Brave New Teaching: A Podcast for High School and Middle School Teachers

Do you remember the first time you read The Great Gatsby? As one of the most commonly taught American novels, it’s likely that by now, you’ve also taught a Great Gatsby unit to your class.Because it is so widely taught, you may have gotten stuck in teaching it the same way over and over again. Well my friends, we’re here to shake that up! Over the years, we’ve found ways to make The Great Gatsby accessible, applicable, and engaging for virtually all the kiddos in our classroom. We’re excited to share these ideas with you today as we discuss what the process of a unit makeover could be like for a unit that uses The Great Gatsby as a vehicle for learning.You’ll hear alllllll the essentials of a brilliant unit makeover - vision boarding, essential questions, and assessment. Plus, we’ll be jumping into the supplements of this unit inside a bonus episode of Brave New Teaching that will give you a sneak peek into what our new Happy Hour is all about!SHOW NOTES: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode128Mentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

As we celebrate American Thanksgiving this week, we know that we have so much to be grateful for here at Brave New Teaching! Mostly, we are thankful for you, our teaching community who continues to come back here week after week. We appreciate you so much.To keep things fun and light, we’re going to do a special episode about some of our favorite fall things at work, at home, and more. These are things that are currently bringing us lots of joy and that we think you’ll love as well. We’ve got quite the list of topics for you - from coffee, to gardening, to books, and even the dream of opening up a Mexican restaurant in Iceland…we’re pretty sure there’s something here for everyone!We hope that this list inspires you to try some new things or even reflect on YOUR favorite things during this season. We all need those little things that make us happy! 🙌🏼One additional thing that we know will make you happy is to join us in our new Brave New Teaching Happy Hour community! Check it out here.SHOW NOTES: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode127Mentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

What teacher doesn’t love a good hack? We’ve all got more than enough on our plates, so anytime we can simplify a task to save us time, while still being effective in our teaching, it’s a BIG win.Today’s hack is brought to you by part four of our “The Best Thing I Ever Taught Series” - sub plans! We’re sharing our 5-step approach to stress-free sub plans that you can use time and time again.The best part of these plans are that they model good teaching. You’ll be able to take care of yourself while also leaving plans that are reasonable, yet have high expectations and will keep moving students’ learning forward. You’ll be able to return to class without missing a beat!Have you registered for our FREE masterclass with live Q&A yet? You’ll hear our three key strategies for making formative assessments work for you in the way that you need them to. Sign up here.SHOW NOTES: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode126 Follow us on Instagram: @bravenewteachingMentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

If we asked you what you get most excited about in teaching, assessments might not be at the top of your list…but it is for us! By the end of this episode, it just might be for you too. Assessments are the star of the show in part three of our “The Best Thing I Ever Taught” series. Today we’re sharing two specific examples of favorite assessments that we have used with our students. Before you listen in, just remember that you can take these ideas and tweak them to fit the exact needs of your students - and that may take some trial and error!If you are in need of some formative quiz ideas, be sure to register for our free new and improved masterclass, Down With The Reading Quiz!SHOW NOTES: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode125Follow us on Instagram: @bravenewteachingMentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

How do you feel about group work? Love it or dread it? Either way, stay tuned because today marks the second episode in our four part “The Best Thing I Ever Taught” series, where we’re covering group work.You can probably tell by the title of this episode that we love group work now…but trust us, that hasn’t always been the case. In the past, we absolutely detested it. Group work was one of those things that led to over planning, too much management, and way too much grading. Fast forward to today, and we’re happy to report that student collaboration is one of the main pillars of our teaching practice.We’re going to give you specific examples of group work activities that have worked brilliantly in our classes. One of them even involves students creating a podcast episode! We hope that these ideas give you some new ideas as to how you can incorporate group work that is engaging for your students and builds classroom community (without adding more work on your end).SHOW NOTES: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode124Download your FREE Gratitude Bell Ringers here: https://www.curriculumrehab.com/gratitudeFollow us on Instagram: @bravenewteachingMentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

We’re kicking off a new 4-episode series called The Best Thing I Ever Taught. (If the name sounds like it’s inspired by The Best Thing I Ever Ate from the Food Network, it’s because it is!) Inside this series, we’ll be sharing all kinds of things that bring us joy and that we, and our students, have seen a huge return on. This week we’re focusing on gateway activities.   First, let’s define exactly what a gateway activity is. It has everything to do with what we do here at Brave New Teaching - essential questions and an inquiry-based curriculum design. More specifically, a gateway activity is the activity at the very beginning of a unit of study that gets your student buy-in. It introduces students to the topics being covered, and gets the chatter going about the essential question for the unit.   We are both sharing the details of the best gateway activities that we’ve each taught, one with a Gatsby unit and the other with a Shakespeare unit. This conversation will let you in on the process of planning these gateway activities, and hopefully you can see that there’s no set procedure for this. It takes brainstorming, and it gets a little messy, but that’s how the best ideas come to be!   If you have any questions after listening, we want to hear from you! Send us a message with questions or comments @bravenewteaching on Instagram. If you want more support with using gateway activities, we invite you to join us in Curriculum Rehab.   SHOW NOTES: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode123   Follow us on Instagram: @bravenewteachingMentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Today's episode is a re-run of one of our favorites! If you aren’t already on the dystopian band wagon, we’re fairly confident that you will be after this episode. We’ve taught dystopia for YEARS, and it hasn’t lost any steam along the way. Can you say that for other genres? So, why is dystopia as a specific genre so gosh darn exciting? Why is it something we believe should be in every single ELA classroom? We couldn’t even begin to count the reasons, but to begin, it helps kids understand the society they are growing up in. More importantly, it allows them to begin to build their own options and questions around society. How cool is that? Today we’re making three solid points on why dystopia is something you need to get behind. Tune in to hear us dive into each of these points: 1. Dystopia is always relevant 2. It’s popular and engaging…hello Hunger Games! 3. It has limitless possibilities  Dystopia Workshop: https://www.curriculumrehab.com/dystopia SHOW NOTES: bravenewteaching.com/episode61Mentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

If you’ve been racking your brain for a way to approach a Shakespeare unit in a way that is engaging and impactful for your students, then you’ll want to stick around. This episode is a conversation between Amanda and one of her coaching clients, Kelsi. You’ll get to hear them give all the juicy details about an incredible unit that they designed together.  Kelsi initially came to Amanda for help because her English course was extremely standards-based and focused on teaching for mastery (aka, drill, drill, drill for state testing).  She was struggling to create units that made sense, but were also purposeful and met her students’ needs and interests.  A Shakespeare unit was coming up and Kelsi desperately wanted to find a way to teach it in an innovative way. So, her and Amanda came together to create a unit that paired Macbeth with Long Way Down, by Jason Reynolds. Not to spoil anything, but…the results were magic.  In comparing the two texts, they came up with an engaging essential question that was perfect for Kelsi's group of Sophomores. Inside the episode, Kelsi shares the step-by-step specifics of how she structured this unit, which routines she implemented, and how she assessed her students’ learning.  Check out the show notes: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode121 Follow us on Instagram: @bravenewteachingMentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

Friends, it’s time to wrap up our nonfiction series that has been focused on biography and memoir. What better way to do that than with a TBR list? We’re sharing our favorite books that fit into the genre of biography and memoir, as well as some that we’ve had on our list but haven’t had a chance to read yet. Disclaimer: you are going to want to put all of these books in your Amazon card immediately. You’ve been warned, so don’t send us your bill! If you ask us, filling up your book shelves with these titles is well worth the money. If you haven’t listened to the rest of this nonfiction series, be sure to check out episode 116, episode 117, episode 118, and episode 119. These episodes really reiterate why you should lean into the possibilities of what this genre has to offer.  Register for our virtual workshop on teaching biography and memoir: https://www.curriculumrehab.com/biographyandmemoir Check out the show notes to easily access all of the text recommendations on our list: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode120 Follow us on Instagram: @bravenewteachingMentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel

For part four of our nonfiction series, we’re looking at using biography and memoir as mentor texts. You’ll hear how we define and use mentor texts in our own classroom. We’ll also give you some specific mentor texts that we recommend using, and our reasoning behind those texts. Since we love a good collabisode, we’ve also crowdsourced some great ideas from our colleagues and friends. They will be sharing their favorite biography and memoirs to use as mentor texts, how it provides a powerful teaching moment, and what students can do with that mentor text. Register for our virtual workshop on teaching biography and memoir: https://www.curriculumrehab.com/biographyandmemoir Check out the show notes to hear all of the mentor text recommendations mentioned in this episode: https://www.bravenewteaching.com/home/episode119 Follow us on Instagram: @bravenewteachingMentioned in this episode:Get more Brave New Teaching each week:Join BNT Happy Hour Here!"Send us a message - please include your contact information so we can chat soon!"Get your FREE Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs gateway lesson: shop.bravenewteaching.com/cloudyCheck out Curriculum Rehab here!Support the show📚 BNT PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT & RESOURCES 👩‍💻 Join Happy Hour! Curriculum Rehab Down with the Reading Quiz Shop the BNT Resource Library Connect with us on Instagram @bravenewteaching Subscribe to our YouTube Channel