We should have a moment of silence for the awesome ideas, handouts, photos, and general brilliance of this teacher's Ning for Am. Studies.

I found a short story that may be more accessible to our sophomores. Perhaps we (sophomore teachers) can come up with a writing prompt to give students so that they can read the story and respond to it during a class period. Then maybe we can give general feedback based on the 6+1 Traits rubric, and then meet as a group to share five papers from our classes? The short story is called "Split Cherry Tree" by Jesse Stuart. It looks high-interest-ish, and would be good for the start of the school year, I think.

This is for Jim Burke fans--copies of all his handouts!

A long AOW--perhaps suited for older students.

A current(ish) music video tells the story.

A collection of handouts, lesson plan ideas, and links from an English teacher. Similar to the English Companion Ning in that you can spend 1/2 hour here and not even notice.

God help us all, this is a website that makes online news stories even shorter. But it would be good for practicing beginning active reading strategies, since the articles are short.

When school starts, the NY Times links to a high-interest story from that day and gives you questions to ask your students. AOW! AOW! Thank you, NY Times, you big important newspaper you!

Easy-to-read AOW ideas for kids who struggle. And who like sports.

For college-level, so at least we know there won't be printouts with owl clip-art.

Narrative essay--too advanced for freshmen?