Like many ELA teachers, I like to use music as an inroad for teaching figures of speech. It’s not only accessible for struggling readers, but also delightful for me because I get to watch a room of too-cool-for-school teens rock out to my tunes. For today’s post, I’d like to share my favorite lesson plan … Read more
It’s been quiet at Super ELA! for the last few months, but things are about to ramp up big time. I’m excited to announce that my new Parts of Speech Coloring Comic Workbook will be available just in time for the start of the 2022-2023 school year! Students of all ages can give their own … Read more
Every English teacher’s been there: It’s Friday, you’ve got too much to grade, and you could really use a day of quiet to plow through the papers. You think to yourself, “Wouldn’t it be great if I could just show a movie?” When I was teaching high school English full time, I had many, many … Read more
The joy of being an English teacher AND a speech teacher is that no matter what I’m teaching, I get to talk about rhetoric! I’m not kidding—I love the days when I get to introduce Aristotle’s “means of persuasion.” This is because ethos (ee-thos), pathos (pay-thos), and logos (low-gos) are all around us all the … Read more
It was a chilly Thursday morning when I pulled into the wooded parking lot of NewGate School in Lakewood Ranch. I felt like Mary Lennox as I entered the campus, like I was entering a mysterious and secret garden of education. (This is how I’ve always thought about Montessori schools.) My “key” to this garden … Read more
January marks the beginning of third quarter, or what I fondly think of as the start of “Shakespeare season” in English classrooms. Sure, Shakespeare Day isn’t until April 23rd, but anyone who’s taught one of Billy Shakes’s plays will tell you that they take a long time to get through, so it’s best to start … Read more
No matter how many times students learn about nouns and the like, sometimes they just need a refresher on the parts of speech. Super ELA! has come to the rescue with the new parts of speech quick review videos! Each video covers the essentials to get students back on their grammar feet in no time. Enjoy quick … Read more