One of the most important ways to scaffold a successful transition from high school to college is to teach real-world, gate-opening writing genres, such as college admission essays. This book describes a writing workshop for ethnically and linguistically diverse high school students, where students receive instruction on specific genre features of the college admission essay. The authors present both the theoretical grounding and the concrete strategies teachers crave, including an outline of specific workshop lessons, teaching calendars, and curricular suggestions. This text encourages secondary teachers to think of writing as a vital tool for all students to succeed academically and professionally. Appropriate for courses and teacher professional development, this accessible book: Reconceptualizes the ways in which writing can best serve marginalized students.Examines research-based curricular and teaching approaches for the secondary school classroom.Provides a writing workshop framework for creating a college admissions essay complete with lesson-planning materials, activities, handouts, bibliographic resources, and more.Includes student perspectives and work samples, offering insight into the lives and struggles of diverse adolescents. “In this important book, Jessica Early and Meredith DeCosta describe a readily replicable set of activities that provides motivated, meaningful opportunities for writing development and helps potential first-generation higher education students gain university admission.” —From the Foreword by Charles Bazerman, Gevirtz Graduate School of Education, University of California Santa Barbara “This is a book about opening doors, about demystifying writing tasks that can keep many students on the outside. The authors take on a major writing challenge—the college application essay—and through careful instruction help students use their real life stories to master it. It is teaching at its best, and democracy at its best.” —Thomas Newkirk, University of New Hampshire “This groundbreaking book has the best qualities of an exemplary research study while also providing us with a handbook of practical wisdom and engaging lessons for teaching writing to a diverse population of secondary students. It is certain to inspire and instruct all English teachers and composition researchers who care about helping traditionally marginalized and underprepared students discover and demonstrate that they are qualified to enter college.” —Sheridan Blau, Teachers College, Columbia University

If you want to learn how to shoot a basketball, you begin by carefully observing someone who knows how to shoot a basketball. If you want to be a writer, you begin by carefully observing the work of accomplished writers. Recognizing the importance that modeling plays in the learning process, high school English teacher Kelly Gallagher shares how he gets his students to stand next to and pay close attention to model writers, and how doing so elevates his students' writing abilities. Write Like This is built around a central premise: if students are to grow as writers, they need to read good writing, they need to study good writing, and, most important, they need to emulate good writers. In Write Like This, Kelly emphasizes real-world writing purposes, the kind of writing he wants his students to be doing twenty years from now. Each chapter focuses on a specific discourse: express and reflect, inform and explain, evaluate and judge, inquire and explore, analyze and interpret, and take a stand/propose a solution. In teaching these lessons, Kelly provides mentor texts (professional samples as well as models he has written in front of his students), student writing samples, and numerous assignments and strategies proven to elevate student writing. By helping teachers bring effective modeling practices into their classrooms, Write Like This enables students to become better adolescent writers. More important, the practices found in this book will help our students develop the writing skills they will need to become adult writers in the real world.

In their first edition of Mentor Texts, authors Lynne Dorfman and Rose Cappelli helped teachers across the country make the most of high-quality children's literature in their writing instruction. Mentor Texts: Teaching Writing Through Children's Literature, K-6, 2nd Edition the authors continue to show teachers how to help students become confident, accomplished writers by using literature as their foundation. The second edition includes brand-new Your Turn Lessons, built around the gradual release of responsibility model, offering suggestions for demonstrations and shared or guided writing. Reflection is emphasized as a necessary component to understanding why mentor authors chose certain strategies, literary devices, sentence structures, and words. Dorfman and Cappelli offer new children's book titles in each chapter and in a carefully curated and annotated Treasure Chest. At the end of each chapter a Think About It'sTalk About It'sWrite About It section invites reflection and conversation with colleagues.The book is organized around the characteristics of good writing'sfocus, content, organization, style, and conventions. The authors write in a friendly and conversational style, employing numerous anecdotes to help teachers visualize the process, and offer strategies that can be immediately implemented in the classroom. This practical resource demonstrates the power of learning to read like writers.

High-school writing prompts often ask students to provide overly simplified responses to complicated issues, but a person’s stance in the real world can rarely, if ever, be reduced to “agree or disagree.” Arguments are complex, with more than two points of view and a range of evidence to consider; however, writing classes don’t always embrace that complexity. Real Writing: Modernizing the Old School Essay contends that engaging fully with complex texts and difficult, nuanced arguments helps students become better thinkers and writers, more fully prepared for life both in and after high school. By offering students current texts to read and issues to discuss, teachers introduce their students to more complex arguments. Real Writing: Modernizing the Old School Essay recognizes the value of various types of texts, but the need for contemporary readings in our literature and composition classes is important for relevancy related to student engagement, the Common Core State Standards, and participation in our democratic society. This book shares curricular moves to engage students in reading and writing authentic arguments.

School is a pervasive element in our lives - but one that goes mostly unquestioned. Most discussions get caught up in details of policy reform and leave the idea of school itself alone. The End of School changes that. Offering a radical, but even-handed, look at the purpose of education and the reality of school, Slayback develops a manifesto for how young people, parents, educators, and employers can move beyond school and take control of education. Slayback -- an entrepreneur and Ivy League dropout -- talks about his own disenchantment with school. Despite being an excellent student and loving learning, he became convinced that school was not achieving its end of providing the best education possible. Other students, business partners, intellectuals, and parents convinced him along the way. The End of School is a look -- both theoretical and practical -- at how to fix that. Slayback addresses the book to students, educators, parents, and employers of all stripes and ages. Whether you're a high school or college student, a recent graduate, a parent of a young person, a teacher, or an entrepreneur, you'll want to pick up The End of School. Some of the topics explored include: - The Purpose of Education - The Purpose of School - The Reality of School - Different Types of Schooling - The Effects of Schooling on Your Future - How to Reverse the Negative Effects of Schooling - How to Take Control of Your Education Outside of School - How to Succeed Without a College Degree - Entrepreneurship vs. School as the Ideal Education And more!

Interactive Writing is specifically focused on the early phases of writing, and has special relevance to prekindergarten, kindergarten, grade 1 and 2 teachers.

At long last someone has produced THE practical guide for teaching analytical writing Compose Yourself lays out everything a teacher needs for teaching the art of clear, complete and well-organized writing in the content areas. In fact, I would purchase this guide for students as well as teachers-and not just for high school, but for both middle school and college as well. -Dr. Katherine Nolan, Education Consultant Finally, a book on how to teach analytical writing in all subjects. And the toolbox I was thrilled to find templates, rubrics, and clear-cut examples for descriptive, process, and persuasive writing. Compose Yourself is a must have for all teachers. -Susan King, Magnet School Administrator, Tampa FL, MSA National Board, National Presenter We are perceived by how well we write. Currently our nation's teachers are struggling to find time and tools to teach thoughtful, logical expository writing. Compose Yourself is a simple, straightforward writing guide for all subject area teachers working to improve their students' analytical, expository writing skills. Compose Yourself must find a place in the toolbox of our nation's secondary teachers. -William F. Roberts, Assistant Superintendent Hacienda La Puente Unified School District (California) Compose Yourself A Guide to Critical Thinking & Analytical Writing in Secondary School is a quick and easy guide to teaching and learning critical thinking and analytical writing at the secondary level, regardless of the subject area. It is perfect for teachers, parents, and students who want to go beyond the worksheet to strengthen their thinking and writing skills, better learn and retain information, and improve overall academic performance. After using this guide, students will be able to write clear, concise, analytical responses to complex, real-world questions in all subjects. This resource includes step-by-step processes, copious examples, writing checklists, helpful tips, and black-line masters, all to help all students improve their thinking and writing. Amy Rukea Stempel has been zealously working in education and education reform since 1989. Prior to founding Lightbulb Learning Services, which specializes in the alignment of curriculum to academic standards, literacy development, and classroom/school leadership, she has led standards and curriculum development projects for the Education Trust, Edison Schools, Inc. (formerly the Edison Project) and standards development efforts for the Council for Basic education. In addition to experience in education policy, Ms. Stempel has also taught literature in the International Baccalaureate program for many years and has happily lived the harried and stimulating life of a classroom teacher. Ms. Stempel's prior publications include, Gaining Traction, Gaining Ground: How Some High Schools Accelerate Learning for Struggling Students, Standards for Excellence in Education (contributor), Where in the World Are We? The Need for International Benchmarking, Six Case Studies of Performance Assessment, and Standards: A Vision for Learning. Many years ago, Ms. Stempel completed a B.A. in English from Carnegie Mellon University and an M.A. in Liberal Studies (with concentrations in literature and history) from Georgetown University.