In the past, I haven’t really thought about effective course design. Well, that’s not really true. I do think about it obsessively when I think about how to structure and present information, but I haven’t really thought about it as formally as...
Why Bother With Authentic Assessment “If learning is not transferred from the place of learning to practical application, there can be no positive return on investment of the time needed to create, implement, and evaluate instruction. Students are smarter than...
Charges, Motivations, and Discovery My sophomores are doing a mock trial as their assessment for our Shakespeare unit. During the unit, the class explored various portions of the Othello (focusing on Iago) and The Tempest (focusing on Prospero). Our driving question...
I am probably one of the very few teachers who isn’t completely thrilled about teaching Shakespeare. However, my sophomores did such a fabulous job at performing a scene, that I wanted to share their videos. Overview Their instructions were to perform their...
Tim Burton is a prolific director. His films are pretty easy to spot and his style is clear. Senioritis is also easy to spot and has a clear, definitive style. To combat Senioritis, I have my seniors do a style analysis of Tim Burton. We spend several weeks...