Raised by Women
Building classroom relationships through poetry.
ELA
Rethinking Agatha Christie
The strange and offensive history of Ten Little Indians” (Hint: They weren’t always called “Indians.”)
“
Reconstructing Race
“Is Mr. Smith a White Guy?” I then changed the topic, volunteering to be a contemporary example. “OK, so the next question is: Is Mr. Smith a white man? Yes […]
Rhetoric or Reality?
Do small schools change teaching practice?
See You When We Get There
Profiling an African American teacher on Chicago’s south side.
Forgive and Remember
Teaching forgiveness through poetry and art.
The Politics of Correction
Nurturing student writing to make it language of power”.”
Creating Bias Detectives, Blowing Up Stereotypes, and Writing Essays that Matter
“Part of the work of teaching students to read is teaching them to question not only the written word, but also the author,” Christensen writes in her article about teaching students how to confront writers whose stories erase the full truth and misrepresent people and places.
Why I Don’t Teach the Hero’s Journey
A high school English teacher deconstructs “Hero’s Journey” curriculum, shows its patriarchal prejudice, and talks about teaching collective rather than only individual transformation.
Welcome Poems Trump Hate
A teacher creates a welcome poems lesson to celebrate the diversity of students — and with students.
Seeing Ourselves with Our Own Eyes
A special education teacher uses poetry to help her middle school students write their own narratives and celebrate themselves.
Beyond Just a Cells Unit
A science teacher includes Black voices and Black history in her classroom by building curriculum around The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks. In doing so, she shows how nonfiction books should not be relegated to language arts but can be effective in a science classroom.
Teaching to the Heart
Using Marshallese poet and climate justice activist Kathy Jetñil-Kijiner’s poem “Dear Matafele Peinam,” a teacher helps 7th graders think about the sacred spaces in their own lives and how they will be affected by climate change.
Mapping Childhood
A neighborhood mapping exercise helps students develop their narrative writing and storytelling skills while also building classroom community by connecting home worlds to the curriculum. Adapted from the newly-released second edition of Reading, Writing, and Rising Up.
Baby Mamas in Literature and Life
Inspired by students’ responses to her own pregnancy, a high school English teacher develops a unit based on teen pregnancy and motherhood—rejecting the usual deficit-based narrative of teen parenting.
A Midsummer Night’s Gender Diversity
Middle schoolers explore how Shakespeare plays with gender expression and expectations in A Midsummer Night’s Dream.
Other People’s Lives
An introduction to persona poems, which ask students “to find that place inside themselves that connects with a moment in history, literature, life.”
Celebrating Skin Tone
An early elementary school teacher combines a science lesson and poetry to encourage children to celebrate their own skin tone and that of their classmates.
Ban the Box!
Should the box about criminal history be eliminated from job applications? A role play helps students explore the lifelong impact of a felony conviction.
“
Stealing Home
The historic destruction of the Chávez Ravine neighborhood in Los Angeles – to build Dodger Stadium – paves the way for students to understand changes in their own neighborhood. Second in a two-part series.
Martin Luther King Jr. and the Common Core
The chief architect of the Common Core created a model lesson of a close reading of King’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail.” A teacher from Birmingham compares that to King’s own critical reading of the “word” and the “world.”
Trayvon Martin and My Students
President Obama’s speech about the Zimmerman acquittal in Trayvon Martin’s murder and Cornel West’s response are rich sources for students learning how to analyze, evaluate, and critique.
Rethinking Bilingual Education
Rethinking Bilingual Education is an exciting new collection of articles about bringing students’ home languages into our classrooms. How do we bring social justice curriculum into our bilingual classrooms? How […]