted to update it because it is such a terrific way to hook students' fall football psyches into reading as it fuels many an analytic discussion about Academics vs. Athletics and other societal issues.

“I can't wait for high school football to start
'Cause Friday Night Lights will get to play a part.
This is the book that students will cheer

When teachers choose it to begin the school year.”

 (adapted from the song, “I’ve Been Waiting All Day For Sunday Night” sung by Carrie Underwood

and set to the tune "I Hate Myself for Loving You” by Joan Jett.)

Okay, okay, my colleagues, I know many of you would love to find a page-turning nonfiction read that could roll right into the first literature study of your autumn term. But if you could find a book that will engage your students and jumpstart discussions of contemporary issues such as gender, race and class, I bet you would give a cheer. A 24-page unit plan coinciding with this book and that offers you the gift of time at the always hectic beginning of the school year might cause a sigh of relief, too.

from en.wikipedia.org

Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger is the perfect match. Let me explain how my scoffing at a book about high school football turned into a decade and a half of, "Just say 'Yes! to the book" enthusiasm.

A while back, my husband, Tim, and I were driving through Virginia on the clogged, as usual, Route 95. We were on our way to Hatteras Island's on North Carolina's Outer Banks.

To keep me from groaning about the lines of traffic, Tim began to enthuse over a book about Texas high school football.  Trying to hook my teacher brain, he explained that this book was not just a paean to football, but was a social commentary on how so many towns allow high school football to dominate their whole lives. The author, H.G. Bissinger chose Odessa Texas's Permian High School's 1988 football season to focus his study. 

Tim iterated a list of issues the author develops in the book, such as the special treatment of athletes, athletics over academics, racism,  gender, class, entitlement, etc. He offered anecdotes about how the black football players were considered equal on the field but separate off of it, and how some of the girls felt that  their sole purpose was to take care of their football players with gifts of food and pigskin-themed decorated homes. He regaled me with stories about little kids who wore jerseys with their favorite high school and not pro team player, and how athletes weren't expected to accomplish much at all academically.

Yada, Yada, Yada. I was not impressed and fell asleep.

Fast forward to a week later, our last day on the beach. As I lounged on the deck eyeing the ocean for dolphins, my husband's and son's animated conversation about the book, which my son had devoured in two days, wiggled its way into my sun-drunk  attention span. Soon, I found myself caught on the Football Express. This time, though, after just a few pages, instead of itching to get off, I bought a reading round-trip ticket.

Starting right then, and during the 6-hour drive home the next day, I read. After filling the washer with salt and sand encrusted clothes, I read.  As my husband slept and my dog snored, I read.

By the next day, I had finished H.G. Bissinger's iconic classic and was ready to subscribe to the Odessa American newspaper so I could follow the Permian Panthers' football season that fall. 

The first thing Monday morning, I explained my desire to teach this book to the local HR manager for a national chain bookstore. She contacted whoever she needed to, and within the hour, I was the ecstatic recipient of two softcover class sets of Friday Night Lights-50 books in all! Next, I swung by the high school and begged, pleaded and generally pestered the principal until he gave me the thumbs up to teach it that fall.

The rest of the summer, I developed my Literature - Friday Night Lights Unit Plan. This complete unit plan includes: Common Core standards which you can easily adapt to your state's benchmarks, the grade level and time frame, assessments, and detailed daily plans as well as writing journal openers, essay topics, chapter by chapter discussion questions, a project, a review sheet and a test. Ten analyzing the elements of literature activities go hand in hand with the lessons and follow Bloom's Taxonomy.

Reading this book along with viewing the movie is sure to generate some terrific analytic discussions.

Make a touchdown with your students this fall and Download this 4.0 rated 24-page plan Literature - Friday Night Lights Unit Plan, from 

https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Literature-Friday-Night-Lights-Unit-Plan-1558 ($).Before you know it, your students and you will be under the spell of Bissinger's football fever and will be singing,

“I can't wait for this fall's school term to start
When Friday Night Lights will win my students' hearts.
This is the book that they will certainly cheer,

'Cause it speaks in such depth to all that they hold dear.”

Enjoy a Teach it Now Day Every Day. 

A Task Card Basket Blooming with Reading, Vocabulary/Writing and Punctuation Activities

December, March and May can be the three toughest months to reel in students’ attention due to the Too Little and Too Much Flu. The main symptoms of this illness are: Too Little desire to learn, Too Little concentration and Too Much lethargy.

In May, though, another ingredient-Too Much testing crowns this month as the most frustrating for teachers.  Between A.P. and state Standards of Learning exams, students’ class attendance is spotty, and their desire to participate in lessons and activities has been sapped by preparing for Multiple Choice tests and writing to a prompt.

Lesson plan continuity endures a major blow although teachers still want and need to teach and students still need to add to their learning homes.

These three sets of Task Cards will alleviate teachers’ frustration and stress while reviving students’ motivation, concentration and attention and creating strong foundations of learning. 

Reading Comprehension - Literature Task Cards

With this set of Elements of Literature Task Cards, Middle School and High School students will reinforce, review and develop their understanding of a text any time that they need to work on expanding their comprehension/higher thinking skills and /or writing aptitudes.

Each element of literature: Plot/Conflict, Character, Setting, Theme, Symbols, Tone and Point of View as well as a set titled, My Insights, is represented by color-coded task cards that reveal questions which address: Understanding/Remembering, Applying Knowledge, Analyzing Ideas, Evaluating Situations and Characters' Actions. Students will also compose original pieces based on the text(s) that they are reading.

Preview and download it from https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Reading-Comprehension-Literature-Task-Cards-1131263 ($4.50)*

Vocabulary - FOR THE LOVE OF WORDS! Task Cards

Middle School and High School students need to gather words that showcase their verbal and written language instead of relying on texting abbreviations to speak for them. When they understand the nuances of word meanings and usage besides just memorizing them, they will score higher on SAT and other standardized tests. Most importantly, they will be able to clearly communicate their thoughts, ideas and beliefs, and will comprehend what they read and what other people write and say.

FOR THE LOVE OF WORDS! is an 11-page Task Card vocabulary study with 32 individual, pairs, small group and whole class activities. These activities engage students' curiosity, and this inquisitiveness sparks learning because they are motivated  to own the words and not borrow them for a test.

Preview and download it from https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Vocabulary-FOR-THE-LOVE-OF-WORDS-1840502 ($4.00)*

Grammar - PUNCTUATION RULES! Task Cards & Activities

Between Tweets, Facebook status updates, Pinning,Texting and various other sites limiting characters, students are forgetting how to properly punctuate their longer writing pieces. PUNCTUATION RULES! Task Cards & Activities, enable Middle School and High School students to improve their Language and Writing knowledge and skills.

This 20-page packet includes

~detailed Teacher Notes

~Rules for End Mark Insight, Comma Sense, Colon/Semi-Colon Credibility, Quotation Mark Quality, and Grasping Apostrophes and Dashes

~8 Task Cards for each of these 5 categories

~1 Task Cards-Punctuation Review Activity with a Part 2 Writing segment

~Answer Keys for all Task Cards

~2 Alternative Activities: Fill-It-In! a MadLib-type of challenge- with an Answer Key, and Proofreading Pride- a Three-Step Correction Format for students to use with any graded and non-graded writing piece- with specific directions.

Preview and download it from https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Grammar-PUNCTUATION-RULES-Task-Cards-Activities-1820840 ($6.00)*

All three of these Task Card sets are aligned with Common Core Standards and Bloom’s Taxonomy.

Most importantly, since they are beneficial for individual, small group or whole class study and discussion, for in-class writing and for homework, these task cards are the perfect antidote to the Too Little and Too Much Flu.

* These Task Card sets and all of my products are on sale at 20% off during The TpT Teacher Appreciation Days Sale- May 5th and 6th. https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/Connie

Enjoy a Teach It Now Day - every day.

31 ELA Writing Activities - "March Maneuvers - Sprint Into Spring"

Mother Nature continues to imprison much of the country in her wintry grip on this first day of March. Teachers are desperate for a few academic ice picks that will chip away the, doldrums encasing their students' brains and freezing their motivation to learn. Thirty-one Common Core aligned writing activities aimed to tone up students’ - and teachers’ -  winter-weary brains will do the trick.  

Teachers, say, "Hello!" to March Maneuvers - Sprint into Spring -  just the chisels you need to engage, inspire and motivate your students during Mother Nature's, "Which Season Am I- Winter or Spring?" month.

What's Included

• Thirty-One writing activities with directions and writing requirements
• A March calendar of celebrations with at least 2 events per day for each day of the month.


5 Sample Activities
1. Choose one of the celebrations under today’s date. Even if you don’t know why this topic became a day of celebration, imagine a reason for its existence. Explain the: Who, what, where, when and why behind its formation. Also discuss any ways people celebrate this day.
2. Write a persuasive essay that supports either promoting or abolishing this celebration.
3. Research the real reason this day came to exist. Explain the: Who, what, where, when, why and how behind its formation. Also discuss any ways people celebrate this day.
4. Choose a character from the literature you are currently studying and show his/her opinion about this day. Be sure that you are writing from this character’s point of view and not your own. 
5. Compose a scene from a book that creates a word picture of a fervent follower of this holiday. 

*General Writing Activity Project
1. Following the teacher’s time-frame and specific requirements for this project, create an

  advertising campaign for this holiday that includes newspaper/magazine, radio and television ads. 
2. *Create three recipes for this day to share on a Food Network show. They can be appetizers, snacks, main dishes, soups, salads, desserts or sides, but no more than two can be from the same category. See the complete list of activities (31) and a March calendar with over 135 Celebrations when you download this product from 
https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Product/Writing-Activities-March-Maneuvers-Sprint-into-Spring-584169.

Think warm breezes and sunny days with March Maneuvers - Sprint into Spring

Happy Teaching,

TEACH IT WRITE - BUILD POWERFUL ACADEMIC HOMES