A classroom teacher reflects on the benefits of professional development leading to improved and energized student writing. Although traditional professional development sparked interest and encouraged modifications, the support of a teacher inquiry group as ongoing professional development provided the impact needed to effect significant change…

Describes how two different middle school teachers transformed the study of vocabulary in their classrooms by engaging students' interest in words, moving the study of vocabulary into students' worlds through theatre and through word tickets and a student-created museum. (SR)

Describes how one middle school teacher was inspired by Janet Allen's book, "Words, Words, Words: Teaching Vocabulary in Grades 4-12," to significantly change the way she thought about and taught vocabulary. Describes several strategies and activities that engaged students in activating background knowledge; making meaningful connections; learning…

Explains why being able to use the latest electronic technologies has everything to do with being literate. Argues that hypermedia design has particular strengths that help to support student literacy development. Shows how hypermedia design is easily adaptable into current school structures and constraints. Describes how students in a design…

Suggests the authentic audience found on the Internet has a profound effect on the quality of student writing in all grades, and that the key to successful technology projects is integrating them into the curriculum so that computers are a means, not an end. Offers ideas for classroom activities and projects using stand-alone computers, and using…

Looks at how technology has changed an eighth-grade teacher's world of teaching and learning in a variety of ways, including: professional growth; connecting the writing process with word processing; presentation of information (such as short story elements or parts of speech); research on and access to the Internet; electronic literary magazines…

Describes the author's own rough start learning about hypertext, and how she began to introduce her middle school students to hypertext. Observes processes students used working on the hypertext "Slave Narrative Project," a joint project between social studies and English departments in the author's middle school and an American teacher in Ghana.…

Discusses 7 questions developed by the author to evaluate web sites. Offers a list of 42 web sites in several categories useful to middle school teachers both for classroom use and professional development: super-linkers (indexes of useful sites); reference materials; writing instruction; literacy, reading, and literature; and educational…

Describes a project that connected eighth-grade readers and preservice English teachers via e-mail to see how they would create their own world of talking and thinking about literature. Offers 2 case studies that examine how these dialogues helped preservice teachers develop questioning, modeling, and assessing strategies. Concludes that e-mail…

Describes how some middle school teachers in Michigan are becoming proactive in their work to educate and reach out to parents on a day-to-day basis. Describes strategies for community building, for informing parents, and for involving parents. The teachers use these strategies as they inform parents about pedagogical practices and explain why…

Argues that drama is one of the most powerful teaching strategies available in the classroom, in all subject areas. Notes reasons drama is not used much. Describes two drama activities used with seventh-grade students, and how they used it (with excitement) as a way of experiencing, thinking through and representing new understandings. (SR)

Describes how a seventh-grade teacher introduced her students to poetry by having them create performances of rhythmic poems. Describes how her students created moving performances of poems and responded to poetry with deeper and more personal insights than she had ever seen. Describes students' public poetry performances. Offers examples of…

Describes how a seventh-grade class created and presented their own museum as a special research project for an ancient cultures unit. Discusses how the class used drama strategies to frame issues and discussions, and used "processed drama" and "mantle of the expert drama" in extended ways to frame two months of inquiry and a final museum display.…

Describes how an eighth-grade language-arts teacher teaches poetry via performance. Describes how she introduces poetry, performance, and audience. Shows how students (even non-readers and non-achievers) quickly show great eagerness to do poetry with enthusiasm, excitement, and energy; and now perform locally. Includes a poetry portfolio outline…

Argues that, for new immigrant children, literacy education that challenges students to speak and engage in meaningful work (not worksheets and handwriting practice) is the key to initiating them into American culture, to helping them feel this country is their home, and to unlocking their lonely hearts. Focuses on the special problems of Chinese…