Fun and Engaging End of Year Test Prep

I'm Lyndsey from Lit with Lyns, and I'm excited to share some fun activities that you can use for end of year test prep.  I know you have all been looking forward to testing just as much as I have (yeah, right!). Each year, right before test time, I start obsessing over what I can do to keep my students engaged, while also reviewing all of the objectives necessary to prepare for testing.  I have found 3 things that have proven to do this for my students:  digital escape rooms, task cards, and technology.

Escape Rooms have been the latest buzz in education.  I kept hearing teachers talk about them on social media, and then I had students come to school talking about how much fun they had going to them over the weekend. Since I try to keep my classroom paperless, I decided to combine the two and create a Digital Escape Room for ELA Test Prep!  Kids dread nothing more than end of year testing...so why not make reviewing for these dreaded assessments something the kids will remember??!?  And how perfect that they can remember skills we need them to know for the test!!!  Check this out here!

Another resource I use are these Common Core Task Cards to teach students vocabulary they may come across, in order to enhance their understanding of terms.  I also use videos when teaching the vocab words, as this is a great way to introduce them, while also keeping the students engaged.  You can find a freebie sample of these here!

I also feel that it's important for students to be able to determine the correct type of text structure, which can often be challenging to do.  Because of this, I try to begin teaching students this towards the beginning of the year.  I see such an improvement in reading comprehension and students' ability to learn more specific content information once they grasp this material.

Point of view is another important component that help students comprehend what they're reading more easily. Understanding the point of view from which the story is being told allows them to have a better idea of the characters in the story, and also enables students to think more in depth about how the characters change throughout the story.  Students who have a strong understanding of the literary vocabulary, text structure, and point of view typically do better at comprehending the material they read.  This is why I created this bundle- E/LA End of Year Test Prep!  This product includes:  20 Point of View Task Cards, 13 Text Structure Task Cards, and 36 Common Core Vocab Task Cards. For a FREEBIE sample of this, please click here!

Digital, Paperless Review
This year, I've decided that the majority of our review will take place digitally, since we're lucky enough to have a class set of laptops.  At my school, we use Google Classroom, but there are many programs that can be used if you don't have this (Edmodo, Canvas, Schoology, etc.).  In order to do this, I created a digital version of my ELA Test Prep Task Cards- Google Drive Edition.

I would love to hear how you review for end of year testing!  Share your ideas in the comments below.

Day One: Engagement Station

Tori here, from Tori Gorosave: An English Teacher's Journey. Back to School is literally right around the corner for me and to be honest, I am super excited! I miss my classroom and it the last year my youngest one will be on campus with me before he heads off to high school. Sigh. Anyway, I want to spend a few minutes and share my favorite tips and tricks for the first day of school. 

Nothing is more deadly to student and teacher morale than bored and disengaged students on the first day of school. The first day of school sets the tone for the rest of the year, so start your year off showing students your class will be a year full of engagement, activity, and involvement by creating stations to introduce your classroom rules, procedures, expectations, and summer reflections. 

Now, I can stand in front of my 8th graders and captivate them for an entire period, but frankly I don't always like being the center of attention and holding students' attention for that long is hard! I want my students working just as hard, if not harder, than me, and if all they are doing the first day is listening to me talk or watching my presentation, then we have a problem.

Here's a preview of how I conduct my first day of class. I assign five mini assignments via stations to my students.  The stations can be completed in small groups, individually, or even presented by the teacher in eight minute segments. I have classes that range from 32-40 students, so I set up two table groups per station so I don't have groups larger than four students. I create a placard title for each station, place a task card or direction sheet next to the placard, plenty of paper or assignment sheets (depending on the task), and a completed sample which is all about me. I let my kids choose their groups of four and sit at a station (it doesn't matter what order they complete the stations in). I set my timer for eight minutes and display it under my ELMO so the class can see how much time they have. Once my timer goes off, students have thirty seconds to get up and rotate to the next station. I usually set my stations up clockwise since I give them such a limited amount of time to rotate. I then repeat the process until all groups have hit all five stations (about 45 minutes). Time flies! It is amazing to have students suffering from shock and awe on the first day once the timer goes off for the last station and students have to start collecting their work and prepare to head on to their next class!

Here is a breakdown of the five stations I use on the first day of school:

Station 1 is a syllabus scavenger hunt. I designed my syllabus to only including content I thought was imperative. I formatted my syllabus like an infographic to make it more visually appealing and capture student and parent attention right off the bat. 

For the syllabus scavenger hunt, I create questions focusing on specific areas of my syllabus. Students need to use the syllabus to answer the questions on a task sheet. 

To get students thinking ahead, Station 2 is a "Twitter Goals" activity. Students are asked to create one goal for my class for the present year, one overall education goal for the year, and one personal / family goal for the year. They explain these goals in 140 characters or less and complete them on a assignment sheet by filling out Twitter message bubbles.  

Reflecting upon and sharing highlights of their summer is one of my students favorite activities. Station 3, "My Summer in Pictures" requires students to choose three pictures to showcase their summer. The pictures can be snapshots from their phone or computer, or generic symbols that represent a person, place, thing, or idea. Underneath each picture, I have students write a caption explaining the significance of the picture.  My students love to complete Station 3 digitally, but many students also create beautiful scrapbook pages. I have students brainstorm their ideas during class station time, but they create the final product at home.

Again because I wanted to have students introduce themselves to me right away, at Station 4 students describe themselves as an emoji. I have a few lists of emojis laid out on the table, but most students are so familiar with emojis that they rarely reference the lists. To complete this station, students choose their emoji and draw it (or if you are digital they can just copy and paste the emoji onto a slide), underneath the emoji they have to demonstrate rockin' vocabulary and choose an adjective that best describes them (it should coincide with the emoji), lastly I have my students write a paragraph explaining how the emoji and adjective describe them. This is such a neat way to get to know a student from their personal perspective.

The final station, Station 5, consists of a "Student Resume." I have a stack of resume task sheets laid out on the table, and students grab one and complete the sections. This resume provides me with parent contact information (it is amazing how often the info on here provides me with working contact numbers where as the office emergency cards don't), student expectations of me, the grades students earned the previous year, a list of my students favorite things, etc. 

That sums up how I use stations to run my first day of school. If you want to use these stations ideas in your class, head on over to my TpT store and grab a set of Back to School Task Cards for yourself.

Have an amazing school year!

Write a Sonnet to Celebrate 400 Years of Shakespeare!

This year marks the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death.  His first folio is on a 50-state tour in the United States.  Perhaps you will be able to see the exhibit in a town near you.

The folios, published in 1623, are credited with preserving 36 of Shakespeare's plays.  Of those plays, eighteen had never been published before.  Can you imagine our world without Macbeth or Julius Caesar?

But even if the first folio tour doesn't get you charged up, you can't deny the influence Shakespeare has had on the English language.  Read (and share with your students) Bernard Levin's clever "On Quoting Shakespeare" essay.  Or think about the movies (West Side Story anyone?) that adapt plots from Shakespeare's plays -- plots that we still find riveting 400 years later.  

While studying an entire play can be challenging and require more time that you may have available, you can introduce your students to Shakespeare through his sonnets.  He wrote 154 of them.  The language of the sonnets can be intimidating to students, but by using some basic poetry analysis tools, your students will be able to understand the content of the sonnet.  Not only that, so many of Shakespeare's sonnets are completely relatable to teens.  The agony and loneliness of Sonnets 29 and 30 could be written by a teen, and Sonnet 18 is beautiful!

Tools for Reading a Sonnet

1. Read it out loud.  Students will often struggle with the language, but if they are just listening for meaning, they can often get the big ideas rather than get hung up on details.

2.  Vocabulary.  Make sure your students have a clear understanding of any new vocabulary in the sonnet.

3.  Paraphrase.  This is the golden key to helping students understand poetry.  Ask them to "translate" the poem line by line, but also to connect what is happening throughout the sonnet.  Each line is linked to the next since the sonnet is building an "argument."

4.  Let your students figure out the form.  Rather than telling them, allow students to discover how the sonnet is put together.  Students should be able to identify the rhyme scheme (three quatrains and a couplet).  They may have more trouble with the meter, but that's where clapping out the accented syllables will help.  I wouldn't fret too much about making sure they can scan a poem or identify iambic pentameter.  The idea is to help students notice the rhythm of the language.

5.  Keep asking students to tell you what they notice -- you will find that they can not only understand the meaning of the poem, they will be able to figure out how it is constructed.  The one thing I did not allow my students to say was, "I don't get it"  because that means they've given up trying!

6.  Don't forget the turn.  The end of the sonnet is like a punchline.  What is the message, epiphany, resolution?  

Tools for Writing a Sonnet

1.  Choose a simple topic.  Any topic can be used -- adopting a pet, last Saturday's soccer game, my messy closet, what's in your lunchbox...help students choose a topic that has a clear beginning, middle, and end.

2.  Work backwards.  Once students understand the format of a sonnet, they can write their sonnet "backwards" by beginning with the end rhyme in mind.  This allows students to stop obsessing about what rhymes with "orange" and focus on what they want their sonnet to be about.

3.  Try for the turn.  The ending of the poem should resolve an issue or share an epiphany.  What do you want your reader to learn or understand after reading this sonnet?  

4.  Relax.  It's a sonnet! Writing one is a bit like doing a sudoku puzzle or completing a crossword puzzle.  Some of your students will really enjoy the challenge, and other won't.  But challenging students to write a sonnet is something they may never have the opportunity to try again!  You can be the teacher who introduced your students to a completely new form of literature!!  

You can tell by now, that I love sonnets (and all poetry, but that's the topic for another blog post!). I just hope that I've encouraged you to share a sonnet, and William Shakespeare, with your students!  There is still time to plan a party !  April 23 is his recognized birthday since there are only baptismal records and no birth certificates.  (Interestingly enough, it is also the date of his death.)

If you're looking for more detailed help, you can check out Sonnet 29 on my Teachers Pay Teachers store.   It will guide you every step of the way!

Enjoy sharing great literature and challenging writing experiences with your students!

Happiness always,

Tackle the Test, and the Text, with Authors' Craft: Looking Beyond the PIE

Ok, so let’s face it, pie is good. Sweet, delicious, cover-me-in-ice-cream pie, is really good. Unfortunately, over the past couple of years, I have found one pie that isn’t so good: the ‘pie’ representing author’s purpose. Beyond persuading, informing, and entertaining, an author writes with deeper meaning and we need our students to understand this.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s a great place to start. When I taught elementary I used P.I.E. to teach author’s purpose all the time. I wanted my students to identify if an author was writing to persuade, inform, or entertain. We need to acknowledge, however, as students grow as readers, they need to start looking beyond the surface of the text. There is a reason an author writes a certain way and there are clues in the text to help us understand why. We have to help our students unwrap the author’s purpose by examining the author’s craft.

At the beginning of every year, I review specific skills such as theme, point of view, and characterization. My students are able to pinpoint these skills within a text. As the year progresses, I push them to dive deeper into the text. Why is the author using a specific point of view? How does this point of view affect the plot? How did the author use characterization to build the main character? How do you know? In order to truly understand a text, a good reader needs read for deeper meaning by examining the author’s craft. We can no longer ask our students to simply ‘identify’ story elements. We can no longer have our students ‘identify’ the theme of a passage. We can no longer settle with being able to identify P.I.E. We need our readers to dig deeper. What is the text saying? What is the author doing? How do you know? What do you take away from this?

Here are some of the cards I use to encourage my students to dig deeper.

To help me do this regularly, I created generic task cards focused on author’s craft. I can pull from these whenever we read any type of text in order to encourage my students to read for deeper meaning. This doesn’t have to be difficult.

I tell my kiddos, authors are sneaky. They have the ability to make you love or hate a character. They have the ability to create a setting that makes you relate to a story. The author can take you worlds away or make you examine where you are standing. While I encourage and support reading for pleasure in my class (a lot actually), I want my students to have the ability to dissect difficult texts.  Authors speak a secret language within a text and as middle school readers it remains our job to crack the code. Authors truly write beyond the ‘P.I.E.’ 

The Secret to Top Scores on State Tests!

I recently read an article where David Coleman, the President of the College Board and architect of the Common Core, stated that in order for students to do well on standardized tests, they must fully understand and be able to use the academic vocabulary being used.

That doesn't seem like very much of a secret until you consider this:

Academic vocabulary is comprised of the words that are most often used in informational texts (such as textbooks) and literary texts (such as novels), but not likely used in everyday speech.

This means our students need to know words like integral, function, parallels and convey, perspective, and affect (which is different from effect.)

Of course, these words are not presented in the big tests in isolation.  They are embedded in sentences and students will have to use their context clues.  Again, sounds simple enough, but it's more than that.  They will be required to focus not just on the word itself or the clues, but how the word is being used in relation to the clues in the sentence.

To me, this means these words have to be explicitly taught and constantly used in class to get the job done.

So what did I do?  I went through the sample state test for my state (Florida) and pulled out the academic vocabulary.

First, I will have to familiarize my students with the words.  I will start by doing a concept sort and asking pairs or small groups to sort them into fiction and non-fiction.  Naturally we'll discuss the categories chosen based on the definitions.  Then we can put the words on the Word Wall with the proper definitions.

Then, I will make it a game to use the words in class as part of any discussion.  The students that uses the word correctly earns a reward as part of our "Super Improver" system.  

Soon after we will play "vocabulary relay" where all the words and the definitions are scattered on the ground at one end of a field and the students are lined up at the other.  The objective:  Race to the words and definitions, grab a matching pair, and take it back to the team.  The next team member then rushes off to do the same.  The team with the most matching pairs wins! 

Lastly, I will be placing the words and their definitions onto Quizlet.com so students can practice with the words digitally with fun games and even quizzes.  We will also use other apps like Kahoot and Plickers where context clues will be necessary yet fun!

Get a FREE copy of Academic Vocabulary ELA Test Prep for a limited time!

Thanks for stopping by!

Using Novels to Teach Tolerance

February, ah the month of love. The month reserved for gushy cards, caring attitudes with increased empathy and affection. Yeah, right!! So obviously this is not a true representation of February in a middle school! By the time February rolls around, we are all suffering from cabin fever, the winter dull, and preparing, even more than usual, for state testing. Stress is high and tolerance is low. Luckily, there is a great way for us to deal with this in the ELA classroom. Some fantastic authors have written some pretty fantastic novels that will not only encourage empathy and tolerance of others, but will also leave a mark in your students’ hearts. The characters, themes, and plots of these novels will help your students grow as readers and grow as individuals. Let’s face it, we’re not just teaching academic skills. As middle school teachers it is our responsibility to teach our students skills for life.

The novels above are used in my classroom as part of an independent novel study. My students choose from 4-6 different novels and have a “homebase” group that they work with throughout the novel. Students are responsible for reading the book independently (mostly in class), but discuss certain parts with their groups. If you do not want to do an independent novel study or literature circle with the following books, I STRONGLY encourage you to choose one to use as a read aloud. You will not regret reading these books!

The four novels I always include in my tolerance novel study:

Wonder by R.J. Palacio

  If you want to fall in love with a character, this is the book for you! The main character, Auggie, was born with a facial deformity causing him to be homeschooled through fourth grade. In fifth grade he decides he wants to go to public school. The book continues with trials and tribulations of a student who stands out from the crowd. Each chapter of the book is from a different character’s perspective, so you really get to feel all points of view. You will feel mad, happy, sad, and fulfilled wen reading this book. (Warning: the family pet dies. I don’t deal well with animals dying in books, hence the warning!)

Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper

            Ok, so if you want to fall in love with ANOTHER character, this is the book for you! In this novel, you will meet an extraordinary girl named Melody. Melody has cerebral palsy and is unable to speak. Though she is an extremely bright student, people think she’s intellectually impaired because she is unable to verbally express herself. Eventually, Melody finds a way to ‘speak’ and people get to see more of who Melody truly is. This book will send you on an emotional rollercoaster and you’ll love every second of it!

Freak the Mighty by Rodman Philbrick

            Ok, so if you want to fall in love with a couple more characters, this is the book for you! (Can you tell I seriously love these books and find them of great value?! I promise, my next synopsis will not start off with the same first line!) In this novel the reader meets two boys, Max and Kevin. Max is a large kid with a learning disability and Kevin is a genius with a physical disability. Once lonely boys with no friends to be had, they both find friendship in the most unusual circumstance. They forge together to make Freak the Mighty. Freak refers to Kevin and Mighty refers to Max. Both boys come from fatherless homes and bond when Kevin is asked to tutor Max. You will enjoy reading about how these two ‘rescue’ each other, but be prepared to have some Kleenex! You can also address the CC standards requiring students to compare literature across various mediums because this novel was made into a movie. It is fun to compare and contrast the novel and the movie!

Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko

            This novel is pretty cool because it takes place at Alcatraz. The main character, Moose is charged with a huge responsibility of taking care of his sister, Natalie. Natalie has autism and her family tries to get her into a special school to help her. After going to the special school, Natalie is sent home because of her inability to adjust to the school. This leaves Moose in charge. Although he knows it’s the number one rule to not speak to, or of, the prisoners, Moose turns to the one and only Al Capone to help his situation out. Can Mr. Capone help? Read to find out more! This is a great series.

More Suggestions For Tolerance Novels:

 -When Zachary Beaver Came to Town (I believe this is a movie as well.)

 -The Schwa was Here

 - Drums, Girls, and Dangerous Pie

 -Tangerine

 -Stranded

 - Fault In Our Stars

 -  Peeling the Onion

 - Thirteen Reasons Why

 - Inside Out & Back Again

 - Eleanor and Park

 - The Absolute True Story of a Part-time Indian (I heard this book is controversial. I haven’t read it yet, but can’t wait!)

 - Island of Blue Dolphins

 - Counting By 7s (I actually haven’t read this yet! I can’t keep it on my shelf long enough to borrow my own book!)

Enjoy these books with your students. Prepare yourself for some amazingly deep conversations with your students. They will not even realize they are building reading skills! 

Thanks for stopping by!

Start a Class Blog

As teachers, we're always looking for a way to make learning "authentic."  That can be a challenge when it comes to writing.  Sure, students can write a letter, article for a newspaper, or argument, but where is the real audience?

As adults, we know the importance of writing for an audience.  Our audience changes the tone, word choice, sentence structure, organization, presentation, and even the conventions we use.  

We can see proof of this in something as simple as the texts we send that are filled with emojis!  (Wouldn't it be fun to write your resume with emojis??)

Hosting a classroom blog is an ideal way to get students writing authentically.  Students are writing for a world audience!  Spelling, conventions, content, tone...all of it matters!  

Not only that, students are learning how to be responsible members of a digital community.   

I used Edublogs to create my class blog -- it's free (every teacher's magic word!), but there are other blogging platforms you can use.

You can decide the level of control you want over your blog -- who can post and make comments.  You may even decide to allow your students to create their own blogs.  

The advantages:  

• connecting to students and people around the world.  One year, we were blogging buddies with a class in Australia.  The visitor widget on our blog let us know where our visitors were coming from -- all over the world!
• staying in touch.  When a classmate moved to Mexico, we were able to stay in contact through our blog.  Grandparents and parents could read about what was going on in our classroom.
• extending the writing day.  Posting a "question of the week" or writing challenge kept my students writing.  
• inside jokes galore!  We know how middle school students love the inside joke -- the blog just kept them going!
• editing and proofreading practice!
• evidence that spelling really does matter!
• a platform for voice.  Students can practice writing with voice -- a skill that we often don't have time to teach.

The disadvantages:

• know and follow your school's privacy rules!  Make sure you teach internet safety to your students as well.
• the learning curve!  If you are not familiar with blogging, plan on spending time playing with the blogging platform you've chosen.  You can use a pre-set template, but you'll want to be able to monitor comments and add fun widgets.  You don't need to be a blogging expert in order to get your blog up and running, but you'll be happier if you spend some time playing with it.
• getting students up and running.  If you don't have access to student computers, tablets, or technology, it will be more challenging to help students figure out how to respond to blog posts, but you can do it!

January is an ideal time to start a class blog.  You've already established your class routines, you

know your students, and it will energize your class (new technology!!)  It will also give you a taste of how you want to run your blog next year. (Because once you start your class blog, you will want to continue!)

Give a class blog a try!  If you are interested in learning more, I've created a guide to running a class blog.  You can find it on my Teachers Pay Teachers store.

Happiness always,

12 Days of Christmas Activities (FREEBIE ACTIVITY)

Happy Holidays Everyone!

We hope all you USAers (is that a word?) had a fantastic Thanksgiving holiday with family and friends! We are officially into the Christmas and Holiday season, and it is oh so exciting!

Celebrating the holidays was one of my favorite parts about being a teacher. I've always taught in Catholic schools, so Christmas was a huge deal to say the least. I used to decorate my classroom with Christmas lights, play Christmas music all day long, decorate with student Christmas work everywhere. You get the idea ... I stinking love Christmas.

This year, Jessica and I created an awesome 12 Days of Christmas Activities unit that can be used in conjunction with any unit of study! Since you are all awesome Middle School Mob junkies, I want to direct you to an EXCLUSIVE FREEBIE that is not featured in our TpT Store. You can only access it by CLICKING HERE!

Here are some awesome pictures of the complete unit. How cute are these activities for students, which you can then use as decorations for your classroom? It's a win-win if you ask us!

Wishing you all a joyous Holiday Season!

Book Recommendations on the Tree (Freebie)

Hey everyone! It's Stephanie from The Marvelous Middle. Next week marks the beginning of the holiday season and my favorite time of the year. Every year I put up a tree in my classroom and every year I struggle with using the same old decorations to trim my classroom tree. So this year, I came up with a way to combine my love of YA books with my love of Christmas. I created an ornament that gets my students involved in the decorating and gives them a voice to recommend books to their classmates. I always love hearing my students talk among themselves about great books they have read during SSR and I often eavesdrop on their conversations about the newest book their classmates should checkout. Yes, my students still ask for my opinion but it isn't the only opinion they seek out. They look to their classmates for book advice. This craftivity gives my students one more way to persuade their fellow classmates to read a book they found amazing, incredibly, or totally awesome. 

Here is one student's finished ornament that I will be laminating and getting ready to trim the tree next week.

The ornament looked like this before it was folded and glued together:

During this activity, the students chose a book to recommend and then decorated the cover of the book on the ornament, including the title, author, and book cover decoration. On the other side, they had to explain why the book they chose was a "gift" to read. The expectation was to pull in the other students by giving them just enough to prompt them to read it for themselves.

If you would like to try this in your own classroom, click here to go to this freebie in my TPT store.

I hope you enjoy this activity as much as my middle schoolers have. Happy Holidays and enjoy trimming your classroom tree.

Thanksgiving Thank You Notes (FREEBIE)

It's Caitlin here from Teach Inspire Change! 

One thing that I personally love to do is write thank you notes. Generally, when I send someone a thank you note, they are shocked, which says to me that thank you notes are going out of style. And they absolutely should not be. There's something truly special about sitting down and expressing your gratitude to someone through a written note. So with Thanksgiving just around the corner, we put together a super helpful resource for you to write thank you notes in your classroom. If I were still in the classroom, I would certainly spend an entire class period working on thank you notes - you could even make your own thank you notes if you're the extra creative, scrapbook-y type!

I really hope you enjoy using this freebie with your students. Happy Thanksgiving to you all - you're almost there :)

P.S. If you're at a loss for a short and challenging unit to teach before the Thanksgiving holiday or even before the Christmas holiday, our "The Gift of the Magi" unit is an excellent resource!

NaNoWriMo in the Classroom

Hi all!

It’s Stephanie from The Marvelous Middle and I am here to share something MARVELOUS going on in my classroom. NaNoWriMo is about ready to happen and for the first time, I’m asking my young authoring students to come along for the ride. November is National Novel Writing Month, which pushes people to write a novel (50,000 minimum word count) during that month. They also have a Young Writers Program that allows students to set their own word count goals and complete their own novels. So this year, the stars have aligned and I have been able to put in the extra time to get this program going with my students.A whole novel you ask? Yes and they looked at me as I’m sure you are looking at the screen right now! After the shock wore off a bit, I explained that they were in total control of their writing destiny and we would be our own community of writers. So with November on the horizon, we began preparing today. We discussed what makes a “good” book and what makes a “bad” book. We talked about how it’s important as authors to understand that our novel must have some characteristics that appeal to readers. I asked the students to share with me their own opinions of qualities of “good” and “bad” books. Below are a few of their responses:

“A good book in my opinion is one that is fast moving. The book has to flow swiftly and smoothly. It needs action, lots of action. I want to see the story in my head. I love mythology books with Cyclopes, centaurs, gods, demi-gods, dragons, etc. I need the book to have interesting battles and a very strong climax. I need the book to hook me almost from the beginning, not half way through the story.”
“Poetry seems unimportant and unorganized in my mind, so it does not interest me.  Most people find poetry interesting and exciting, but everyone is entitled to their own opinion.”
“A book that has no conflict is a book I am NOT reading.”
“To me a bad book, is a book that tries to please everybody by taking the newest thing and making a book about it.”
“A good book should make me shove my face in it and never stop reading it!”
“Science fiction books appeal to me because the things that happen aren’t in everyday life, you just can’t walk out your front door and sun flares hit the Earth.”
“I think it’s a great way of writing always leaving your reader on the edge of their seat, making them want to keep reading and reading on. When I say that they should leave you in suspense that doesn’t mean that they should stop the chapter in the middle of a sentence, it means that say a girl gets kidnaped and the cops are about to go to the scene and they make a wrong turn per say that’s where the chapter would end in my opinion. You want to know what’s going to happen now that they are not on the right track.”
Next week, we will start to look at what makes a character interesting and seeing that strong characters move the story along. Then beginning on plot structure by the end of the week. We will be ready to start writing our literary masterpieces November 2.I am most looking forward to my students realizing that authors don’t typically just throw a novel together and need to go through a process. My students struggle with revision, regardless of how many times we have talked about its importance. I’m hoping that writing a novel and seeing that revision is critical will begin to open their eyes to more than just getting words down on paper. And it still remains a good lesson for me, too. I will be taking my own NaNoWriMo challenge of writing a 50,000 word novel in November.  If you would like to join me, information can be found at www.nanowrimo.org.Follow our young authors through the process on my blog, The Marvelous Middle. If you would like more information about NaNoWriMo Young Writers Program, go to http://ywp.nanowrimo.org.