The Polliwog Journal

One of our inservice days this year was dedicated to technology. In one session we learned about netTrekker, a subscription search tool for schools. It seems to be worth the money we paid to subscribe. I want our students to know how to use it, so I came up with a lesson to teach them [...]

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AP students are often asked to analyze the diction of a passage. Diction means to some degree the author’s style, such as formal diction, but more technically diction means the author’s choice of words. I sometimes have students highlight words and phrases that have a similar tone or meaning. They may use more than one [...]

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On a whim, I pasted the first paragraph of a story (A Very Old Man With Enormous Wings by Gabriel Garcia Marquez) into Wordle.

It would be cool to hand the Wordle out (nothing more, not even the title) to the class before reading have students in groups come up with the following:

What is the story [...]

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A wordle is clever in a number of ways. The word “wordle” is just funny; it kind of tickles the tongue, makes the tongue vibrate just a bit.
Ms K has some ideas about how to use Wordle in the classroom. I may have to try some of them, IF we aren’t blocked!
What I like best [...]

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