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One of my most successful lessons was part of an American Literature unit on Emily Dickinson, where we explored her unconventional style and themes of identity and isolation. After one class, a male student stayed behind to tell me how much he enjoyed her poetry, which was a powerful reminder of how meaningful and relevant her work can be to all students.

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For the beginning of a poetry unit, I used Billy Collin's "Introduction to Poetry" to show how students feels about poetry. It's full of figurative language and it expresses how the poet wants people to experience poetry. One example is that he wants others to waterski across a poem and wave to the poet on the shore. But he goes on to say that most people want to tie up a poem and beat a confession out of it. What I like about this poem is that it's relatable and accessible, particularly for students who think they don't like and/or understand poetry. Using that, I'm able to show students how to break down and poem by asking them what the poem is about, who the speaker/audience is, and the tone. Students have a lot of fun with it and sometimes I've had them stand out and act it out.

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A successful lesson I taught my freshman class was during our Shakespeare unit. We were learning how to analyze as well as successfully write our own sonnets. Students had to create a modern day text conversation between Romeo and Juliet in sonnet form. They definitely had fun with it using Gen Alpha language, but it was mostly successful because they were learning the sonnet steps as well as the play without feeling like they were being lectured about it.

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One of my most successful lessons is often in a choice novel unit. I'd cover a standard in whole class mini lesson (using a previous whole-class novel/excerpt as my example), they'd discuss it in their reading groups, and then individually analyze their novels and present examples to the class. The success was in the buy-in, since students were reading something that interested them and then sharing out their examples to the class with confidence and ownership because of the small group pep talks. Not only did they get to read something they wanted, they in turn were able to hear numerous examples and variations on the standard while flexing their own understanding to peers. Definite confidence builder.

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My sophomore honors students ended the year by reading different novels in groups and identifying an ethical or moral dilemma (in the form of a question) being explored by the author through the development of characters and setting. They then presented an overview of the text they read, engaged the class in an activity to explore the dilemma, and made a connection to the real world (historic or current).

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In Peru, my students and I read The House on Mango Street. Students chose one of the vignettes that they liked the most or connected to the most and made a digital collage on Canva that connected to the theme of the vignette they chose and they then presented to each other in small groups. This got students talking and analyzing the theme through an activity that was fun for them.

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This is my first year teaching English. When I was teaching a humanities course at university, it helped the students if I told them that I also had difficulty with a particularly hard paper and that they were not stupid for struggling with it.

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I was reading the "Tell Tale Heart" with my American Lit students this last year and they broke off into groups and created "therapy sessions" for the narrator, the old man, etc. They dove into psychological issues, character motivations (both real and imagined), etc. Some of the students new how therapy worked from their own experiences, but all had seen shows to know the basic structure of how it works and did a great job digging into the characters to expose the reasons for their behavior.

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One engaging lesson I can think of is doing anticipatory sets before a reading (I've done it with American Born Chinese, House of the Scorpion, and Trifles). I have students fill out a Google Form for the agree/disagree statements then project the results (anonymously) on the board. The students then have to discuss why they agree/disagree with each statement, and it's a great way to get buy-in from them before reading a text.

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I hate to be vague, but my most successful lessons are when the students are in a positive uproar, discussing the content. Whether laughing or angry about it, I feel like we've won. I try to push it to that level by asking provocative questions.

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The last time I taught Macbeth with my 10th graders, the whole unit was pretty smooth! The highlight was the mock trial we held as our final product: not only was student buy-in through the roof (so many fun costumes, fake tears, and attempted Scottish accents), but students also demonstrated such a strong and sophisticated understanding of the play throughout the trial. It was fun ,AND I felt proud of their learning!

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To help students analyze character, I've had them create social media posts as various characters. They are given three or four characters (e.g. Macbeth, Lady Macbeth, Banquo, MacDuff) and write three social media posts to show the progression of the characters. Often they have a lot of fun with coming up with a short bio, handles, hashtags (many of them chose #happywifehappylife), and emotional interactions between the characters. I like that you can use it for varied texts (for example, the first time I used it was with The Story of An Hour).

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The most successful lesson I have conducted from a previous English class came during my 2nd semester of student teaching. My class was preparing for a reading of "Night" by Elie Wiesel and we had a very productive conversation around the banality of evil and diffusion of responsibility as it relates to bureaucratization. We discussed Max Weber's idea of the monopoly of violence through contemporary instances of institutional / systemic through a modified 4 corners activity.

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My class and I discussed gender roles as presented by Shakespeare in a Midsummer Night's Dream and Ibsen in A Doll's House. My students needed to choose two characters, one from each play that needed to have a discussion regarding the purpose of marriage and whether it was a worthwhile institution. My students were very creative in creating dialogue that took into account voice, historical context, and thematic connections when creating their original works.

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Well this is my first year teaching English...so I don't have a lesson to share as of yet, haha. I'm looking forward to learning with everybody and gaining great ideas!

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My most successful lesson from a previous English class related to the novel The Outsiders I use with 9th graders. At the end of the unit students have a "body biography" project where they have to analyze the characteristics of one main character and root their opinion in text evidence. It's a great way to connect their beliefs/opinions to the text and they always seem to enjoy the project as it does involve some arts and crafts as well.

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One of my most successful lessons was the one where students got to have an opinion about the text, to judge. My kids love arguing and judging and sometimes being able to express that they don't like something is more meaningful because of the connections they get to have and to engage with the text in the way they want, not in the way someone told them is "right."

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One of my favorite papers was one where students had to use fiction, original research, and peer-reviewed articles to answer a question about the relationships between humans and nature.

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My class and I read a play called 'Water By The Spoonful', and my students were tasked with finding contemporary articles that tied in with the play. One of the major themes was living with PTSD/ soldiers returning from war, and my students found a ton of articles, and offered new perspective on the main character Elliot.