Teaching Middle School ELA

I'm sure you've heard the phrase, "Comparison is the thief of joy" more times that you care to.

I know I have ...

However, I'd invite you to sit down and consider what this really could mean for you in your life.

This happened to me just last week when I went to my first yoga class in over two years.

Let's just say yoga is an area where I get to improve quite a bit. (I can barely touch my toes let alone get into some of those poses and HOLD them. 😬)

And as I looked around at how much better everyone else was in the class, I started to feel myself put pressure on my performance.

And when I did that, it completely stole from my experience. I was so focused on not being good enough that I didn't give myself the credit that I deserved.

What I could have done instead was acknowledge myself and my body for being present to what it is capable of. For what it is able to do.

Doing this has the power to shift your whole world because what we tell ourselves actually freaking matters!

The world of teaching can be so incredibly similar.

We see all kinds of things on social media that can make us feel less than. That has us questioning whether we're actually good at our jobs (spoiler alert: you are!).

So I invite you to catch yourself the next time you're in a moment of comparison.

Ask yourself how that thought is really serving you, and what thought you could offer to your brain instead.

Just some food for thought as we work to be the best version of who WE are.

To another week, living intentionally,

Caitlin

On this episode of the Teaching Middle School ELA podcast, we dissect the anatomy of a successful lesson plan — a captivating beginning, a standards-focused middle, and an impactful conclusion. This framework not only ensures your lessons flow effectively but also significantly cuts down planning time, allowing you to leave work at work and actually take back your personal time outside the classroom.

After we cover the components of a successful lesson, we spend time guiding you in the steps to take to effectively string together those lessons throughout your entire academic year. We call this process developing your scope and sequence. Once you follow this process and nail down your scope and sequence, you'll find that everything else seems to fall into place extremely easily. You'll even hear from an EB Teacher who tells us how she was able to actually "Kiss the Sunday Scaries goodbye!"

Of course, we want this feeling for every single middle school ELA teacher!

Tune in to this episode to hear more details about how you can easily begin building your scope and sequence now so that you don't have to spend your summer with the weight of back to school on your shoulders!

FREE RESOURCE: Curious about trying Batch Planning this summer? Simply click the link below to grab our 10 Tips to Get Started Batch Planning and take a look at how easy it can be to begin!

https://www.ebteacher.com/free-10-tips-for-Batch-Planning

Batch Planning is the ONE thing you can do now that will have the biggest impact on your entire school year!

BIG NEWS: The EB Teachers' ELA Portal will officially be open for enrollment this summer! If having access to ALL of the items below sounds helpful to you, then we invite you to take a quick moment to add your name to our priority list today! Are you ready for:

• Hundreds of ready-to-go ELA lessons
• A robust Core ELA Curriculum that includes reading, writing, grammar, and vocabulary covering all of the ELA standards
• Innovative digital lesson planning software
• Hours of on-demand PD videos
• A community of thousands of supportive ELA teachers from around the world

Pretty incredible, right? Click the link below to add your name to the priority list today:

https://www.ebteacher.com/ebtc-priority-list

In this episode of The Teaching Middle School ELA Podcast, Caitlin, Megan, and Jessica continue their Science of Reading series by tackling phonological awareness, a key component of the Word Recognition section of Scarborough’s Reading Rope. Join your hosts as they demystify phonological awareness for middle school teachers, explaining why it's vital for older students and how it can tie into the study of poetry. You'll walk away with ten simple, creative strategies to help students develop their phonological awareness through sound patterns, rhymes, and more. Whether you're new to the concept or looking to deepen your understanding, this episode is filled with practical ideas that you can use in your classroom tomorrow!

I’m sure you can all relate to a feeling that Alexa so openly shared with me today. Sometimes, as teachers, we find ourselves in a rut--lacking inspiration, energy, or confidence in the classroom.

It could be due to a particular unit that isn’t clicking, some classroom personalities that aren’t quite jiving, or simply a time when life outside of school is so hectic, draining, or challenging that our happiness and success at work are affected.

While these feelings and seasons in teaching are totally normal, they still completely suck. There is no doubt about it. Fortunately, Alexa stumbled upon our podcast during one of these very seasons, and in her words, the rest is history!

Links mentioned in this episode:

ebacademics.com/detective

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Other episodes you might enjoy:

• Constructive Criticism: How to Change Your Mindset and Be Open to Feedback
• Mini Literary Analysis Writing PD: Hooking Your Students

Confession time: Do you dread teaching writing? Do you struggle to teach writing and do your students struggle to produce anything passable that doesn’t take you hours to grade? If so, consider what might be your biggest struggle with writing. Whatever the struggle, has writing become your least favorite part of teaching English because it’s just SO. MUCH. WORK?

We want to change that. At EB, we actually focus on 4 pillars that will truly help you look forward to teaching writing because you are confident in HOW to actually teach it and your students are confident in HOW to actually write. Listen in today as we share one of our favorite pillars with you.

Tune in now to hear:

• [1:25] Caitlin starts off today's topic with what makes us dread teaching writing and how much work there is in doing so.
• [2:46] Jessica goes on to list some of the struggles teachers face when it comes to teaching writing.
• [4:23] Jessica touches on one of the 4 pillars that we use at EB that will help you look forward to teaching the subject.
• [4:58] Caitlin goes on to share how providing students with teacher writing samples help them get a better idea on how to formulate their essays.
• [7:10] Jessica talks about the common mistakes we make in teaching writing.
• [8:38] Caitlin touches on the simple yet effective idea of writing a sample essay in advance; she goes on to share how this has become a game-changer in her writing classes
• [13:48] Jessica discusses setting guidelines when providing your students writing samples and some engaging ways you can do it such as breaking down a paragraph sentence by sentence and letting your students creatively construct the paragraph themselves.
• [17:58] Caitlin continues speaking on the importance of this strategy. The sample essays you write can be used for years to come, and you also get to practice your writing skills while you're at it.
• [20:20] If you're interested in learning more about our writing program, you may visit www.ebwritingprogram.com.

Click here to listen now!

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