This photo captures the thinking behind the most inspired moment of my week.
I spent yesterday Gamestorming with a group of local English teachers in order to surface, prioritize, and resolve their emerging curricular needs. Once our work together was complete, we situated the games inside of a completely different context: lesson design. The anchor chart above reflects how we practiced using Post Ups, Clusters, Affinity Mapping, and Forced Ranking to help readers make sophisticated inferences about characters. You can learn more about how to execute these games yourself right here.
One of the teachers who tested this plan in her classroom this morning dropped me this email message shortly after:
Just read an article about the Boston Marathon bombing with my students. I used the strategies you showed us yesterday. HOLY COW!!! I have never had a group that was more engaged and their comprehension was through the roof (something I rarely see). I am so happy right now I want to cry!
Made my week.
Happy Friday!!
