Voices from the Middle - Volume 25, Issue 1, 2017

This article examines the utilization, implementation, and impact of an original writing lesson—the anthem essay. The anthem essay lesson was designed to prepare preservice teachers to teach a structured writing lesson for middle level writers. This culturally relevant lesson prompted emerging writers to focus on and interrogate social issues at play in their personal lives and within their communities. Through dialogue, discussion, and collaboration, students were prepared to write community—that is, when writing is not only for the individual, but linked to how we belong with each other in the world. In other words, students write within and for community. The anthem essay invited and centered student ideas while interrupting traditional ways of teaching essay writing for young adolescent writers.

This article reflects a teacher’s realization that, while her catchy songs and mnemonics geared toward the young adolescent sense of humor help students memorize rules, they do not really foster authentic understanding or deeper thinking about any of the content they create. After reading “Anthem or Nah?”, Anderson adapted one of her writing lessons and was able to get her students more engaged in not just writing, but in their thinking about themselves, their classmates, and society as a whole.

This column helps show readers ways to raise their voices in advocacy, expanding on methods discussed at everydayadvocacy.org—A Toolkit for Teachers. In the debut column, Fleischer discusses ways to work smart.

This month, the Nerdy team offers up their version of a subscription box. You can always find them at nerdybookclub.wordpress.com.

Linda Rief crafts this column, writing alongside her middle school students, to show the beauty and possibilities that lie within the words our students use to make sense of their world. In this issue, the Bowtie Boys (a group of 8th, 9th, and 10th graders) talk with Rief about advice they would give to teachers.

This column aims to make current research more accessible to classroom teachers and to help find ways to apply it in the classroom. In her debut column, Scherff looks at close reading.

The New Voices column explores the struggles, successes, and dreams of early-career middle level educators, from preservice through sixth year. In this issue, Lehman discusses the problem of teacher retention.

This column brings news from the NCTE Middle Level Section steering committee. This month, we learn how one member of the Middle Level Section Steering Committee found her people.