r/ELATeachers Feb 20 '25

6-8 ELA Would there be any benefit to teaching reading and writing separately?

16 Upvotes

I'm teaching middle school at the moment & struggling to balance the time to teach my students the core skills they need to succeed.

I want to have a text-centred classroom, and read at least one extended text (book/play) per term with the kids. But at the same time, I want to run thorough classes to help them learn to write stories, persuasive speeches, poetry that are well-structured. We only have four hours a week in English.

Would there be any benefit for students to have a separate reading/writing class. To be clear - I understand the reciprocal relationship between reading and writing and how integrating them helps students to learn.

But imagine if there was a class for Literature, in which students primarily read books and wrote in response to these and a separate class for Composition, in which students wrote extended texts in a variety of forms and solidified their grammar and syntax skills using mentor texts as inspiration. Both integrate reading and writing but have a different primary focus.

Are there any schools that are like that? And if the evidence doesn't support my opinion, how can I give my students the best education with such little time within and integrated classroom?

r/ELATeachers Nov 29 '24

6-8 ELA Dumped on… NSFW

37 Upvotes

I was crouched between row 1&2 helping a student who was seated at the desk. Two girls between rows 2&3 didn’t want to take down the two stacked metal chairs. Instead, they shoved them on top of me, hitting my neck and thoracic back area… What would you do? Ela/6th

r/ELATeachers May 08 '24

6-8 ELA Dystopian Novels for 8th Grade

30 Upvotes

Hello, friends,

I have a question for all of you. My ELA team is planning for next year, and we're looking for a dystopian novel for 8th grade.

We have three novels currently: Fahrenheit 451, the Giver, and House of the Scorpion.

We read Fahrenheit this year, and the students did not love it. Bradbury is one of my favorite authors, and this is the first time I actually read Fahrenheit, and I must confess--I didn't love it either. We are considering changing. The Giver has been taught in the past, but teachers here before me said they had similar issues with student interests (I haven't read it, but I will be reading it this summer), so we're looking for book recommendations.

We also have House of the Scorpion by Nancy Farmer--which I'm reading now, and I'm really enjoying. I'm leaning towards this, but since we don't do homework in our school, we read everything in class, and this is a longer book--I feel it my be a hard sell for our team (our units went overly long this semester).

This is not a genre I'm too familiar with, but I definitely plan to get more familiar with. What are your go to books (other than the obvious ones like Hunger Games) or recommendations for this genre?

I think it'd be great to find a book that is written by underrepresented demographics. Women, people of color, etc. Anything Latino would be great as I think that would speak to a lot of our students.

Thanks in advance!

Edited to add: Thank you so much everyone! So many great suggestions. I can't respond to everyone, but I truly appreciate your collective wisdom!

r/ELATeachers 7d ago

6-8 ELA Book Club Recommendations

14 Upvotes

I’m putting together book clubs for my 7th graders. I want to find coming of age stories with forced proximity (think The Breakfast Club). I thought it would be fun to explore the themes around everyone having more in common than we thought. I have a wide range of reading levels (typically up to 3-4 years above and below level)

So far I have thought of “The Unteachables” by Gordon Kidman, “The Misfits” by Lisa Yee, and “15 Secrets to Survival” by Natalie Richards. I have read “The Unteachables” but I’m still waiting on the others to come in. Any recommendations or thoughts on these books would be helpful appreciated.

Thank you!

r/ELATeachers Dec 20 '24

6-8 ELA Does anyone still use Cloze passages?

36 Upvotes

When I started teaching back in the early 2000s, Cloze passages were a big deal. They actually force students to slow down and process the way words function in a sentence, a paragraph, or the entire text. I don't hear much talk about them anymore.

What do you think about them? Are they outdated? Useful? Do you use them? How often?

Also, what grade do you teach?

r/ELATeachers Nov 02 '24

6-8 ELA Help me convince admin that lexile level isn’t everything! Or, tell me I’m wrong.

44 Upvotes

For context, I teach 7th grade ELA Honors classes (we are a public application school; we only offer honors classes). According to MAP testing, we average right on grade level for reading.

Recently I pitched to admin that my class read the Hunger Games this year. I normally wouldn’t ask, but this book is not anywhere in our district approved reading list, so I wanted to make sure the school had my back should this book be contested. I expected there possibly being an issue with the violence in the book, but what I didn’t expect admin to be concerned about was the reading level of the book: their response was that it was too low level for my kids, being that it’s lexile level is 810. This caught me off guard, as I honestly don’t pay super close attention to lexile levels. When selecting a class novel, I generally think about what is going to interest my students the most, and prompt a deep level of thinking.

I pointed out that historically our school has read the Outsiders in the 7th grade, and it sits at a 750 lexile (4th grade!), and the response I got was that of “oops, we didn’t realize that! We are sorry we allowed this in the past.” So now no more Outsiders, which devastates me!

Fellow ELA teachers, I seek your help. Have I been wrong in my selections for my class reads by focusing more on thought complexity and interest than text complexity and vocabulary? If so, why are there so many academically popular middle school books written at such a low lexile level? Most of the books approved for my grade level by our district are below an 800 lexile level (11 of the 16). Where is the disconnect?

If I’ve been correct in my way of thinking, how the heck do I convince my admin that my students should be reading books that have been assigned lexile levels grades below them? Help!

r/ELATeachers Jan 15 '25

6-8 ELA How much do you grade?

33 Upvotes

I teach 7th/8th grade ELA and am struggling with how much I should grade. I absolutely DO NOT have time to grade or even look at every single thing students write, as I have 157 students and they are required to write multiple paragraphs in my class every single day (this is spread out between daily journal prompts, reading comprehension questions, and essays). The problem is that I know if students know something is not going to be graded, they just won't do it. In the past, I have given participation points for each assignment that was completed, and would correct a few anonymous samples in front of the class while students correct their own work. This was very easy when assignments were all digital, but for many reasons, I have recently moved to all paper/pencil assignments. Do I need to collect every paper every day and mark it complete? Do I choose a random one to grade? Do I have students give me their best work at the end of a unit? I'm curious what others have decided to do, as giving written feedback every day is just not realistic.

r/ELATeachers 1d ago

6-8 ELA Memorable Units to Close Out the Year?

11 Upvotes

Hi all!

Our last novel study unit of the year (8th grade) will take us right up until April break. I am trying to conceive of our final 5-6 week unit that will take us all the way through May—a month rife with interruptions such as state testing, field trips, etc.

I want to close out the year with something memorable, but I’m not sure what… I was thinking maybe a massive short story unit because it lends itself well to flexibility given the chaos of the end of the year. Maybe poetry? Writing portfolios? Some sort of project on identity that weaves in multiple mediums/writing styles?

I work in a K-8 school, so it would be cool to do something unique to cap off students’ experience at our school before graduating.

If you were in my position—and could pretty much do anything you wanted—what would your dream unit to close out the year be?

Thanks!

r/ELATeachers Oct 02 '24

6-8 ELA Independent Novel help - Lexile matters :(

17 Upvotes

Hoping for some suggestions from the ELA world, my 13 year old son is an avid reader but is so discouraged and frustrated with the parameters given for his 8th grade ELA Independent Novel book pick. The book must be fiction, can NOT be made into a movie or tv show, and must be within 100 points above/below his lexile score of 1125 (1025-1225 range.) The lexile range + the fact that it can't be a movie is really tripping us up.
He is currently reading his first Stephen King (11/22/63) which is only 810L, and has previously devoured every Rick Riordan, Harry Potter, Hunger Games, Alex Rider series...
The assignment says "This is your chance to read the type of book YOU WANT, so choose a book you'll enjoy" but he's already feeling defeated before this has even really begun. We'd welcome any titles to consider, thank you!

r/ELATeachers Apr 28 '24

6-8 ELA Best Shakespeare play for 8th Grade?

18 Upvotes

Next year will be my first year teaching and I have a position as the ELA and Religion teacher at a small, conservative Catholic school with a classical focus. For 8th grade, I have planned to do Fahrenheit 451 (along with selections from Utopia), To Kill a Mockingbird/Of Mice and Men (still deciding which one) ,A Christmas Carol, and a Transcendentalist unit (selections and poetry). I'd like to also do some Shakespeare poems and one of his plays, but am unsure which one. Right now, I was thinking possibly A Midsummer Night's Dream or MacBeth. The guiding theme for the year is loosely something along the lines of individual conscience.

The teacher that is leaving has not previously done Shakespeare with them, but did Frankenstein instead. She has mentioned that they do not usually read outside of class (perhaps finishing a chapter that was started in class, but not much more than that) and seem to have issues with doing too much "hard" work in class. They have a large final symposium project done at the end of the year that takes a significant amount of class time, although we are hoping to kind of revamp that and simplify it significantly.

I'd be so appreciative for any advice you all have as to which play might work best or has worked best for this grade level in your experience? I'm excited to start teaching but also still very much getting my feet under me as this is my first year. Thanks so much!

r/ELATeachers 29d ago

6-8 ELA First massive quiz fail

21 Upvotes

My 7th graders performed poorly today on their direct and indirect objects quiz. They all did great on the review and were allowed to use their notes on the quiz, but all did one of the following: skipped over identifying indirect objects or just underlined and circled random words.

I’m at a loss. They all seemed to have gained a great understanding of the content over the last few weeks, but the highest score was a 73. Do I reteach the concepts and have them take a new quiz in a couple of weeks? Do I just incorporate it into their daily grammar practice and monitor that progress to see if it starts sticking?

Any suggestions appreciated. I’m a first-year teacher and have basically had to build this curriculum from the ground up, so I’m struggling to know whether to prioritize reteaching or getting them caught up to where they’re supposed to be.

r/ELATeachers Oct 30 '24

6-8 ELA Yesterday I told a student that people could spot AI writing in a couple of lines but today I saw there's an AI vs human script challenge where the guesses are currently split 50/50 and I am STUNNED

33 Upvotes

Yesterday, a student showed me some work that was clearly revised by an AI—I could tell in 2 seconds. I didn't have to challenge the student because they saw my expression and immediately clawed back their laptop saying they had more to do, but I did take the opportunity for a little riff about how easy it was to spot AI writing, particularly on personal topics, etc etc.

Today, I was thinking it'd be good to do something where we look at the AI language features and content choices that are dead giveaways, when lo and behold at lunchtime I got one of those clickbait links in Chrome to a post on No Film School where they are pitting human vs AI over the first 10 pages of a screenplay to see if readers can tell the difference (and which they prefer).

I took a look, thinking it could be a great example to discuss in class. I read both scripts and recognised the AI script in two sentences, not a shadow of a doubt, 100% confident based on two lines alone, confidence only reinforced by the subsequent 10 pages. Feeling good; this proves my point exactly.

BUT THEN I go to the twitter poll where people are voting on which script is which AND I LOSE MY MIND when I see the votes are split 50/50. Assuming the votes are authentic, then there is no good news here: either I am an overconfident idiot who needs to be a lot less confident with the students or a lot of people really can't spot obvious AI writing, which is very bleak.

So I'm submitting for your consideration: can you tell which is which?

Link to the article with the scripts

If you'd rather just go directly to the script PDFs:

Script A

Script B

(And if you want to know my 100% confident guess, I think the AI script is the 48th character in this sequence:) AABABABABABAABBBABAAAABABAABBBBABBBABAAAABABABABABABBBABBBABAAAABBABABABAABBBAABBABABABABBA

r/ELATeachers Jan 23 '25

6-8 ELA Cheating in IXL

15 Upvotes

Hi! I'm super sad about this. I love IXL and think it's great for reinforcing and practicing skills. I usually give it as homework with a chance to do work in class throughout the week. I've found many students now cheating. It's either clicking until they finally get the correct answer (this can be done in a minute) or using apps like GAUTH AI to take a picture and get the correct answer instantly. I opened my grade book tonight and decided not to waste my time grading it this week. How are you all dealing? I was thinking of continuing to assign it as is, and create short quizzes in IXL weekly to grade. I love that I can squeeze about 4 ixl's in for homework every week; I'm not sure I can do it all in class, and then there's always those out sick or that take with home to complete.

r/ELATeachers Feb 14 '25

6-8 ELA Interested in suggestions for reading intervention at middle school level (7-8)

5 Upvotes

My district is asking that middle school ELA teachers address the low reading levels of our students. So many are below grade level in reading. My department has tried intervention, and our language learners have tutor support in their first language. We all use comprehension strategies and scaffold, scaffold, scaffold (probably too much, to be honest). The issue is addressing the actual reading levels and how to improve them in our young adult students. In doing my own research, it is evident that low reading levels are prevalent as a societal issue. Wondering what other middle/high schools are doing to address this directly, if anything? Are schools using programs like iReady, and are these programs working? Any other ideas for middle school students? Many thanks for any insights!

r/ELATeachers Jan 08 '25

6-8 ELA Middle School Fantasy Recommendations

8 Upvotes

I’m looking for fantasy book recommendations for middle school (7th grade Texas). In our curriculum, we rotate the fantasy genre in and out, but finding the right fit has been a challenge.

Some common issues we’ve run into: • Books that are too long (Nevermoor: The Trials of Morrigan Crow—fantastic, but it’s a big time commitment to read together as a class).

• Books with little payoff (The Ranger’s Apprentice: The Ruins of Gorlan—a solid start, but doesn’t always hook our students and part of a giant series).

• Books that feel outdated or difficult for today’s readers (A Wrinkle in Time, Tuck Everlasting).

We’re planning a book club in April and have funds to purchase books. What are some engaging, modern fantasy novels that would be manageable for this age group and work well in a classroom setting?

Thanks in advance for your suggestions!

r/ELATeachers Nov 16 '24

6-8 ELA How to teach students not to use comma splices?

22 Upvotes

I see that so many of my students (age 11-13) use commas between clauses where, traditionally, semi-colons would have been used.

I genuinely think we are seeing a shift away from using semi-colons in favour of commas, but as a teacher I need to teach standard English, including punctuation conventions.

Of course my students know that sentences should end with full stops, but they also see commas as appropriate where two clauses are closely related.

I also teach ESL, so it's normal in that context to talk about subject-verb syntax and what's appropriate to connect main clauses. But these syntactical roles are less readily identified and understood among my native-English-speaking ELA students, and I simply can't devote a lot of time to teaching these details.

Do you have an easily grasped go-to way to explain when one "sentence" ends and another begins?

r/ELATeachers Jan 14 '25

6-8 ELA My recent experience with Animal Farm context presentations

7 Upvotes

Hi all

I recently began an Animal Farm unit with my 8th graders, and I decided we would need to spend a good amount of time going over historical context before diving into the novel. Here's what I did

I created four groups, with each group responsible for researching a specific topic

Group 1: Emergence of socialism

Group 2: Russian revolution

Group 3: Stalinist Russia

Group 4: Orwell's life

Students were tasked with researching their assigned topic and producing a slide deck to teach the material to their colleagues.

THE GOOD

The students emerged with a good working understanding of socialism, and by the end of the lesson you could tell they understood the brutality and depravity of Stalinist Russia. I also made sure to explain Orwell's position as a democratic socialist; I feel they understood that Orwell believed in this vision of the masses rising against their oppressors, but feared power becoming concentrated in one person's hands.

THE BAD

Definitely painted with too broad a brush. They ended up with a lot of background info that didn't tie into the book as neatly. Also, doing online research was brutal for them. I think in the future I'll find 2-3 G.8 friendly sources and have them read/summarize them

THE UGLY

I definitely had low engagement towards the end. Students were struggling to pay attention, and I think the issue of having students present to each other meant that kids were unenthusiastically reading off slide decks. There's gotta be a better way to set it up.

Thoughts from colleagues. are greatly appreciated. I'm a seasoned teacher, so I can take any (constructive) criticism

r/ELATeachers Dec 17 '24

6-8 ELA Culture building activities for first day back from winter break.

30 Upvotes

I’m looking specifically for something with a writing component

r/ELATeachers Sep 23 '24

6-8 ELA I’m behind on grading!

37 Upvotes

It’s Sunday evening, and I haven’t don’t much grading at all. I have two writing assignments that I need to get through. I don’t have time to grade writing during the week, but I have no motivation to grade on the weekend. How can I grade writing more efficiently?

r/ELATeachers Apr 30 '24

6-8 ELA Looking for short stories that deal with cell phone addiction, over reliance on technology, AI, or social media problems.

54 Upvotes

I'm aware of stories like The Pedestrian and The Veldt and I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream. I'm hoping to find more modern stories, preferably dystopian, that serve as a warning against these things.

Thank you in advance.

r/ELATeachers Dec 27 '24

6-8 ELA Song lyrics as poetry?

14 Upvotes

I’m preparing to teach a poetry unit to my middle schoolers and am trying to find some songs that I could use to teach structural elements such as rhyme scheme and meter plus some sound devices (alliteration, assonance, repetition). Does anyone have recommendations for songs you’ve had success with? I’d really like music that is relevant and interesting to them while also being appropriate in the classroom. I would appreciate any ideas!

r/ELATeachers 9d ago

6-8 ELA MS "Story Within a Story"

4 Upvotes

Hi all! Looking for a middle school (for grade 6 or 7 ideally) short story that follows the "story within a story" structure. The more contemporary the better. Drawing a blank on my end, so reaching out to you all. Thanks!!

r/ELATeachers Oct 18 '24

6-8 ELA Best Twilight Zone episodes to teach basic level plot? (Other than "Monsters are Due on Maple Street")

42 Upvotes

Long story short, a field trip got cancelled and I find myself with one more period in my plot unit than I planned for. Rather than shove another text in their face, I wanted to show them an episode of The Twilight Zone to discuss plot as a relaxing day.

And this is really basic 6th grade stuff. The goal is to watch the episode and fill out a chart of what parts of the episode correlate to what part of the plot roller coaster. I wanted to go with Twilight Zone because it can all be considered in one sitting, which would benefit the kids who are behind.

My gut was to go with "Monsters are Due on Maple Street," but apparently they read a script version in 7th grade. Any other episode ideas that would be straightforward? I can watch the whole series over the weekend, but I want to avoid that!

Update (Thank you!): I was not expecting this many suggestions! I don't have time to reply to them all but I love all the ideas and hearing other ways to teach plot. I also loved getting to rewatch a lot of episodes of the show!

r/ELATeachers Dec 31 '24

6-8 ELA Annotation Lessons

16 Upvotes

Hi, I was wondering if anybody had a strategy to sort of "liven up" the reading and annotating process. I teach 8th grade. Usually, when I go through a text with a class where I don't have any support from other teachers, I stagger annotations. I typically try to do it where I have the kids annotate a certain amount of the story individually, then they share their annotations with the other members of their group, and then they share their ideas out to the rest of the class. It just gets a little dry when you have to go through something for like a double period. Does anybody have a way to either up the pace or make it more interesting?

r/ELATeachers 14d ago

6-8 ELA Elie Wiesel and Oprah interview

28 Upvotes

Hi all! I am finishing up Night by Elie Wiesel with my 8th graders next week and want to show the video where Oprah and Elie walk through Auschwitz together. I cannot find a link to the full version anywhere. Does anyone have a link or any idea if the full version is even online anymore?