Good Teaching Practices

I am always on the look out for new ideas and suggestions for "good teaching practices". I was impressed when I stumbled across Berkeley's website. I used to become frustrated when I was in university and I felt that what we were being taught compared to what was being practiced were light-years apart! Even though this is for university instructors, much of it can be easily adapted to the high school classroom.

Here is some of what I found:

Tools for Teaching excerpts

"A compendium of classroom-tested strategies and suggestions designed to improve the teaching practices of all college instructors, including beginning, mid-career, and senior faculty members. The book describes 49 teaching tools that cover both traditional practical tasks--writing a course syllabus, delivering an effective lecture--as well as newer, broader concerns such as responding to diversity on campus and coping with budget constraints."

Assessing Student Learning (from the Office of Educational Development)

I particularly liked "The One-Minute Paper" suggestions.

Motivating Students

I think every teacher struggles with motivating the unmotivated from time to time. I am particularly interested in strengthening self-motivation as well as balancing assessment.

Inception

I saw it and it made me wonder. It hasn't yet won me over yet, but some ELA teachers were discussing ideas for using it. Any ideas?

Ideas for use?

Right now, the idea of "paradox" comes to mind. Camera angles could definitely be another "angle" on the movie (haha). I'll keep mulling.

The Truman Show

Poster by Jim Carrey Online

Film Study ideas:

Lesson Plan #1

Includes some "time saving" ideas

Lesson Plan #2

Overview & some discussion questions

Lesson Plan #3

Discussion ideas

Assignment ideas

Mr. Smilanich's ideas for short assignments & major essay

Ideas for use?

I teach The Truman Show for my ELA 10 class; it provides an awesome introduction to camera angles, symbols, allusions, etc.

The Lion King - Be Prepared (colour and symbolism)

I love learning...and I love having those "Ah-ha!" moments while I'm learning (as Despicable Me comes to mind, "Light bulb...")

For me, I was at a Conference last year when I discovered the uses for a single song from The Lion King:

Ideas for use?

-consider the use of colours (and the transitions)

-camera angles (demonstrating power and submission)

-SYMBOLS! (my students told me they will never watch the movie in the same light!)

UP!

A cool idea for a sweet, sweet film:

Up - Colour Script

Ideas for use?

I love to teach about COLOUR in movies. What a great idea for introducing the use of colour and the symbolism that goes with it.

Grade 9 novel study ideas...

I'm in the midst of planning for next semester. I am wrestling with novel study ideas for my 9s. Normally the three thematic units I like are:

• "Where do we come from?" (intro Shakespeare, pictures, fairy tales, mythology, etc)
• "Who am I?" (right here, right now)
• "Where are we going?" (futuristic, space, goals, dreams)

For the "Who am I?" unit, I am looking at having literary circles for the following:

• The Book Thief - Zusak
• The Boy in the Stripped PJs - Boyne
• The Diary of a Young Girl - Frank
• ??? - something with a strong male protagonist

I'm a little stuck with the fourth one right now... think...think... think...

Blog repurposed!

Some great resources to begin with:

ReadWriteThink

NCTE's website with lesson plans, discussions and plenty of resources...

Teaching Film in High School English Language Arts

Brad Smilanich's film study website - a personal hero!

Web English Teacher

Awesome internet resources for a variety of pieces of literature.

Film Study @ Web English Teacher

Just to get a little more specific....

Let it begin!