English nerd to Journalism geek

The transition

SID Students film GameDay: Northwest

Eighteen months ago, I embarked on a new journey in my teaching career: transitioning from English teacher to a Convergence Journalism instructor at Olathe Northwest High School.

For 10 years, I taught English at Olathe South and ONW. I feel like I came a long way teaching English from my early years when I didn't know how to teach Julius Caesar or Close Reading strategies.

I majored in English and Journalism at K-State, and it was always my dream to teach Video Journalism. It was just a natural move for me to go from English teacher to Journalism teacher, while incorporating my love of video, technology and social media.

However, last year I felt like I was behind the learning curve of my students. The software, technique, studio and cameras were all foreign to me. I felt like a brand new teacher all over again.

Washington, DC bound

Last February, I traveled to Washington, DC to learn the concept of Backpack Journalism from Bill Gentile. Backpack Journalism is the idea that anyone can film, edit and tell a story with equipment that will essentially fit in your backpack. 

Working with Jerry Gardiner on his backpack journalism video

I elected to do my story on one of the workshop participants, Jerry Gardiner, who came from Liberia, Africa to learn video storytelling. I followed Jerry on his journey for two days, documenting his mission to film and edit his story. Here is my finished documentary:

This experience taught me so much about video storytelling. I learned the six-shot system and the concept of video sequencing.

It was such a great experience that we brought Gentile to Olathe Northwest High School last summer to work with 15 of our students. The students learned a great deal, and I took away even more ideas for my students.

Bill Gentile working with our students in the summer

Tri-ing new things

Last year, our studio and equipment was falling apart. It had not been replaced since the building opened 11 years ago. 

This year, we tore out the old set and changed our studio into a green screen, infinity wall. We also ordered a new tri-caster system that allows us to produce our ONW...NOW! shows in a much more efficient and up-to-date way. We use a virtual set for our anchors, and we can produce the show with fewer people than we did before. Overall, it runs much smoother than our old set-up.

Students producing ONW...NOW!

Here is an edition of a show from this year:

Sophomore redesign

One other change we made this year was to redesign our sophomore video curriculum. I was excited to share what I learned from Bill Gentile, and I saw many of the ideas were applicable to our sophomore class. 

We started the year with "Cutting Carrots" which is a filming and editing exercise that implements the six-shot system and sequencing. Here is an example:

We took this simple concept and applied it to the rest of our projects: AB Sequencing, Chase Scene and music videos. The last two projects directly applied the ideas of backpack journalism, where students filmed each other putting together legos and told the story of the blood drive.

Sophomores filming the Lego Project

I feel great about the direction our sophomore video class is going, and I believe our students will be much more prepared for my Convergence Journalism in the future.

Looking to the future...

I have a vision for where I would like to take this program. A few goals I have for the future are:

1. Learn more about the tricaster. I am hoping to attend a workshop in New York City this spring where I will learn how to use the tricaster to its full potential. I know it can do much more than we already do with it.

2. Implement more writing in the class through news articles and student blogs. I spent most of first semester working on the video portion of the class, and I feel great about the progress we have made. I want to improve our writing and begin creating stories for our Raven Daily website.

3. Win awards. e-Magine is our spring film festival that we host every year. Last year, we didn't win any awards in the news story category. After the competition last year, I told the class I was making it a goal to win awards at e-Magine. I feel great about the work we have done, and feel we can be competitive this year.

Final thoughts

I feel like I have come a long way in the last 18 months as a convergence journalism teacher, but I know I still have a great deal of work to do. I am constantly reading other blogs, websites and communicating with other journalism teachers. It has helped me grow a great deal. I am excited about where I will be a year from now when I look back again.

Three ways to make your CLASSROOM more efficient

I believe that in order to be a great coach, you must be a great teacher. The two skills are really the same.

When I am coaching football, my classroom is 100 yards long, and I am managing 100+ student-athletes. When I am teaching Sophomore English, my classroom is about 15 yards long, with 25+ students. The skills needed to instruct on the playing field and in the classroom are really the same, even though the size of the classroom and number of students may be very different.

Last week, I wrote a post called “Three ways to make your practice more efficient.” As I thought about it, those three components really extend to the classroom as well: have a plan, go on the clock, and create competition.

Have a plan

This really goes without saying. However, there are multiple types of plans I believe you should have in the classroom: daily, weekly, unit, and yearly.

I still keep an old-fashioned plan book where I write down what we did each day in class. At the end of the day, I use any extra space to reflect on how the lesson went, and what I would change for next year. This is very valuable to me as I reflect back on the year, and when I prepare to teach the same unit or lesson next year.

When planning ahead, I have learned not to write anything in ink. Instead, I use small Post-It notes to write lesson plans on. I have found that it is easier to move those Post-It notes around in case there is a snow day, fire drill, or some other distraction that throws off your entire schedule. On the day of the lesson, I write down the objective, lesson, and my reflection in the book.

Go on the clock

Much like using a clock during practice to keep yourself on pace, I have found that using an egg timer is extremely valuable during class. It keeps me from getting too long-winded, but also gives students time to fully write or discuss a topic. I use it several ways:

• Timing the first 10-minutes of Silent Sustained Reading at the start of the hour.
• Giving students 5-10 minutes to “Quick Write” where I ask them to write and keep their pen or pencil moving the entire time.
• Providing students with one minute to discuss a topic with their shoulder-partner.
• Holding myself to a certain amount of time when delivering a mini-lesson so that I do not speak too long.
• Keeping track during a time-write assessment.

I would be lost now without my egg timer. It is a simple thing to use, but it really helps to keep my lesson on pace each day.

Create competition (with yourself)

A few years ago, I went in a radical new direction with the “3PGrading System.” I have modified this system some, but one of the key components is factoring in how much a student improves throughout the year. This creates competition within the student: motivation to improve.

As I wrote about with my outside reading project, I ask mystudents to read 20 books in one school year. For some students, they have never read more than one or two books, if any. To think about reading 20 books seems like a huge stretch, so I ask them to compete within themselves to do it. If I have a student who only read one or two books last year, but reads 10 books in my class, I call that a huge win.

My students also keep writing portfolios. At the end of the year, I ask them to reflect back on their writing from the start of the year until May. I challenge them to identify areas where they have improved, whether it is organization, ideas and content, embedding quotations… something. This drives our end-of-the-year conferences where we look at their reading and writing and how much improvement they have made.

These are three simple things I do in my classroom that parallel what we as coaches do on the football field. What are some other strategies that you bring from the classroom to the athletic field?

Fahrenheit 451 Synthesis: Common Core-Style

In my former teaching life, I used to scour the internet for quiz and test questions for the book I was teaching. When I first started teaching Fahrenheit 451, I pulled questions from Sparknotes, such as:

1. Why does Beatty hate books so much?

2. Read the poem “Dover Beach,” by Matthew Arnold. In what ways is it significant that Montag reads this particular poem to Mildred and her friends?

These are both great questions, but frankly... who cares? The old days of multiple-choice tests to assess whether or not students can remember minute details from a novel are gone.


This year, my Sophomore English colleagues (Jessica Magaha, Neil McEachen, and Erika Backs) and I developed an AP-style synthesis prompt that acted as our culminating project for Fahrenheit 451.

The prompt we developed was: Write an essay in which you defend, challenge or qualify the claim that it is in the best interest of the people that the government restrict freedoms.

This is a huge idea; not one that you can find in any textbook or online resource.

While students read the novel, we did close reading of "texture texts" students could use as resources for their argument. The sources included:

“The Allegory of the Cave” - Plato

“More Guns, Less Crime” – Todd Blodgett

“NRA Puts One Nation Under the Gun” – Leonard Pitts Jr.

“The Pedestrian” – Ray Bradbury

Once we were finished studying all of these texts, students were asked to write an argument that synthesized three of the sources, with the requirement that Fahrenheit 451 was used as one of the sources. 

Download the complete assignment here.

We also encouraged students to attempt to qualify the prompt, which was a new way of thinking for them. When you qualify, you take a side while acknowledging that the issue is not black or white. We asked students to use the following template from They Say, I Say for their thesis paragraph:

Template for introducing ongoing discussion:
In discussions of _____, one controversial issues has been _________________. On the one hand, ____________ argues _________________. On the other hand, _____________ contends ______________. Others even maintain ________________. My own view is _________________.

This template forced students to look at multiple perspectives of the issue, and admit that it isn't a simple answer. 

Here is one student's opening paragraph:

In discussions of restrictions of freedoms, one controversial issue has been that the government restricts too many freedoms. On the one hand, Ray Bradbury argues that if the government is too strict and doesn’t allow much freedom, a dystopian society will develop where all individuality is gone. On the other hand, Todd Blodgett contends that the government needs to restrict freedoms or things will get out of control. Leonard Pitts, Jr. even maintains that restricting freedoms like the government does is illogical and can easily get out of control. My own view is that it’s acceptable for the government to restrict freedoms when there’s a threat the country’s safety, but not if that means taking away freedoms given to citizens in the constitution.

From this point, we used the tips from my previous post about getting students engaged in writing: we analyzed a student sample paper, and I wrote in front of them.

Overall, this was a challenging and rigorous assignment. Yes, it may be easier to give a scantron test with 100 multiple choice questions, but this assignment went much deeper into the IDEAS of the novel, and asked students to make connections to contemporary issues.

What are some ways that you are changing the way you teach novels in the era of the Common Core?

Introducing Macbeth: Common Core-Style

Which of the following do you believe is the most creative interpretation for the opening scene from Shakespeare's The Tragedy of Macbeth?

• Three old hags burying items on a lonely beach.

• Witches, dressed as Catholic school girls, destroying a cemetery.

• The witches disguised as nurses in Nazi Germany ripping the heart out of a soldier on a gurney.

With the new Common Core State Standards assessment looming on the horizon, teachers across the country are looking for ways to modify what they are doing in order to fit the increased rigor that the standards demand.

Previously, I wrote about how I changed my approach to teaching Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. Instead of listening to and reading the entire play, I broke it down and did a close reading and analysis of specific speeches from the play.

When I used to teach Macbeth, I would just read the first scene, discuss it briefly, and move on. This year, I wanted to change my "old" way of teaching Macbeth by first looking at how different filmmakers directed their versions of the Scottish Play.

I found the following clip online already edited together featuring the opening scene from the following directors: Roman Polanski (1971), Geoffrey Wright (2006) and Rupert Goold (2010):



I posed the following question to my students:
"Which filmmaker's version is the most creative in terms of ______________________?"

The blank space should be one aspect of each version. As a class, we brainstormed aspects such as: costumes, setting, casting, props, music, sound effects, and camera work. Students were to pick one aspect, and collect evidence from each version using the following graphic organizer from all three versions.

View the graphic organizer here.

After taking notes, students developed an argument in answer to the question above. We used the following template from They Say, I Say in order to introduce an ongoing debate, and culminate with the student's main claim, or thesis statement:

Template for introducing ongoing discussion:
In discussions of _____, one controversial issues has been _________________. On the one hand, ____________ argues _________________. On the other hand, _____________ contends ______________. Others even maintain ________________. My own view is _________________.

First, I wrote in front of my students. I chose to do an unrelated topic, but one that I hold dear to my heart: Star Wars. In about five minutes, I used the template above to create an opening paragraph and thesis statement:

In discussions of the Star Wars films, one controversial issue has been the introduction of new characters to the film's universe. On the one hand, some critics argue that the Ewoks are essential because they ultimately helped destroy the Death Star. On the other hand, some people contend that Darth Maul was a ferocious Sith, and the only highlight in The Phantom Menace. Others even maintain that Boba Fett's introduction  (and subsequent death) added a bit of mystery to the series. My own view is that Yoda was, in fact, the most essential introduction to the Star Wars universe because he ultimately trained Luke Skywalker, and guided his development as a Jedi Knight.

It isn't perfect, and I would edit many things; the important thing is that my students saw me write in front of them.

Then, it was their turn to write. They went back to their notes, and reflected on each director's version, and chose which version was the most creative in one specific aspect. The template above served as a guide to get the students writing. Here is an example from one student:

In discussions of the various film versions of William Shakespeare's play Macbeth, one controversial issue has been the costumes of the witches. Shakespeare purists favor Roman Polanski's traditional portrayal of witches that are frumpy older ladies with long noses. Others prefer Rupert Goold's ironic portrayal of the witches with a very eerie demeanor and a nurse facade. I prefer Geoffrey Wright's witches who are contemporary teenagers in schoolgirl uniforms, but still have an apparent edge to their character.

After this initial paragraph, students developed the rest of their argument using the argument writing models discussed in Kelly Gallagher's book Write Like This. They were required to pull in evidence from all three versions to support their claim: both as examples and evidence that addressed the opposition.

This lesson moved far beyond my standard way of teaching the opening scene: listening to a CD and briefly discussing what the witches are saying and doing. Now, students were forced to analyze the director's decisions in dramatizing the play for film. It went into much deeper analysis than I ever had asked students to do before with the play.

What are some ways you are making Shakespeare fit the new demands of the Common Core State Standards?

Three ways to engage your students in writing

For years, most schools have operated under the following assumptions:

• Social studies teachers know how to teach students about World War II and the Constitution.
• Art teachers know how to teach students about painting and art analysis.
• English teachers know how to teach reading and writing.

This is the logic in many schools; however, in the era of the Common Core State Standards, this paradigm must shift. One of the great things about the CCSS is that it asks ALL teachers to help teach reading, writing, speaking and listening. Previously, I wrote about five easy ways any teacher can get her students to start close reading.

For some reason, even though all teachers wrote countless papers in high school, college and maybe even graduate school, teaching writing simply freaks teachers out. Even English teachers aren't immune to this feeling when it comes to writing instruction.

Writing instruction should not fall only on the Language Arts department. Kelly Gallagher's book Write Like This is an excellent example for how English teachers can teach writing in their class.

However, his basic principles can be applied to ANY subject area.

Here are three simple things that you, yes even you Mr. Math teacher, can do to engage your students in writing:

1. Training wheels: Provide templates

Learning how to write is a bit like learning how to ride a bike. At first, students need to have "training wheels" before they can learn how to write on their own. Templates make excellent training wheels.

I first learned about templates from the book They Say I Say. 

Before the CCSS, my assignments would require a minimum number of quotations, and students would just "throw" those quotations in without any introducing or explanation. They would just appear randomly throughout the paper. Now, we use templates especially with our freshmen and sophomores when we teach them how to incorporate evidence in their writing. Simple quotation templates from the book include:

Introducing a quotation:

According to ___(Author)____, "________(Quotation)___________."

__(Author)________ states "______(Quotation)____."

Explaining a quote:

In other words, _____(Explanation)_______________________.

Basically, _________(Explanation)___________________________.

Sure, it is a bit like doing a Mad Lib, but it works. Once students have a basic understanding of how to incorporate templates in their writing, we expand to longer templates that we create in our professional learning communities. Here are some examples of longer, more complex templates:

Rhetorical Precis (From: http://www.lhsseniorproject.com)
Satire analysis of Animal Farm
Imagery in Fahrenheit 451

Could you design a template for writing a lab report in science class? What about justifications in Calculus? Heart rate analysis in physical education? Think about templates that would be applicable to your subject area, and then create them from scratch. Once students have this basic writing idea down, then we can begin removing the "training wheels."

2. Take the plunge: Teacher modeling

We learn new skills best by observing others who are experts at the skill we are trying to learn.  Kelly Gallagher's analogy is that you would learn how to golf by watching PGA golfers swing a club. I show my quarterbacks game film from college and professional teams to teach them technique and plays. This is basic teaching, but something we forget when it comes to writing. Students need to see the teacher write (and sometimes fail!) in front of them.

It. Is. Terrifying.

Take the plunge! Write in front of your students.

It is scary to sit at a computer in front of 25 teenagers and have every keystroke appear on the projector. Sometimes the words flow right through my fingers. Sometimes, I can't think of anything to type. Sometimes, I make a number of mistakes that my students are quick to correct. It is very scary, but it is essential for students to see us struggling with the same work we are asking them to do.

This can apply to ANY subject area:

• Social studies teachers can write thesis statements.
• Math teachers can write justifications.
• Art teachers can write art reviews.
• Science teachers can write lab reports.

The next time you incorporate writing in your class, take the leap and try writing in front of them. You will learn something about the assignment you are giving them, and your students will learn through watching you write in front of them.

3. Learn from experts: Mentor texts

The problem with most high school students isn't that they don't know how to write. The problem is that they have yet to find their own style and voice. That takes time and work; unfortunately, it doesn't happen over night. One way to help this is to provide mentor texts that students can close read to analyze what the author is DOING, and then emulate that style in their own writing.

We first have students perform a close read of the text, making note of the moves that the author is making. I will often have questions about "how long" a piece has to be, or "what all needs to be included" in the writing. When we look at these mentor texts, we notice the length of paragraphs - usually 2-3 sentences (Not 8-10 you say? Blasphemy!) There are also usually 20+ paragraphs, which is wildly different from the five paragraph essays that we all know and love (hate?) to teach. This is how real writers write, and our students need to closely examine what these writers do.

There is a great blog written by two English teachers called Teach Mentor Texts where they highlight examples of texts that can be used for emulation. I love using Roger Ebert, Rick Reilly and Leonard Pitts Jr. articles as mentor texts because they have have distinct styles that students can emulate.

Admittedly, I am lacking knowledge when it comes to this area in other subjects. I do not know who the writing gurus are for math, science or social studies. I would encourage you to look through articles or examples from real experts in your field, allow students to closely look at the moves author makes, and emulate the style until they are able to find their own voice.

Final thoughts

Malcolm Gladwell talks about the 10,000 hour rule in his book Outliers. The basic idea is that it takes 10,000 hours for anyone to become an expert in her area of expertise. If students are only writing in their English classes, they will never get to the 10,000 hour mark in 12 years of school. However, if the writing is happening in every subject area, this is a much more realistic goal.

No matter what subject you teach, all teachers can implement writing in their courses. The responsibility should not fall solely on the shoulders of the English department. These are three strategies that any subject area teachers can quickly implement in their classes: templates, writing in front of students, and mentor texts. My belief is that if we can just get students writing in their other classes, the English teachers can worry about the grammar, organization and everything else that comes with it.