Class Act

Use short stories to teach English? Yes! Designed as a professional development opportunity for English language teachers, the ideas in this booklet can easily be adapted to advanced ESL/ELL classes.

Deafening, dusty, debris. Such were the working conditions in the 1800s textile industry as portrayed in Katherine Paterson's novel Lyddie. Scholars watch a short video clip about life and work in the mills. Next, they work with partners...

 Scholars discover how working in a textile mill in the nineteenth century affected the title character from Katherine Paterson's novel, Lyddie. Partners analyze quotes from the novel and then add evidence and questions about working...

Let's get visual! Scholars embark on a gallery walk around the classroom to view quotes, images, and videos about historical and modern working conditions in various professions. They consider how working conditions have changed over...

A short story is only as strong as its characters, development, and conflicts. Encourage the young authors in your class to plan their stories based on the elements of narrative writing, all provided in brainstorming graphic organizers.

Life may not be fair but working conditions should be. Scholars research working conditions at Wegmans by studying the company website. They complete a working conditions anchor chart and discuss their findings in a think-pair-share...

Ravenous or hungry, happy or ecstatic—why does word choice matter? Scholars continue to analyze working conditions in the mill and how the conditions affect the protagonist of Katherine Paterson's novel, Lyddie. They engage in a close...

Do your young authors suffer from writer's block when they try to write short stories? Access their natural creativity with C-Gor, the writing monster! The instructional activity takes aspiring authors through a new writing process...

War and conquest are not the only factors in language change and development, as the narrator of a short video points out in her lecture about the evolution of the English language. Using the phrases, "They gave us a hearty welcome," and...

Who is Herman Melville? Read and discuss "Bartleby the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-street." Then, discuss the film adaptations of Melville's work and translate a passage of the text into modern-day English. Discussion questions are...