The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast | ELA Betsy Potash: ELA

Today I want to talk about a subject I’m sure you’ve thought a lot about - how much are you willing to do for your job? And what do you do when you’ve hit your wall?
I want to start by taking you to the dusty steps of the duplex I shared during my first year of teaching. It’s dusk, and I’m crying. I recently won the award for excellence in new teaching at my school, receiving many hugs and congratulations, as well as a raise and kind compliments from my head of school. I should be feeling great, right? I had discovered so much that year in my quest to engage my 10th and 11th graders - how to run Harkness discussions, hold poetry slams, launch play performances, find the gold on the teaching shelves of the Los Angeles Public Library. I had given it everything, and truthfully it had given me a lot back.
But I was thinking of quitting. 
Utterly exhausted, I sat on those steps wondering if I could possibly continue in a career that took this much. Could I continue to work from 7 am to 10 pm? Could I continue to think about my job everywhere - in the car, with my friends, at the beach? Could I find love and family if I was always in my classroom, the dorm, or coaching on the tennis court? 
Wiping my eyes, I ran up those dusty stairs and into my office to find a piece of paper. I made a list of 23 rules for myself. The boundaries I would have to hold if I wanted to continue in the career I loved. I took everything else off my bulletin board and put the rules in the middle. 
Then, I stayed in teaching. And though honestly I’m not sure I was ever better at it than that first year when I made it my whole life, I found that my boundaries helped me enjoy my work as a creative teacher for many years.
Until one night almost a decade later. It was nearly midnight and I had had THE WORST day. Up early to prep something or other, then racing from class to class all morning before taking my advisees out for a special lunch that had been requested by my residential life boss which made me late for a lunch meeting with my 10th grade honors students participating in the portfolio program that had been requested by my academic boss. Then more classes, coaching, a school dinner, an evening of working in the dorm and I was home at 11 with some work to do for the next day. I stared and stared at my computer screen as the rage built up in my mind and eventually led me into my email inbox to open a note to my head of school. 
You can probably imagine it. I kind of wish I still had it. I just let allll my feelings out, which isn’t very common for me. I woke up to a response inviting me to a meeting right away. 
My rage having subsided a bit, I felt awkward when I walked into that wood-paneled office in the administration building. Nothing helps you tap into how you really feel better than a 16 hour workday, and I told my head of school I wasn’t sure I could really capture it all again. He laughed a little awkwardly and said the email did a very good job. We talked for a while, and in the end, he took a huge part of my spring workload off my plate. 
OK, so these are two very different stories about the same thing. Hitting the wall. Thinking about leaving the profession. I can’t pretend to know all the circumstances you’re facing right now, but I’m seeing a lot of folks in our community struggling. If you’re hitting a wall like I have, for reasons of your own, see if you can tap into your feelings and try to create a pivot point. 
It could be personal - like my list of boundaries. Maybe instead of quitting, you radically change how you grade, refuse to give up your prep period, stop agreeing to join committees, only check email twice a day, and commit to taking weekends off. 
Or it could be a line you ask to draw in the sand with your boss - like my midnight letter (though I suggest you approach it more coherently than I did). If you need a change, is it possible you could get one through a letter or a very

With exam season coming up, you're probably looking for some creative ELA review activities.

Whether your school requires that students sit a traditional exam, or you have room for something like the graduation speech final or another type of final project, it's helpful to look back over the big concepts, themes, and texts you've covered as the year draws to a close.

So what options do you have besides printing out a 20 page review packet and giving students time to study it? A lot, as it turns out. Today we're going to explore five of them, in hopes that you'll find a match that feels just right to you.

Before we get started, I want you to know that I'll be running Camp Creative, The Easiest Roadmap to Student Podcasting, in June. Inside this (free) and fun PD, you'll get access to the best models, easiest tech, and complete curriculum to get you and your students started with podcast projects. Everything arrives by email, so even if you're busy the week of June 10-14, you can catch up whenever you get a chance. It just takes 10 minutes a day to go through the materials!

Links Mentioned:

Grab your Copy of the Review Quiz Game Here:  https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1s2HlNyX8Zh9_WYnJsZmTgbbLvGjewzhDnAn8aPgXg2U/copy 

Sign up for Camp Creative Here: https://sparkcreativity.kartra.com/page/camppodcasting2024 
 
Go Further: 
Explore alllll the Episodes of The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast.
Join our community, Creative High School English, on Facebook.
Come hang out on Instagram. 
Enjoying the podcast? Please consider sharing it with a friend, snagging a screenshot to share on the ‘gram, or tapping those ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ to help others discover the show. Thank you! 

Today, I want to highlight a useful tool Amanda Cardenas shared earlier this year on the show called The Sesame Street Quiz. It’s so versatile, so fun, and so helpful that I feel it deserves a show of its own, so here we go. 
Amanda has already shared with us how these work, back in episode 267.
Here’s a quick review: 
A Sesame Street Quiz gives students four items. Three are connected and one is an outlier. For example, if you’re reading Chapter 2 of The Great Gatsby, you might give students the options: Daisy, Jordan, floating, red. Which three are connected and why? Which one is the outlier and why? Amanda lets kids use their book and notes as they respond.
Now, think about this idea of a Sesame Street Quiz. It’s a great way to check in and see which kids are doing the reading, and understanding the reading. But how else might you use it?
It could make a great bellringer or discussion warm-up. Have students make their decisions alone or with a partner, justifying their choices. 
It could make for an intriguing way to review before a final exam. Invite students to consider the key texts of the term, and choose which ones go together and which is an outlier.
It could lead into a fascinating one-pager assessment, with kids creating a visual representation of the three that group together and integrating quotations and analysis in their own words of why those three link.
It could be a helpful exit ticket, to see how well students digested the material from the lesson if you’ve been deep diving into a text.
I bet you can think of lots more uses as well! But however you use it, this week I just want to highly recommend that you give a Sesame Street question a try ASAP. 
 
Related Links: 
Episode 267, with Amanda Cardenas: https://nowsparkcreativity.com/2024/03/so-your-students-arent-doing-the-reading-heres-help.html 
Explore more of Amanda's work: https://www.mudandinkteaching.org/  
 
Go Further: 
Explore alllll the Episodes of The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast.
Join our community, Creative High School English, on Facebook.
Come hang out on Instagram. 
Enjoying the podcast? Please consider sharing it with a friend, snagging a screenshot to share on the ‘gram, or tapping those ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ to help others discover the show. Thank you! 

Have you ever wished you could get students excited about genius hour, then immediately wondered what you’d do if half of them couldn’t think of a topic? Well, today on the podcast, creative teacher Melissa Moser is here to talk about one of her favorite electives to teach - Genius Hour, and exactly how she sets students up for success - even the ones who just don’t know what passion to pursue when it comes to a passion project.

This is a topic near and dear to my heart, and I think you’re going to love all the specifics Melissa shares.

Ooh, and real quick, if you’re wondering what I mean by genius hour, I’d like to suggest you hit pause and go back to episode 122, The Ultimate Guide to Genius Hour. You’ll enjoy this amazing case study so much more once you understand exactly what it means to give your students the time and space to study their own greatest interests in a genius hour project. OK, let’s dive in!

 
Links from Today's Episode:
The Ultimate Guide to Genius Hour (Episode 122)
The Genius Hour Curriculum
Information about The Lighthouse
 
Go Further:
Explore alllll the Episodes of The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast.
Join our community, Creative High School English, on Facebook.
Come hang out on Instagram. 
Enjoying the podcast? Please consider sharing it with a friend, snagging a screenshot to share on the ‘gram, or tapping those ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ to help others discover the show. Thank you! 

 
Welcome to the Thursday edition of The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast, a podcast for English teachers in search of creative teaching strategies. Whether you’re new to the show or a long-time listener, I’m so glad you’re here for this week’s mini episode. Today, I want to share a fun visual trick for helping students vary their sentence structure. 
I never really thought about sentence length until I was writing professionally. Sure, I knew to avoid run-on sentences, how to wield a semicolon, and what an appositive could do. But really it was when I realized I wanted to vary my sentence LENGTH in the articles I was writing for other websites that I started playing with structure more. 
I wanted punchy moments.
I also wanted long, detailed stories that could twist and turn through the text, capturing my reader’s imagination with sensory imagery and vivid descriptions.
The combination of both led to more exciting writing with more varied types of structure. It’s not that I went into a line thinking “I want to use an appositive, three commas, and a semicolon here.” It’s that I was trying to write a long sentence after a short sentence, so I experimented.
There’s an easy way to guide students to do the same thing. I call it “Shaped Stories.” Simply create a handout or slide with a photo at the top, and a big black rectangle down below. Then add white rectangles on the big black one, each a space for students’ sentences going down the page, and make the white rectangles different sizes. Leave a tiny rectangle where a sentence will have to be just two or three words. Then add a wide, tall one where a sentence would have to be complex to fill it. Then try medium-size, and so on and so forth down the page.
When you invite students to set a story inside the picture prompt at the top, ask them to fill each box completely with their sentences. Show them your example, and feel free to review a few types of sentence structures that might help them out. 
When it comes to varied sentence structure, shaped stories are an easy (and fun) hack for helping students practice. That’s why this week I want to highly recommend you take a peek at the visuals in the show notes for inspiration and then give it a try. 
Go Further: 
Explore alllll the Episodes of The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast.
Join our community, Creative High School English, on Facebook.
Come hang out on Instagram. 

Enjoying the podcast? Please consider sharing it with a friend, snagging a screenshot to share on the ‘gram, or tapping those ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ to help others discover the show. Thank you!
 
 
 

Book talk podcasts can provide gentle choice reading accountability, target presentation of knowledge and speaking skills, and build a library of book recommendations for future students.
Not bad, right? Today on the podcast I'm going to walk you through how to launch a book talk podcast with your students, and why it will be fantastic.
Example Script:  https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Aj__-O8kwEJTXr_-3o7AU9B15sSQYIIFyn-cy-HSkUQ/edit?usp=sharing 
 
Go Further: 
Explore alllll the Episodes of The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast.
Join our community, Creative High School English, on Facebook.
Come hang out on Instagram. 
Enjoying the podcast? Please consider sharing it with a friend, snagging a screenshot to share on the ‘gram, or tapping those ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ to help others discover the show. Thank you!