Using #GrammarFails to Hook Students in English Class

Whenever I come across an error in spelling, grammar, mechanics, or usage in public, I cringe. It's one thing to see it on students' papers, but when businesses and other professionals make these mistakes...well, shouldn't they know better?

Showing your students these real-world mistakes (and having them correct them AND go out and find their own examples) strengthens our argument that English class IS important (because who hasn't heard the moans and groans from students about having to take English EVERY year?).

I keep a Pinterest Grammar Errors board (but it covers all kinds of errors) and I also have a presentation on TpT that can be shown to your class any time (just skip the back-to-school introduction and go straight to the 70+ slides with examples).

Here are some favorites I just came across from The Grammar Gendarme:

Hide yo' aunts...

{And what is up with that huge number one?}

I'm going to the firth floor, please. 

And this eCard would be the first image featured on FASEBUK.

>>  *separate  <<

How can one make so many errors in one post? 

This one just makes me laugh out loud. :) 

Because being killed to life wouldn't be as newsworthy.

You know those students who just ignore those red squiggley lines in their document and go ahead and hit "Print" anyway? Ya. This is their future. At Wal-Mart.

Mmmmm...doesn't crap sound delicious?

See loads more of this crap here:

Using Humor to Demonstrate the Importance of English Class: Real World #GrammarFails 

My "Grammar Errors" Pinterest Board

How to Host a Non-Violent Class Hunger Games

If your students are anything like mine, one of the first things they ask me is if we get to have a class simulation of the Games while we read The Hunger Games Trilogy. Even after they find out that I don't allow a recreation of the Games because it would defeat the purpose of the novels, they continue to ask me EVERY SINGLE DAY if they can "fight" each other with toy weapons, or wrestling matches, or air-soft guns. I just shake my head.

I've always been adamant about stressing the theme of non-violence throughout the unit. But...they are typical students who want an excuse to "goof around" in class. And I do like to give them opportunities to get up, move around, have fun...but learn something while they're doing it. Nothing is learned by giving them fake weapons and simulating a "Hunger Games" activity. Or at least not what I want them to learn.

You know your students want to compete in some way, but how can you give them that thrill of competition in a non-violent way?

How about trying one of these ideas:

-Food Drive competition: It literally IS the Hunger Games.

-The Academic Games: Use trivia questions from the novel; ask each student a question. If they answer correctly, they stay in the game. If they get it wrong, they're out. Last one standing is the victor.

-The Spelling Tracker Jacker: Not quite the same ring as a spelling bee, but like the "Academic Games," students would spell words from the novel to compete. Imagine throwing them off with Suzanne Collins' spelling of "muttations." Bahahaha...(that's my evil President Snow laugh, by the way).

-The Training Games: For those who still need that physical challenge, focus on training skills where students compete against one another in various physical challenges that test their agility, speed, accuracy, and endurance.

-The Sponsorship Challenge: Have students work in groups to create marketing campaigns for the Tributes from the novel(s). The can create an entire campaign, including a TV ad-spot, billboard, podcast, and more. Students can vote for the tribute they would sponsor based on the campaigns.

-Surviving the Games: Create a series of survival challenges for teams of students. These can include activities like knot-tying, plant and insect identification, shelter building, and more. As an alternative to survival skills, try group challenges that allow students to rely on one another to complete. Using these team-building activities allow for collaboration and bonding between your students.

In my next post, I will share the activities I used with my classes and show you how you can implement them into your curriculum.

Make sure you follow me so you know when I post next!

Happy World Poetry Day!

 March 21st is World Poetry Day, a celebration to promote and encourage poetry worldwide.

As we begin the week in our classrooms, recite your favorite poem to your students and ask that they share theirs. Talk about why you like the poem, why it holds meaning for you.

If you are teaching a unit that does not allow much time for a poetry recital, have students write a poem (rather than a journal entry, essay, or complete sentence response on a handout). Yes, song lyrics–including rap–count as poetry! I always tell my students to make sure it is school-appropriate, however. If you are currently reading The Hunger Games, have them summarize a chapter with a poem or rap. Or pick out your favorite dialogue between characters and arrange them into a poem. Encourage them to use words in a different, unexpected way.

To honor this day, I typed a lesson and handout that can be used with your students today or any day. It is free and you can download it HERE. It encourages using Twitter as a way to spread the love and appreciation of poetry (or Poetweet!). Download my lesson so you can create a poetweet or twaiku with your students!

For more information about today, check out the official site for World Poetry Day HERE.

  I hope you & your students have a great time reading, writing, and sharing poems. Happy World Poetry Day!

Connecting The Hunger Games to the Holocaust

Spoiler Alert:  Because my posts are going to focus mainly on using The Hunger Games trilogy in your classroom, there will be spoilers.  So please be warned if you have yet to read the novels!  And if you haven't read them, what in the world are you waiting for!? 

In an earlier post I mentioned there were many ways teachers could relate the material in the novel The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins with World War II, Hitler, and the Holocaust.  The purpose of this post is to explore some of those connections students can make or you could point out.

As fellow teacher Carol Ann pointed out in a previous comment, one of the first connections we may make is to ancient Rome and the gladiator games where people would watch others fight to the death for entertainment.  And there are certainly plenty of allusions to this time period and society to support those connections.  Suzanne Collins admits she was inspired by Roman gladiators for the basis of the Hunger Games in an online interview on Scholastic Books' Hunger Games website.

I do like to have the students make connections to ancient Rome when they learn early on what the Hunger Games are.  But as we get further into the novel, I also like to connect it to more recent events/times, such as the Holocaust.  I think it helps students realize how easily we can be manipulated into believing murder is acceptable, and even necessary, to sustain or better our way of life.  Adolf Hitler wanted to establish a "New Order," which included domination (and extermination) of many groups of people.  As a result, millions of innocent people died in the Holocaust, including over six million of Jewish faith.

Photo courtesy of: http://israelchildren.co/The_Holocaust.html

While the Holocaust may not have been a public form of entertainment like the Games, the millions of children, women, and men who died were killed by those who were either forced to kill or it was their job and they willingly did it.  These murderers may have been the victims' peers, or their neighbors, and maybe even their friends.  Did they want to kill them?  Did they do it because they had to or because it meant their life was spared? Or were they brainwashed by the political propaganda they were fed and believed they were superior to the Jewish people and other minorities?  As you force your students to look at both perspectives, they should see that Katniss and the other tributes are put into the same position many German soldiers and citizens were: kill or be killed.