Welcome to the Middle Grades!
MiddleWeb is all about middle school & the middle grades — with a sharp focus on teaching and learning in grades 4-8. Join us, learn about our 5 streams of content, and find out how to get involved.
MiddleWeb is all about middle school & the middle grades — with a sharp focus on teaching and learning in grades 4-8. Join us, learn about our 5 streams of content, and find out how to get involved.
Every teacher who works with students as readers should read Jennifer Serravallo’s new book, Understanding Texts & Readers, writes NCBT and principal Rita Platt, noting it brings big-picture reading goals, skills, strategies and texts together in a meaningful hierarchy.
Once readers assess their time management issues, they can try PJ Caposey’s easy-to-implement suggestions to overcome such practices as being tech avoidant, disorganized, checklist dependent or a “people pleaser.” Consultant Anne Anderson likes the book’s education focus.
To meet the learning needs of students with diverse abilities in inclusion classrooms, NBCT Elizabeth Stein suggests a focus on equity. She offers four key strategies (with supporting resources) that align specifically with co-teaching strengths and student abilities.
Michelle Russell’s first try at giving a group math test – with students self selecting into groups of four – will add a new tool to her practice. She reports on how her students responded, what they achieved, and how she and the students evaluated the experience.
Background Knowledge / Class Apps
by Curtis Chandler · Published 02/18/2019 · Last modified 02/20/2019
Good teachers ‘stir the pot’ to activate student background knowledge before a new lesson. But what if their understandings are flawed? Teacher educator Curtis Chandler has research-based tips to help detect and fix the faults. Plus some tech tools that can add fun to the process.
It’s time to think about a more respectful way to disagree in edu-world, writes principal and NBCT Rita Platt. Her questions for reflection could help educators be more yes/and and less either/or as we communicate, especially in social media, where rancor is too common.
Nurturing Informed Thinking is filled with practical and inspiring ideas to help students integrate multiple texts about a nonfiction topic. Both content area and ELA teachers will find this book a valuable resource, writes middle school educator Mary K. Marsh.
Annette Breaux and Todd Whitaker’s concise, tips-packed book is a quick read with strategies that can easily be implemented tomorrow, says teacher leader Laura Von Staden. Among her favorites: “Leave One Compliment a Day” and “Ask Yourself Five Questions.”
Classroom studies should emulate what is happening in the real world of scientists, says NBCT Kathy Renfrew. This means students are not only questioning, investigating, talking and writing – they are reading about science. She suggests reading strategies and resources.
ELA educator Cheryl Mizerny invites you to have fun developing your own UDL-enhanced unit. The former special ed teacher details how using Universal Design for Learning helps all learners grow, then she shares her argumentative writing unit enhanced with UDL practices.