Not the End of My Tale

  Många lärarkollegor frågor var de kan hitta intressanta sagor att berätta för sina elever. Världen är full med berättelser och jag tycker om att lära nya hela tiden. Då delar jag gärna med mig av veckans saga på svenska. Här kommer en folksaga från Kina som jag läste i boken Peace Tales av Margaret Read MacDonald. Ute på den afrikanska savannen trampade en elefant förbi och stannade upp när hon fick syn på en färggrann kolibri som låg platt på ryggen på marken. Fågelns små fötter lyfts upp i luften. "Detta ser visst konstigt ut. Vad gör du, lilla kolibri?" frågade elefanten. Kolibrien svarade: ”Har du inte hört? Jag fick höra imorse att himlen kanske faller ner idag. Och jag vill vara redo. ” Elefanten skrattade och hånade den lilla fågeln. "Vem har sagt det? Hur kan du tro på sådant trams? Tror du att de små fötterna skulle kunna hålla upp himlen?" "Jag kan kanske inte hålla up himlen alldeles själv,", svarade kolibrin. ”Men jag gör så mycet som jag kan

 To help my older students start writing fiction, I used a prompt generator at  diyMFA . I also added a word of the day from NextStepEnglish:  https://nextstepenglish.com/word-of-the-day-conflagration/ .  Our word was conflagration, a very large fire that destroys buildings or large pieces of land. As we shuffled the prompt generator, we picked...  "shopping mall Santa, lost something important, has bullets but no gun and a picture of a modern building". We discussed these elements together and wrote both together and individually. Each of the students wrote their own version of this story while I wrote one, too.  I do believe that an English teacher should be able to write anything they ask their students to write and to proudly demonstrate their craft. I realize that there is the risk of the teacher's work being judged harshly, but how can we expect the students to be brave enough to write and share with others if we are not willing to write and share with them. So, I w

 Since most of my classes will be online for the next 6 weeks, I registered for an educator account at getepic.com . It is free and full of thousands of digital books (most in English, but there are a few other languages there). Students just use the classcode (no personal info needed) and can choose books to read online. Some books even include audio. As a teacher, I can keep track of how many books each student has read (if they click on their initials when they start) and how they did on the end-of-book quiz. I even tried one of the short quizzes with one of my students, and she liked it. The quiz was short enough to not be bothersome while providing just enough positive feedback to let her feel like her accomplishment was seen. The only drawback is that the students can only read for free during school hours local time, Monday- Friday 7 am - 4 pm. You can even make reading lists for your students. I made one with books about Hawaii or based in Hawaii since that is where we currentl