A Symphony of Possibilities explores arts-based pedagogies for secondary teachers of English language arts. Drama music poetry public art and visual art are explored in detail by experts in their fields sharing proven methods of instruction with secondary students and teachers.<br xmlns="http://pub2web.metastore.ingenta.com/ns/"/><br/>In an educational environment that privileges scripted curricula and intensive preparation for high-stakes tests the arts offer a more hands-on approach to learning and problem solving challenging students to approach course material in personal and interactive ways. In A Symphony of Possibilities experts in their fields explore in detail arts-based pedagogies for secondary teachers of English language arts focusing on drama music poetry public art and visual art and sharing proven methods of instruction. Through the arts we see teachers and researchers who explore and expand on comprehension memory issues of identity and culturally relevant pedagogies and we see students excited by their active learning. Editors Katherine J. Macro and Michelle Zoss and their contributors provide creative approaches that help teachers accommodate the diversity of their students and their needs as well as move their students into innovative and thoughtful learning spaces. This book goes a long way toward answering the question What is the role of the arts for English teachers?

Grounded in NCTE’s position statements “The Students’ Right to Read” and “NCTE Beliefs about the Students’ Right to Write” this book focuses on high school English language arts classes drawing from the work of seven teachers from across the country to illustrate how advocating for students’ rights to read and write can be revolutionary work.<br xmlns="http://pub2web.metastore.ingenta.com/ns/"/><br/>Drawing from the work of high school teachers across the country Adventurous Thinking illustrates how advocating for students’ rights to read and write can be revolutionary work. Ours is a conflicted time: the #BlackLivesMatter and #MeToo movements for instance run parallel with increasingly hostile attitudes toward immigrants and prescriptive K–12 curricula including calls to censor texts. Teachers who fight to give their students the tools and opportunities to read about and write on topics of their choice and express ideas that may be controversial are in editor Mollie V. Blackburn’s words “revolutionary artists and their teaching is revolutionary art.” The teacher chapters focus on high school English language arts classes that engaged with topics such as immigration linguistic diversity religious diversity the #BlackLivesMatter movement interrogating privilege LGBTQ people and people with physical disabilities and mental illness. Following these accounts is an interview with Angie Thomas author of The Hate U Give and an essay by Millie Davis former director of NCTE’s Intellectual Freedom Center. The closing essay reflects on provocative curriculum and pedagogy criticality community and connections as they get taken up in the book and might get taken up in the classrooms of readers. The book is grounded in foundational principles from NCTE’s position statements The Students’ Right to Read and NCTE Beliefs about the Students’ Right to Write that underlie these contributors’ practices principles that add up to one committed declaration: Literacy is every student’s right.

Already Readers and Writers: Honoring Students' Rights to Read and Write in the Middle Grade Classroom is meant to help all middle school educators encourage their students to build literate lives both within the classroom and well beyond it.

Veteran middle school teacher Jennifer Ochoa has brought together middle school teachers and teacher leaders children’s author and We Need Diverse Books cofounder Ellen Oh children’s literature scholar Kristin McIlhagga reading and writing workshop teacher-author Linda Rief and censorship expert Millie Davis to examine current middle school literacy practices that support students’ rights to read and write.

By showcasing their experiences and activities and positioning NCTE policy statements—The Students' Right to Read and NCTE Beliefs about the Students’ Right to Write—as foundational guiding documents Ochoa and her colleagues prove that even in today’s standards-driven environment authentic reading and writing practices can create literacy-rich middle school classrooms.

As a bonus teachers who don’t have strong support in their schools to implement these practices will find a myriad of suggestions for developing a virtual personal learning network—a grassroots professional development tailored to their needs and interests—that will support them in their efforts to help kids as readers and writers.

About Principles in Practice

Books in the Principles in Practice imprint offer teachers concrete illustrations of effective classroom practices based in NCTE research briefs and policy statements.

Each book discusses the research on a specific topic links the research to an NCTE brief or policy statement and then demonstrates how those principles come alive in practice: by showcasing actual classroom practices that demonstrate the policies in action; by talking about research in practical teacher-friendly language; and by offering teachers possibilities for rethinking their own practices in light of the ideas presented in the books.

Beyond Standardized Truth included in the Principles in Practice imprint is the result of the author’s own efforts to bridge the gap between valuing reading and being able to respond with appropriate instruction or evaluate growth in reading. 

Scott Filkins brings us into his classroom and the classrooms of his colleagues to demonstrate how high school teachers across the disciplines can engage in inquiry-based reading assessment to support student learning. Based in the IRA–NCTE Standards for the Assessment of Reading and Writing Revised Edition the classroom portraits highlight the importance of incorporating genuinely formative assessment into our instruction. 

Filkins unpacks his own history with assessment through engaging “confessions” of his early practices and eventual growth toward a framework that situates reading assessment in an inquiry model. Throughout the book he showcases his colleagues’ attempts to use an inquiry framework including the various tools and documentation methods that help them inquire into their students’ habits and thoughts as readers use formative assessment to fuel the gradual release of responsibility framework and use reading assessment as a means of professional reflection. 

Finally Filkins challenges us to broaden the conversation about assessment to a wider range of stakeholders and offers a vision of assessment as an expression of care for the students in our charge.

A deep dive into the rich resources available for teaching Shakespeare’s plays Bring on the Bard is for every high school teacher—early career to veteran—looking for new hands-on activities to draw students of all ability levels into the work and world of Shakespeare. 

Shakespeare didn’t write his plays for readers; he wrote individual “cue scripts” for actors who hadn’t read the entire play but had to perform on the fly with almost no rehearsal. Those cue scripts have become the written form of his dramas compiled originally in the First Folio of 1623. And the actors’ cues for meaning emotion and emphasis are still embedded in Shakespeare’s language ripe for discovery by today’s students. 

Shakespeare’s plays rightly remain a staple of the ELA curriculum but evolving standards and youth culture itself challenge teachers to put students—not a text—at the center of a reading experience in order to support diverse readers and learners.

How can we do this? 

Experienced educators Kevin Long and Mary T. Christel introduce us to the Folio technique which builds on active drama approaches that position students to engage with a rich text through low-risk speaking and improvisation activities. Without requiring students to become actors the Folio technique helps them to discover the clues the Bard built into his works that allow actors to efficiently understand their characters’ text context and subtext. Teachers can use excerpts from the First Folio along with a mass market paperback or digital edition of a play to help students get closer to Shakespeare’s intentions; understand the language action and emotions of the characters; and perhaps even explore the challenges the Bard’s modern editors face.

The book offers suggestions for using parallel text graphic and abridged editions of Shakespeare’s works as well as activities using cue scripts and a variety of viewing experiences. 

The proverbial “lost art of conversation” has become more than a cliché. Once young people learned the art of conversation outside of the classroom—in their homes in organized social groups and with their peers—but today such human encounters are limited partly because of the ubiquitous presence of technology. Face-to-face conversation offers a different and vital kind of connection one that is at the core of our humanity and essential for a democratic society. As teachers we have a responsibility to help our students find their voices and truly listen to the voices they hear. The strategies and activities described in this book are easily integrated into an already existing curriculum and will allow students to become not only better speakers but better writers better thinkers and better human beings.

Classrooms should be spaces where every child feels safe to bring their whole self to school. This book shows how to set up preK–grade 6 classrooms that support student agency independence and choice. The results of classrooms designed with these goals in mind include: 

• Greater student engagement with curriculum
• Students who know themselves and are empowered as learners
• Students who feel valued and care about their learning as well as the learning of others
• A more cohesive authentic and accepting community of learners
• Opportunities for choice and decision-making by all learners

With examples drawn from real classrooms the authors demonstrate how to make choices in seating materials used books read and more. Special attention is paid to the design of classroom libraries in which a variety of diverse quality books anchor so much of the work in helping young readers and writers grow and learn.

The book is richly illustrated with photos and samples to provide an inside look at classrooms in which children are centered and the teacher is responsive to creating spaces with student agency in mind.

172 pp. 2023. Grades PreK–6

Aimed at accomplished veteran teachers Continuing the Journey offers practical advice encouragement and cutting-edge ideas for today’s English classroom. 

Coauthors Leila Christenbury and Ken Lindblom well-known teachers writers and former editors of English Journal are joined in this book by almost two dozen classroom teachers and researchers. Together they present real strategies for real classrooms and offer teachers ideas insights and support. Focused on literature and informational texts this lively book (the first in a series) is a road map to professional renewal and to becoming a better teacher. Topics include: 

• Changes in you your classroom and your school
• What it means to be a better teacher
• Teaching literary texts and literary nonfiction
• And incorporating the study of informational texts and of social media in your classroom

An innovative feature of the book—the Ideal Teachers’ Lounge—invites the voices of many highly regarded teachers and scholars to engage inspire and inform you about the challenging world of professional teaching. Vignettes from real classrooms infuse the book with practicality. Inviting collegial and knowledgeable Leila and Ken share their experience stories and ideas flavored with drama and humor. If you are a veteran English teacher well beyond the first-year jitters and ready to focus fully on the success of your students and your own professional growth Continuing the Journey both book and series is for you.

In this third book in the Continuing the Journey series Ken Lindblom and Leila Christenbury explore teaching English language speaking and listening. Aimed at veteran teachers yet accessible to highly capable early career teachers this book offers practical advice encouragement and cutting-edge ideas for today’s English classroom.

Drawing on contemporary and foundational research to infuse classrooms with substance and energy the authors focus on authentic assignments with real-world value. 

Topics in this volume include: 

• Understanding and teaching language change and attention to culture
• Fostering audience-responsive communication
• Addressing today’s challenges for in-person and technology-enabled speaking
• Encouraging and assessing respectful talk and multimedia communication
• Managing heated conversations
• Grasping why deep listening may be a lost art and how we can recover it. 

Packed with classroom-ready approaches provocative ideas encouraging insights as well as the authors’ anecdotes and asides this book will entertain educate and inspire teachers who take seriously the importance of language speaking and listening in today’s dynamic world. 

As an added benefit teachers and scholars from across the country add their voices and experiences in the ideal Teachers’ Lounge providing important and diverse perspectives and advice. The Teachers' Lounge contributors: 

• Sydney Bryan
• Kelly Byrne Bull
• Tricia Ebarvia
• Christian Z. Goering
• Sharonica Nelson
• Molly S. Potas
• Kia Jane Richmond
• Jana L. Rieck
• Martha Sandven
• Brian Stzabnik
• Peter S. Willis

About Continuing the Journey 

Continuing the Journey is a five-book series on advanced approaches to teaching English language arts. Written for veteran teachers by Leila Christenbury and Ken Lindblom the books include “From the Teachers’ Lounge” an innovative feature that honors the expertise of both colleagues from the field and highly regarded scholars. Topics addressed in the series include literature and informational texts; language and writing; listening speaking and presenting; digital literacies; and living the professional life of a veteran teacher.

Named one of the 20 Best New Rhetoric Books to Read in 2021 by BookAuthority

Winner of the 2021 Vision Award from the Coalition for Community Writing 

Humanities scholar Aja Y. Martinez makes a compelling case for counterstory as methodology in rhetoric and writing studies through the well-established framework of critical race theory (CRT) reviewing first the counterstory work of Richard Delgado Derrick Bell and Patricia J. Williams whom she terms counterstory exemplars. Delgado Bell and Williams foundational critical race theorists working in the respective counterstory genres of narrated dialogue fantasy/allegory and autobiography have set precedent for others who would research and compose with this method.

Arguing that counterstory provides opportunities for marginalized voices to contribute to conversations about dominant ideology Martinez applies racial and feminist rhetorical criticism to the rich histories and theories established through counterstory genres all the while demonstrating how CRT theories and methods can inform teaching research and writing/publishing of counterstory.

About the CCCC Studies in Writing & Rhetoric (SWR) Series

In this series the methods of studies vary from the critical to historical to linguistic to ethnographic and their authors draw on work in various fields that inform composition—including rhetoric communication education discourse analysis psychology cultural studies and literature. Their focuses are similarly diverse—ranging from individual writers and teachers to classrooms and communities and curricula to analyses of the social political and material contexts of writing and its teaching.

Cross-Talk in Comp Theory is a collection of pivotal texts that mark the rebirth of a field composition studies beginning with the rise of the process movement. It has been thrice revised to account for shortfalls and changing conversations. The second edition paid increased attention to the significance of gender the rise in voices of people of color and the move toward technology. The third edition deepened the conversation on technology and multimodal composing while keeping most of what had been successful in prior editions of the collection.

In this latest edition we recognize that discussions of discourse have become commonplace. Meanwhile issues of social justice—who we teach how we teach and who “we” are—have become much more prescient in our composition classrooms as elsewhere. And as technology evolves so too do our discussions of the role of technology and multimodality in our classrooms.

This important text:

• Maintains the historical perspective of previous editions;
• Provides critical insights into the ever-changing discipline of composition studies; and
• Centers composition scholars and instructors on the challenges and opportunities brought about by changes in today’s students and world.

Whether you’re new to teaching composition or a long-time composition instructor evolving alongside a rapidly changing field requires awareness of where the field has been where it stands and where it’s going to be of sound service to today’s composition students.

Zapata demonstrates how to reinvigorate aesthetic and critical response in early childhood and elementary classrooms through literature explorations of diverse picturebook collections. Drawing on classroom practices she offers approaches and guiding principles that can be tailored to individual contexts through an anti-oppressive lens. Her approach is informed by the ethical work of integrating diverse children’s picturebooks in the classroom a desire to cultivate a critical literature classroom landscape that resists stereotypical representations of people of color in literature and a commitment to recentering critical engagement of diverse picturebooks. Part of the Principles in Practice imprint the book draws on NCTE’s position statement Preparing Teachers with Knowledge of Children’s and Young Adult Literature.

Discussion Pathways to Literacy Learning examines the function of classroom discussion as an essential element in inquiry and literacy learning.

McCann Kahn and Walter provide examples of classroom discussion activities that have been part of an ongoing partnership between university professors and high school English teachers. The book draws on their research into the effect of discussion on literacy learning and offers examples of activities and guidelines for activities that teachers can use in their own practice. Beyond demonstrating the strong impact that authentic discussions have on learning the authors show how participation in discussions can be pleasurable and meaningful experiences for adolescents especially when then can choose the focus for their shared inquiry.

This fun and practical book gives teachers of grades 3–5 teachers both the research and the day-to-day practical activities to expand and empower their students’ vocabulary. 

Upper elementary students will develop a deeper understanding of how the English language works enrich their vocabularies and improve their reading and writing skills through the information and lessons provided by veteran educators Mary Jo Fresch and David L. Harrison. 

Each chapter presents definitions and playful examples (in poetry and prose) to teach: 

• Antonyms synonyms acronyms (and many more “nyms”)
• Similes and metaphors
• Common idioms
• Shades of meaning and word origins 

Practical lessons and activities for each category will engage students in joyful practice. A final chapter offers insights into language choices by eight well-known children’s poets and authors including two former US Young People’s Poets Laureate—Kenn Nesbitt and Margarita Engle—and world-renowned Jane Yolen.

Teacher researcher and consultant Amy Benjamin challenges the idea of “skill and drill” grammar in the second edition of this lively engaging and immensely practical guide. 

Does grammar instruction have to elicit moans and groans from students and teachers alike? Only when it’s taught the old-fashioned way: as a series of rules to follow and errors to “fix” that have little or no connection to practical application or real-world writing.

Benjamin’s enlightened view of grammar is grounded in linguistics and teaches us how to make informed decisions about teaching grammar—how to move beyond fixing surface errors to teaching how grammar can be used as the building blocks of sentences to create meaning. By using sentence patterns mapping visuals and manipulatives Benjamin presents an approach to grammar instruction that is suitable for a variety of student populations.

Although she doesn’t advocate for teaching to the test Benjamin acknowledges the pressures students face when taking high-stakes tests such as the SAT and ACT. Included is a chapter on how to improve students’ editing skills to help prepare them for the short-answer portion of these tests.

The authors share classroom vignettes strategies and resources for “going public” with literacy assessment through teacher collaboration with colleagues with families and with the community.

Teachers want assessment tools and strategies that inform instruction engage students in the process and invite families and community members to enter into the conversation about student learning and progress. When teachers work collaboratively with one another they align beliefs and practices to generate new ideas that reflect the questions they are asking about literacy and learning. When students families and the community are invited to be active engaged participants in these discussions all stakeholders have an opportunity to create a shared vision for literacy learning and to construct assessment tools and strategies that help everyone answer the important questions: “How as teachers are we engaging with one another over our literacy assessment beliefs and practices?” and “How can we better bring families and communities into these conversations?” 

In this volume of the Principles in Practice Literacy Assessment strand of books veteran educators Kathryn Mitchell Pierce and Rosario Ordoñez-Jasis share classroom vignettes strategies and resources for “going public” with literacy assessment through teacher collaboration with colleagues with families and with the community. Drawing from the IRA–NCTE Standards for the Assessment of Reading and Writing Revised Edition and their own extensive experience the authors have compiled a set of collaborative assessment principles as well as a model for teacher professional development around assessment to guide teachers from assessment theory to practical implementation in the classroom. 

Teachers are at the heart of assessment conversations because they have up-close and personal experiences with how assessments impact their students. These experiences provide an invaluable perspective that is essential to all decision making about assessing student learning. But teachers don’t—or shouldn’t—stand alone. Their critical expertise is strengthened by the experiences and expertise of others invested in the success of our students—colleagues families communities and students themselves.

In Growing Writers veteran teacher educator Anne Elrod Whitney explores how the principles defined in NCTE’s Professional Knowledge for the Teaching of Writing position statement can support high school writers and teachers of writing through knowledge and a conscious search for meaning in our writing activities. 

When principles guide our teaching we can better understand our teaching purposes make decisions about approaches and content vet ideas supplied by others and grow as teachers of writing. As part of the Writing in Today’s Classrooms strand of the Principles in Practice imprint the book includes snapshots from high school teachers working in a variety of settings who illustrate how their own principled classroom practices have helped both them and their students to grow whether they are writing for advocacy learning the importance of revision experimenting with new audiences or embracing the vulnerability and the power of writing. 

The principles come alive through the author’s analysis and friendly discussion and the contributing teachers’ everyday practices. Whitney’s compassionate support and encouragement of active ongoing learning is supplemented by further-reading lists and an annotated bibliography of both print and digital texts to accompany us on our journeys to ever-greater effectiveness as writers and teachers of writing.

Even from the earliest grades children have the rights to read and write—not just in dominant American English but also in their own languages and dialects.

Young children make meaning and make sense from the earliest years. They read facial expressions engage in interactions and read symbols across a variety of named languages. Historically narrow definitions of reading and writing however often prevent children of color and immigrants from having access to texts that reflect their diverse cultures and backgrounds. Classroom materials also often don't reflect the growing majority of multilingual children of color compromising their right to access texts that reflect their cultural values language practices and historical legacies.

Promoting equitable inclusive and plural understandings of literacy Mariana Souto-Manning and eight New York City public school teachers explore how elementary teachers can welcome into their classrooms the voices values language practices stories and experiences of their students who have been minoritized by dominant curricula cultivating reading and writing experiences that showcase children's varied skills and rich practices.

Readers are invited to enter classrooms where teachers have engaged with the principles detailed in two NCTE position statements--NCTE Beliefs about the Students' Right to Write and The Students' Right to Read--in the pursuit of justice. Collectively their experiences show that when teachers view the communities their students come from as assets to and in school children not only thrive academically but they also gain confidence in themselves as learners and develop a critical consciousness. Together stepping into their power they seek to right historical and contemporary wrongs as they commit to changing the world.

About Principles in Practice

Books in the Principles in Practice imprint offer teachers concrete illustrations of effective classroom practices based in NCTE research briefs and policy statements.

Each book discusses the research on a specific topic links the research to an NCTE brief or policy statement and then demonstrates how those principles come alive in practice: by showcasing actual classroom practices that demonstrate the policies in action; by talking about research in practical teacher-friendly language; and by offering teachers possibilities for rethinking their own practices in light of the ideas presented in the books.

In Just Theory David Downing offers an alternative history of critical theory in the context of the birth and transformation of the Western philosophical tradition. 

Rather than providing a summary survey it situates the production of theoretical texts within the geopolitical economy of just two pivotal cultural turns: Cultural Turn 1 (roughly 450–350 BCE) looks at the Platonic revolution during which a new philosophic universalist and literate discourse emerged from what had long been an oral culture; Cultural Turn 2 (roughly 1770–1870) investigates the Romantic revolution and its nineteenth-century aftermath up to the Paris Commune. 

While focusing on the quest for social justice Downing situates the two cultural turns within deep time: Cultural Turn 1 gave birth to the Western philosophical tradition during the Holocene; Cultural Turn 2 witnessed the beginnings of the shift to the Anthropocene when the Industrial Revolution and the fossil fuel age began to alter our complex biospheres and geospheres. As described in the epilogue the aftereffects of Western metaphysics have dramatically shaped our twenty-first-century world especially for teachers and scholars in English and the humanities.

From synesthetic poems to questioning poems to the ghazal Lightning Paths: 75 Poetry Writing Exercises has something fun or fascinating for every student and teacher as they explore the possibilities of poetry writing. 

The exercises teach and utilize technique while also focusing on and inspiring the intuitive and imaginative qualities of poetry. Each poem type includes an introduction explaining the exercise’s goal detailed instructions and a student example. The 75 activities are divided into three sections: 

• Exercises that focus on different types of imagery and ways to generate fresh imagery
• Exercises born out of unusual prompts and ideas that engage a writer’s experiences in the real world 
• Exercises related to what form might look like or how it might function 

>Kyle Vaughn invites every writer to explore the power of poetry illuminating the way through the endless possibilities for inspiration.

This book demonstrates how researchers and practitioners in writing and rhetoric studies can engage in story work across differences in culture language locations and experience. Based on an ethnographic study in Nepal spanning a decade Author Katie Silvester speaks with and to the stories of Bhutanese women in diaspora learning English later in life during resettlement and in the context of waves of social change brought on by the end of their asylum. In the process she demonstrates how researchers and practitioners in writing and rhetoric studies might:

• Engage in literacy work across differences in culture language location and experience;
• Reconfigure and reformulate with others how we come to understand the literacy hope and violence in specific migrations; and
• Use the stories that students bring with them to the classroom about their backgrounds to promote literacy learning.

The stories in this book aren’t just powerful; as the world becomes smaller and instructors everywhere find themselves teaching students of increasingly diverse backgrounds this book provides insight for teaching literacies across cultural landscapes. 

An expansive look at the discipline of writing studies with a focus on serving and supporting first-year writing students and instructors at open access institutions.

There is a huge gap between perceptions of the field of writing studies and the material realities of those who teach in it. Materiality and Writing Studies: Aligning Labor Scholarship and Teaching argues for the centering of the field’s research and service on first-year writing particularly the “new majority” of college students (who are more diverse than ever before) and those who teach them.

The book features the voices of first-year writing instructors at a two-year open-access multi-campus institution whose students are consistently underrepresented in discussions of the discipline. Drawing from a study of 78 two-year college student writers and an analysis of nearly two decades of issues of the major journals in the field of writing studies Holly Hassel and Cassandra Phillips sketch out a reimagined vision for writing studies that roots the scholarship research and service in the discipline squarely within the changing material realities of contemporary college writing instruction.

About the CCCC Studies in Writing & Rhetoric (SWR) Series

In this series the methods of studies vary from the critical to historical to linguistic to ethnographic and their authors draw on work in various fields that inform composition—including rhetoric communication education discourse analysis psychology cultural studies and literature. Their focuses are similarly diverse—ranging from individual writers and teachers to classrooms and communities and curricula to analyses of the social political and material contexts of writing and its teaching.

The nature and tools of writing have changed. Today’s students compose and read chunks of webtexts and short text messages while they are on the move. If compositionists wish to be pedagogically relevant they need to think more carefully about how their students read and compose texts and where they do so.

More and more young people are choosing to write a variety of texts in a variety of locations because technologies make it possible. As a result educational scholars are developing new understandings of how to incorporate such technologies into the classroom. To that end this book provides practical resources and assignments for writing instructors who are interested in a pedagogy that makes use of mobile technologies. Editor Claire Lutkewitte and her contributors explore both writing for and about mobile technologies and writing with mobile technologies. 

Coming at a time when instructors are pressured to be professionally innovative but are rarely provided ideal circumstances in which to do so this book offers: 

• A starting point for instructors who haven’t yet used mobile technologies in the classroom
• Fresh ideas to those who have and proof that they are not alone
• And a call of reassurance that we can do more with less

In Nonfiction Writers Dig Deep some of today’s most celebrated writers for children share essays that describe a critical part of the informational writing process that is often left out of classroom instruction. 

To craft engaging nonfiction professional writers choose topics that fascinate them and explore concepts and themes that reflect their passions personalities beliefs and experiences in the world. By scrutinizing the information they collect to make their own personal meaning they create distinctive books that delight as well as inform. 

In addition to essays from mentor authors the book includes a wide range of tips tools teaching strategies and activity ideas from editor Melissa Stewart to help students (1) choose a topic (2) focus that topic by identifying a core idea theme or concept and (3) analyze their research to find a personal connection. By adding a piece of themselves to their drafts students will learn to craft rich unique prose. 

Featuring essays by Sarah Albee Chris Barton Donna Janell Bowman Mary Kay Carson Nancy Castaldo Jason Chin Lesa Cline-Ransome Seth Fishman Candace Fleming Kelly Milner Halls Deborah Heiligman Susan Hood Gail Jarrow Lita Judge Jess Keating Barbara Kerley Heather Lang Cynthia Levinson Michelle Markel Carla Killough McClafferty Heather Montgomery Patricia Newman Elizabeth Partridge Baptiste Paul Miranda Paul Teresa Robeson Mara Rockliff Barb Rosenstock Laura Purdie Salas Anita Sanchez April Pulley Sayre Steve Sheinkin Ray Anthony Shepard Anita Silvey Traci Sorell Tanya Lee Stone Jennifer Swanson Stephen R. Swinburne Don Tate Laurie Ann Thompson Pamela Turner Patricia Valdez Sandra Neil Wallace Laurie Wallmark Jennifer Ward Carole Boston Weatherford Lee Wind Paula Yoo and Karen Romano Young.

An insightful and informative guide for many of the situations and issues high school English Language Arts teachers face every day.

From four veteran teacher educators On the Case in the English Language Arts Classroom offers twenty case narratives as well as a format for discussion professional resources that can inform decisions and a guide to constructing new case narratives that can expand the possibilities for developing powerful problem-solving strategies.

Being a high school English teacher is both rewarding and difficult. Although teacher education programs try to be thorough they can’t prepare preservice teachers for every situation that might arise. For instance:

• How can an ELA teacher work with learners who have suffered significant trauma?
• How can a well-prepared literature instructor teach high school students the basics of reading?
• Should a teacher shy away from classroom conversations because they can become “too political”?
• How does a teacher contend with a crushing workload?

On the Case in the English Language Arts Classroom provides teachers at any point in their career the opportunity to analyze potential situations and problems that commonly confront teachers through case studies that prompt extensive stimulating discussion and invite written responses.