November content is all about research writing, gratitude, and personal learning goals.

NOVEMBER FEATURES:

• Research and Inquiry Writing Assignment Resources (Teaching tips, grading information, lesson examples, etc)

• Sports fiction book recommendations for kids

• Gratitude & Giving Visual Creative Writing Quick Writes

• Mini-Webinar on Journaling for Personal Learning

• Gratitude Log and Gratitude Tickets for Students and Teacher Friends

• Planning materials including a coffee-themed teacher planner to start looking toward 2024

• Grant outline to make getting materials easy for your classroom (New year, new books?)

Arthur O’Shaughnessy in his 1874 poem “Ode” wrote: “Yet we are the movers and shakers/Of the world forever, it seems.” I love the term “mover and shaker” because it reminds me of dancing, but what it really lends is to people who make an impact on the world. It is no secret that one of my favorite units to teach is research. I love the choice, the process, and the hard work it takes to produce the product. I also love seeing middle schoolers wrap their brains around the formatting of this project (MLA), and how they get excited about solving problems. One of my favorite things, after all, is to solve problems.

The MLA Research Paper unit I do each winter going into spring focuses on activism. Students identify a problem in their school, community, or world and then research that problem, Inevitably, they see causes, effects, and hypothesize solutions as well. This post will walk you through some mentor texts and resources, strategies, and pacing of the overall unit.

I just finished 95 student writing conferences on Friday. Besides going through my fair share of coffee and green ginger tea, I have come out on the other side a bit more reflective. This whole process started with a student comment three weeks ago, when students were getting ready to turn in their first draft of their research papers.

In one of my more recent posts, I outlined how to make a research unit in just a few hours. I was in a crunch that was unexpected and I wanted to showcase my process for freshening up a unit from year-to-year. One of my favorite parts of the research unit teaching students MLA format and also teaching them how to use source pages to take notes.

Whether you have one of those moments where you decide to change your whole game plan up, or if you have something (like I did) that caused you to go into an unexpected mad scramble, sometimes it is helpful to know how someone else tackled a difficult task in a short amount of time. Research is the mother of all daunting tasks that may be the hardest thing to accomplish imaginably...in a small amount of time. 

This post and I go back. Wayyyy back. I have been dreading to officially write this post because of how strongly I feel about this topic. I'm going to get to the point. Here is the main question: should students be taught MLA or Modern Language Association standards in the secondary classroom? If so, when? How old? Now, before I go making some folks angry about MLA, I want to go on record. I do not care if you teach MLA or APA, but one of them needs to be taught, and I would argue that the sooner the better is the most beneficial when it comes to education and developing young writers. 

The research unit is my favorite unit of study, but it is also the toughest for a variety of reasons. Students are granted the freedom to do their own research and not given all of the materials needed to produce a piece of writing (our curriculum is heavy novel based with literary analysis). In sixth grade, they get to choose from a list of topics that are focused on a theme. Choice is still an option, but with limitations. Students need freedom in their writing to make choices, yet restrictions to allow for structure with the assignment.

The main components of the checklist include lessons on:

1. Plagiarism

2. Source Evaluation

3. Resource Location

4. MLA Formatting/Other Format

5. Great Student Exemplars

Essay Packet: a workbook for students that contains all the steps of the specific essay assignment included; life saver for the teacher of writing; communication method for parents