An Ode to John Green, Part 1: The Novels

I would have to argue that John Green is one of the most inspirational and motivational people who are currently alive.  Other than my friends, my family, and my wonderful, loving boyfriend, I have never encountered someone who has so quickly and thoroughly inspired me to 1.) be happy, 2.) dedicate a good amount of my life to making other people happy, and 3.) see that the world is an incredible place, filled with amazing people and amazing possibilities.  However, what I really want to discuss on this blog is something I hope so much to be able to use one day in my classroom: I hope to use his amazing, beautiful novels, and I'd like to tell you why you should, too.

More after the break.

Lesson Plan 2: Gatsby Socratic Seminar

I love Socratic seminars.
When I was in my Junior AP English class, Socratic seminars were unanimously the best days of the class--and we had an awesome "Gatsby Party" at the end of our The Great Gatsby unit, complete with food and music.  We loved Socratic seminars, and I am so excited to use them in my classes.
If you don't know what a Socratic seminar is, I really, really suggest looking into them.  One way you could is by checking out my newest lesson plan, which is designed as a pre-assignment to a final paper on the escapism of characters from The Great Gatsby.  I included all of the handouts needed for the lesson plan, as well as detailed instructions, so hopefully it will help if you've never done a Socratic seminar in your classroom.
If you have heard of Socratic seminars, and maybe even used them . . . well, maybe give mine a shot, too?  If anyone does, please, please discuss the results in the comments for this post!

Lesson Plan #1: Extra Credit Gaming

I'm currently in a class largely focused on creating lesson plans, which is something I've only done in a casual, untrained way.  Well, not anymore.  Using TaskStream, we had an assignment to create our first lesson plan, and let me just say, I'm kind of proud.

Details and a link to the lesson plan after the break.

Sans Comic Sans 1: Shakespeare

One of the things I do hope to accomplish with this blog is to show how you can teach with fun, creative fonts that aren't the worst things ever.  Let me lay down some ground rules about how I always pick out fonts.

1. Your font should be easy to read.  No font should be so ornate that it takes you more than a second to realize what is even being said.
2. Do not ever, ever use kitsch fonts with flowers or snowmen or anything, unless maybe you're teaching elementary.  These fonts are terrible.  Please never use them.
3. Do not use Comic Sans, clearly.  It's immature, and silly, and awful.
4. Do not use Papyrus.  Not only is it just a really terrible font, students can now make Avatar jokes about it.
5. Try to avoid Arial.  There are so many other sans serif fonts out there that look so much nicer.  I'm actually a pretty big fan of Calibri.  Arial is not only instantly recognizable, it's also sort of garishly stark.
6. Also try to avoid Times New Roman.  The font is used so often for essays that it's hard to see it as an actual typeface.  Try Garamond instead; it's classic for good reason.
7. Don't use Trajan.  The entire time, students will just be wondering what movie poster they've seen it on.
8. Don't be afraid to try fonts that are fun and different.  Just, you know, be classy about it.

That being said, I really enjoy putting certain fonts to certain types of literature.  For my final project in an undergrad Shakespeare class, I actually did a font book for main characters from all of the plays we read that semester.  It was incredibly fun.  I'll definitely be using some of them here.  I'm going to run through the plays I think are most commonly taught, and only ones I've read.  I also won't be doing Romeo and Juliet; there are just too many takes on it, and I can't decide.  Hopefully, you can get some ideas for how to make handouts look nicer without having to resort to anything awful.
Examples after the break.