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Posts from the ‘From the Classroom’ Category

Jul 22

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From the Classroom: What Does Real-World Writing Look Like?

By Tricia Ebarvia

Speaking on a panel at the NCTE Annual Convention last fall, author Cris Crutcher commented, “Reading Shakespeare is an academic exercise. It’s not one that’s going to get me to love reading.” Though I disagree with him about Shakespeare―I think studying Shakespeare can give us tremendous insight into who we are as human beings and speak to us in profound ways―his remark did give me pause. How many of the things we assign―books, writing assignments―are no more than academic exercises? Read more

Jun 24

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From the Classroom: If You Build It, They Will Come

By Tricia Ebarvia

Last week, I shared how I organize my classroom library. But how did I build my library? How did I know what books to include? And how do I keep it fresh and inviting for students? This week, I share the answers to these questions and more.

START AT HOME

Three years ago, my first attempt at a classroom library was a collection of titles that I’d read during and after college. Well-loved copies of books like A Farewell to Arms, Pride and Prejudice, and Mrs. Dalloway sat along side more contemporary fiction I read for pleasure when I had the time, titles like A Thousand Splendid Suns and The Time Traveler’s Wife.  As an English major and general book nerd, it was a lot of books!  That was also the year I was teaching AP Lit, so many of those “English major” titles were going to come in handy with the independent reading I was planning on having my seniors do.

But I soon realized that while many of these titles were great for AP Lit students, they weren’t so great for my other classes, Read more

Jun 17

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From the Classroom: A Labor of (Book) Love

By Tricia Ebarvia

I wrote earlier this year about my efforts to foster a culture of reading in my classroom. I reflected on the ways reading has shaped how I experience the world. I considered how my reading practices and preferences affect my students, both positively and negatively.

As a result, I dedicated more and more class time to independent reading this year than I have ever before. I replaced mini-grammar exercises with book talks. I read the books my students read and recommended to me. I cut down on whole class novel analysis and gave students what they said they needed most—time. Time to read, read, and read some more.

But I’d be remiss not to also mention that extra ingredient which made our reading community possible: a classroom library. Read more

May 20

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From the Classroom: Reflection as Looking Back, Looking Forward

By Tricia Ebarvia

The other day I announced to my ninth graders that we were about to begin our very last book of the school year, The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini. Some students were, no doubt, excited about the arrival of summer. Others expressed surprise at how quickly the year had gone by.

The end of the school year always brings mixed feelings for me. Read more

Apr 22

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From the Classroom: One Poem, One School

By Tricia Ebarvia

Every year as April approaches, my colleagues and I gather together to make a decision. What poem will we choose to celebrate National Poetry Month this year?

For the last nine years, students at Conestoga High School have marked National Poetry Month with a celebration known as “One Poem, One ‘Stoga.” Each April, every English class takes a break from its regularly scheduled programming to study one poem together. That means that more than 2,000 students, from 14-year-old freshmen to 18-year-old seniors, read the same poem. It’s one of the few shared experiences students have that transcends age, grade, and academic level. Read more

Mar 18

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From the Classroom: How do we build our students’ readerly lives?

By Tricia Ebarvia

A few years ago, I read Kelly Gallagher’s Readicide, and since then, I’ve had to ask myself some tough questions about how and why I teach literature. This passage, in particular, continues to haunt me:

Shouldn’t schools be the place where students interact with interesting books? Shouldn’t the faculty have an ongoing, laser-like commitment to put good books in our students’ hands? Shouldn’t this be a front-burner issue at all times?

Read more

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