Get more out of Exit Slips: What the research tells us

Many of us use exit slips for formative assessment. According to Robert Marzano, there are four main categories of prompts that will help you get the most out of exit slips.

These prompts accomplish the following:

• Check for understanding
• Encourage reflection
• Check the use of instructional strategies
• Request student feedback on teacher practices

We have assembled a set of FREE exit slips based on the first three prompts. While you may want to target additional feedback in your class, preparing your exit slips ahead of time can be a time-saver that will elicit solid feedback.

We have found that adding space for students to record their learning targets also encourages them to reflect on the focus of the lesson.

Source: "The Many Uses of Exit Slips" by Robert Marzano in Educational Leadership, October 2012 (Vol. 70, #2, p. 80-81).

Download our FREE exit slips here!

Goodbye (for now), National Poetry Month!

It's been a spectacular month, and we're sad to see it go, but the departure of National Poetry Month doesn't mean our love of poetry has to go with it!

Find out more about inspiring your students with poetry by clicking on some of these fantastic links:

Academy of American Poets: For Educators
Free poetry resources, curriculum, essays on teaching, tips for teaching, ideas

EDSITEment: The Best of the Humanities on the Web
Literature and language arts lesson plans for grades K-12

826 National Teacher Support
Publications about writing and teaching from 826 National

Favorite Poem Project
Poetry lesson plans, K-12

Folger Shakespeare Library Poetry in the Schools
DC-area Poetry in the Schools program info

Library of Congress Poetry & Literature Lesson Plans
Resources for grades 6-12

National Education Association: Bringing Poetry to the Classroom
Lessons, activities, and AV resources

Poetry Foundation Articles for Teachers & Students
Links for students and teaching ideas for instructors

Poetry Out Loud Teaching Resources
Teacher resources for national student recitation contest Poetry Out Loud

Poetryclass
Ideas and methods for teaching poetry

ReadWriteThink
K-12 reading and language arts classroom resources for educators and students

Teachers & Writers Collaborative
Digital resources and lesson plans for teachers

Web English Teacher
Links to activities and lesson plans related to specific types of poetry and poets

Writers in the Schools
Educator resources blog from the Writers in the Schools (WITS) program

Youth Speaks Teen Poetry Slam
Nonprofit teen spoken word organization based in San Francisco

Happy Birthday Shakespeare!

Happy 449th to William Shakespeare! We hope you'll check out our birthday party activities and free cupcake templates for ideas on creating your own party for the Bard!

To celebrate today, we're taking a trip back in time with some Medieval and Elizabethan recipes: soda bread, cheese tarts, salmagundi, and rice pudding. Yum!

(Clicking on the recipe will bring you to the original recipe source, where you can find even more interesting menu options.)

Celebrate Shakespeare's Birthday (on any day)!

William Shakespeare was born on April 23, 1564, and he died on the same day in 1616. We think that if Shakespeare were here to celebrate his 449th birthday, he would absolutely love the party we cooked up in his honor.

Our Shakespeare's Birthday Party set features a colorful poster and 32 task cards featuring fun trivia and lines from Shakespeare's plays. It also includes a "modernize Shakespeare" activity, where students update a line drawing of Shakespeare by cutting, gluing, drawing, and otherwise transforming to bring his image into the 21st century. (Middle school students have a ton of fun equipping Shakespeare with Kindles, iPods, and Kanye glasses.) The party is a great way to kick off a Shakespeare unit or to introduce him to apprehensive students!

The set also includes 12 printable cupcake wrapper templates (both in color and in black-and-white). The wraps feature our own original artwork of a coy little Shakespearean cat and dog donning their Elizabethan best, and quotes from Shakespeare plays. Some of the quotes we included are these:

"If music be the food of love, play on." (Twelfth Night)
"Prepare for mirth, for mirth becomes a feast." (Pericles, Prince of Tyre)
"Honey, and milk, and sugar; there is three." (Love's Labours Lost)

Look at how adorable the cupcakes turned out! The wraps in the picture below were printed in black-and-white on colored paper.

And these were printed in color. If you happen to own a fancy pair of scissors (like the ones that can cut in zigzags or waves), they would probably add an excellent touch.

Yum! Educational and delicious! Olive the cat was quite fond of them too.



You can download four of the cupcake templates for free here!

April is National Poetry Month!

March comes in like a lion and out like a... poet? Maybe we don't have that quite right, but we do know one thing: we couldn't be more excited about this year's National Poetry Month!

As advocates of writing and reading, we encourage you to check out the Academy of American Poets website this month for some great ideas to bring poetry into your classroom. If you teach grades 7-10, take a look at these free lesson plans that are aligned to common core. And while you're at it, sign up for a gorgeous free poster (while supplies last) to hang at your school.

We plan on celebrating this month with a nod to a true master of verse: William Shakespeare. Stay tuned for featured products, facts, and freebies that center around the Great Bard!

But for now, we'll leave you with a poem to celebrate the season. Enjoy William Wordsworth's famous ballad, "Lines Written in Early Spring" (1798):

    Lines Written in Early Spring

    by William Wordsworth

    I heard a thousand blended notes,

    While in a grove I sate reclined,

    In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts

    Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

    To her fair works did nature link

    The human soul that through me ran;

    And much it grieved my heart to think

    What man has made of man.

    Through primrose tufts, in that green bower,

    The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;

    And 'tis my faith that every flower

    Enjoys the air it breathes.

    The birds around me hopped and played:

    Their thoughts I cannot measure:——

    But the least motion which they made,

    It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

    The budding twigs spread out their fan,

    To catch the breezy air;

    And I must think, do all I can,

    That there was pleasure there.

    If this belief from heaven be sent,

    If such be Nature's holy plan,

    Have I not reason to lament

    What man has made of man?

Our inaugural blog post (it comes with free labels!)

Ahhh... There's nothing like cracking open a brand-new blog and staring at the blank white of the page! 

We thought it would be fun to start this blog off by linking to the first free product we created. These great mailing labels come to you in fillable PDF format, which means you can customize them to say whatever you'd like and save the template again and again! The template fits Avery 5160 labels, which are available pretty much everywhere that labels are sold. Use them for addressing thank-you cards, labeling files, and whatever else you can think of. (After all, they're free)!

Get your free mailing labels here!