The Joys of Teaching Literature
The Joys of Teaching Literature is a podcast for secondary English language arts teachers who want to make literature study engaging, relevant, and meaningful. It focuses on inspiring creative and curious thinkers and writers in the classroom. Episodes offer practical ideas and encouragement for high school ELA instruction. Listeners can visit theteachersworkshop.com for additional resources.
Episodes
#172: Catch-up Days
Catch-up days allow your students to conference with you about their writing, make sense of their notes, or make up missing work.
#171: 10 Creative Writing Projects
A list of ten creative writing projects for the end of a unit.
#170: Setting Goals with a Writing Portfolio
Put students in charge of their own learning by asking them to set goals when they receive feedback on an essay.
#169: How to Design a Unit Using Essential Questions
It's easy to change a text-based question into an essential question and it will make learning about the topic much more meaningful and interesting for students.
#168: How to Assign One-Pagers and Sketchnotes
Learn how to assign a visual one-pager and celebrate the creativity of your students.
#167: 5 Categories of Literary Techniques
Learn how to categorize literary techniques to make them easier to learn.
#166: How to Use Music in an ELA Classroom
Learn how to ask students to discuss music like you would a poem or story. Create a fun project or assignment related to music.
#165: The Creative Nonfiction Essay
Students appreciate it when there's less academic rules and expectations for writing. Here's how to assign a creative nonfiction essay on a topic of choice.
#164: How Teachers Can Avoid Taking Work Home
It's easy to get distracted at work so here are some tips to stay focused and not bring work home.
#163: How to Create a Positive Classroom Culture and Environment
These five simple methods will help you create a positive and welcoming classroom environment where students feel comfortable sharing their ideas.
#162: Teaching Stories About Modern Media
Instead of getting upset about kids and their phones, let's teach stories about how and why people consume media.
#161: How to Use Freud and Psychoanalysis to Teach Literature
Let's talk about the moving parts of the psyche and how students can use Freud to make a better interpretation of a character's behavior.
#160: A Spatial Approach to Literary Analysis
Give your students six options to create graphic organizers and track the patterns, topics, and motifs of a poem, short story, novel, or play. Posters are a great way to get students out of their seats by collaborating, presenting, organizing their ideas and quotes.
#159: How to Teach Shakespeare
Learn five techniques that will help you teach The Bard.
#158: Reading Blocks in Secondary ELA
Reading blocks held during class time may help students read challenging novels.
#157: Kids, Phones, and Class Participation
Let's think about how to get kids off their phone and tuned into the conversation.
#156: The Best Contemporary Novels to Teach in High School
Here is my list of 9 contemporary novels to teach in high school.
#155: 3 Types of Interviews and Conversations in ELA
Students can present their thoughts in front of the entire class or they can record an interview by using their phone or computer. Here are three types of interviews and conversations that students can record.
#154: Meaning-Making in ELA: 3 Ways to Get Students Invested
If we want students to read and do the work, they need to constantly be in the process of meaning-making. Here are three ways I try to make things meaningful for my students.
#153: Teaching the Podcast Serial, Season 1, Episode 1
Your students will love studying Serial, Season 1 with Sarah Koenig because it's real and relevant.
#152: How to Teach or Assign a Podcast
Give your students options when assigning a podcast. I'll review some techniques that will make creating a podcast easy.
#151: Close Reading Passages in Novels
There are a lot of things to consider when asking students to close read a passage in a novel. Learn some fun activities I do to make it manageable.
#150: 6 Engaging Activities to Analyze a Novel in ELA
Here are six activities to keep on your desk to mix things up when interpreting a novel with your students.
#149: Preventing the Use of AI in ELA
There are all kinds of things English teachers can do to prevent the use of AI, but the most important is to provide verbal feedback while they write.
#148: Media and Genre-Based Units
Instead of unit and thematic-based units with essential questions, you could try media and genre-based units where students study and then create podcasts, poetry, video essays, short fiction, and personal essays.
#147: Creating Relevance in a Modern Classroom
I used two modern short stories to open up conversations about violence, technology, gossip, and surveillance. Students posted links to make connections to two different short stories.
#146: 5 Fun Ways Students Find Quotes
Preparing to write an essay means finding as many quotes as possible to help answer a question, but it can be a fun activity with these five activities.
#145: Meaningful Project-Based Learning for High School English
Bring a new energy to your class with a year-long project that will inspire all of your students and get every hand up in the air. Students deserve a chance to express their thoughts about the world without the pressure of academic analysis. My new online course just opened and you can find it at Teacher's Workshop.
#144: 5 Ways to Handle the ELA Workload
ELA teachers have a ton of work including grading essays, class notes, reading notes, and quizzes, not to mention lesson planning, emails, and meetings. Let's think about how to handle it all.
#143: Character Study: A Whole Novel Activity
Students love to talk about how a character grows and changes because they also experience a lot of change in high school.
#142: 10 Whole Class Discussion Strategies
It seems like it's getting harder and harder to get students to speak in front of the entire class. Learn some strategies to make it easier for kids to share their thoughts.
#141: The Purpose of Literary Techniques and Devices
Instead of listing literary techniques, students should focus on determining their purpose and function. I reduce it to three main purposes to make it easy.
#140: Storytelling, the Personal Narrative, and the College Essay
Start the year with a personal narrative and your students will understand what makes a great story. Or maybe it will help them get into college.
#139: More Fun, Less Stress
Start this school year by having more fun and experiencing less stress. I have three main techniques to get you on your way.
#138: Modern Learning with Free Literacy Blocks
All of your students may not be as obsessed with novels as you are. Free Literacy Blocks will rope in the kids who want to talk about modern topics.
#137: Literary Podcast Unit and Podcast Project
End the year with a creative podcast project instead of a traditional essay.
#136: The Personal, Philosophical, and Political Response to Literature
Students want to find meaning in literature, and they can do it with the three P's of relevance: the personal, the political, and the philosophical.
#135: The Basics of Film Interpretation
Learn how to close read film like you close read a poem. Your students will love it and it's an important life skill.
#134: Mini Writing Conferences: 4 Stages of Feedback
Mini conferences gives your students time to research and write and get verbal feedback as they plan their next steps. Hear about my latest writing assignment.
#133: What is a Teachable Moment?
Teachable moments should be part of our daily approach to teaching fiction, but what are they and how can we talk about them?
#132: 5 Ways to Introduce a Novel
Novels don't have the same visual pizzaz as social media, so we have to find ways to convince students why they should read. I'll go over five ways to introduce novels that should make the idea of reading for such a long time a lot less scary.
#131: Short Story Adaptations
Film adaptations are a great way to get students to imagine how a story could unfold in today's world. I'll describe an assignment I give with Dubliners, by James Joyce.
#130: The Best Engagement Strategy: Scaffolding and Guided Notes
It's easy to keep students focused if they have guide that will lead them to a complete comprehension of the topic. In this episode, I'll describe how I ask my students to take notes in class.
#129: Teaching Media Literacy with Short Stories
Students wake up when they read a story about technology and the media. They have plenty to say about how the media presents reality and in this episode, I'll talk about a small assignment I gave to get those conversations going.
#128: Man Vs. Machine: ELA Vs. AI
The epic battle of man vs. machine goes on and this time, it's the ELA teacher against AI. Listen to my thoughts on what we can do about the robot that writes stuff.
#127: How to Make Learning Personal
While it might be difficult to inspire students to love great novels, it's easier to ask them to think and write about things that are personally meaningful. I'll go over different activities and projects that help make learning more personal for students.
#126: Learning and Exercise: A Conversation with Dr. Reed of ActivEd
Dr. Reed started Walkabouts, an educational technology that teaches students while they exercise. This is an interview that should raise the eyebrow of any teacher looking for a new way to transform their classroom.
#125: How to Avoid Teacher Burnout
There are so many reasons to get stressed out at work, so here are a few ways to avoid burnout.
#124: Extracurricular Activities and the Work-Life Balance
Working outside school with students in sports and activities can be very rewarding but also demanding.
#123: Creative Writing: The Be-All and End-All
Creative writing allows students to be free of all the rules and rubrics and now with modern technology, there are many ways students can express their view of the world.
#122: How to Close Read Poetry and Prose: 5 Steps
Help your students master the complex skill of close reading with these five easy steps.
#121: Academic Success Explained: 7 Steps
Teachers provide many opportunities for students to prepare for an essay or exam. We must map out the process so it's not a mystery.
#120: How to Teach Literary Techniques
Teaching literary techniques can be difficult, and intimidating to students, but there's a way to make it fun and easy.
#119: Video Poems to Watch in Class: Performance and Poetry Film
There are many websites that feature poetry film and poets reading their poems in front of a live audience. Students are more likely to get interested in poetry if they can see and hear it.
#118: How to Inspire Students to Love Reading
The biggest challenge ELA teachers face year to year is how to get to students to not only read the novels we assign, but to love reading them. Here are some tips to inspire students to love reading.
#117: 5 Poems to Start the Year
Starting the year strong is easy with a few straightforward, yet challenging poems.
#116: Great Books to Teach in High School
What makes a great novel? What makes it great to teach? What boxes should it check to make it into the curriculum?
#115: How to Avoid Plagiarism and Cheating: 7 Tricks
It's easy to get upset about plagiarism and cheating, and hard to find a way to reduce the desire to gain an unfair advantage. I'll go over seven methods to discourage cheating in your class.
#114: Classroom Routines: 5 Simple Hacks
Little distractions can add up to a lot of wasted classroom time. Here are five little routines that will help you maximize learning time and eliminate time spent on stressful paperwork stuff.
#113: Free Literacy Blocks
Free literacy blocks allow students to explore a topic or question of choice on a weekly basis for a set amount of time. It's all about freedom, choice, and curiosity.
#112: The Creative Classroom
Students love the creative process behind everything, not just literature. Bringing the worlds of sports, science, visual art, and technology together with the world of literature can lead to exciting conversations.
#111: The Hope Project: Final Reflection
How does it feel to graduate? What have you learned? What is hope? I complete the final assignment I give my seniors at the end of the year, and this is the short audio of my video essay for The Hope Project.
#110: History and Literature
Fiction exists outside the world of history and at the same time, often gives a more accurate account of reality than textbooks. When we discuss a novel, when is it appropriate to bring in a discussion of culture and history?
#109: 5 Musings for Next Year
It's nice to start fresh in the fall. Here are five small things you can do that will help you truly love teaching.
#108: How to Pair Film and Literature
Interpreting the meaning of a frame or shot in a movie is just like interpreting a metaphor or symbol. This week, I'll talk about how I pair film and literature.
#107: Autonomous, Relevant Learning, Good Conversation
It can be really fun to let students go online and choose their own adventure. An open-ended conversation about anything and everything will inspire students to solve the world's problems. Sometimes, it's good to let students educate themselves.
#106: The Research Paper Made Easy: 8 Steps of the Writing Process
Writing a research paper doesn't need to be a stressful experience. I'll go over the eight things I do in class to guide my students through the writing process.
#105: The Hope Project
This year, I'll do something I call "The Hope Project". It gives my students the opportunity to make sense of the year and look forward.
#104: Happy Teacher, Happy Students
If we walk into our class excited and ready to go, our students will too. I'll go over some things I've learned about how to be positive.
#103: Whole-Novel Activities
Teaching topic by topic instead of chapter by chapter makes life easier on you and your students. Whole-novel activities allow students to track the development of a topic through the entire story.
#102: 4 Easy Ways to Talk About Race in School
When students learn about race and culture, they learn about everything. I'll talk about teaching an elective called Racial Literacy and go over four easy ways to talk about race in your ELA classroom.
#101: Filmmaking Made Easy: 10 Tips
My students worked in groups to create a short film in just one week. I'll take you through ten tips to help your students avoid common mistakes.
#100: New Year, New Habits: Reflecting on Reflecting
We should reflect on what works best in our classrooms more than once a year. This week, I'll talk about how both students and teachers should reflect on how to grow and change habits on a regular basis.
#99: Teaching Narrative Mode with Short Stories
Short stories are a great way to introduce the various narrators students might encounter in novels. I'll talk about free indirect discourse, first person narration, internal monologue and all that good stuff.
#98: How to Make Fiction Relevant
It's fiction, it's not real, but it is relevant. I'll describe a writing assignment that forces students to think about how fiction connects to the world we live in.
#97: The Best Secondary English Language Arts (ELA) Blogs, Podcasts and Websites for High School Teachers
There are so many great teachers that share their creative ideas online, and this is one of the best ways teachers can improve and find new ways to inspire students. Visit my blog to find links to all the blogs and websites.
#96: How to Write a Meaningful Conclusion
The conclusion can be a game changer for our students who need a good reason to write. The conclusion is what an education is all about, so let's rethink how we talk about the conclusion.
#95: Hourglass Unit Planning: Large to Small to Large
My units on novels move from the large, external world of the character to the small, internal one (and then back again).
#94: What If We Treat Students Like Athletes?
Wouldn't it be nice if students could get just as excited to come to our classroom as they did for the big game? Or if we had the same attitude toward mistakes, building skills, and teamwork? This week, I'll elaborate on the metaphor, learning is a sport.
#93: Simplifying Rubrics, Checklists, and Feedback
The first time I saw a rubric, I thought, yikes! That doesn't look like a whole lot of fun. So let's think about how we can simplify rubrics so they are easy to understand and useful.
Recommended
پلی لیست | PlayList
Conspiracy Files with Paige Carter
Bad Friends
Learn 50 English Phrases While You Sleep | Everyday English Phrases & Vocabulary
This Past Weekend w/ Theo Von
Dateline NBC
Back to the 80s Radio
Crime Stories with Nancy Grace
Bible Tea
این نقطه
TED Business
Dark Night Tales with Brian King
