Latest Lesson Plans
Facts Before Fiction: Writing into Autumn
"Fictional stories and poetry are often held together by fact, and this lesson shows students how they can weave practical…
Talk to the Hand: A Creative Exercise in Seeing, Writing, and Making Spontaneous Broadsides
T&W writer Matthew Burgess brings a new creative writing exercise that refreshes "our perceptual apparatus." Watch your students slip out…
The Map as Metaphor: Poetic Cartographies in the Virtual Classroom
In this virtual creative writing lesson plan by educator and poet Joanna Fuhrman, she asks students to choose meaningful objects…
“What If”: Trusting Students with Difficult and Challenging Model Texts
In this article, teacher Brittny Ray Crowell brings the poem, "I saw Emmett Till this week at the grocery store,"…
Facts Before Fiction: Writing into Autumn
“Fictional stories and poetry are often held together by fact, and this lesson shows students how they can weave practical knowledge into imaginative writing.” Educator Diane Conmy shares one of her favorite lessons, inspired by autumn and the book “Autumn Leaves” by Ken Robbins.
30 Poems in 30 Days: Writing Prompts for National Poetry Month
30 for 30: This April, find writing workshop prompts for every day of National Poetry Month.
The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop: An Interview with Felicia Rose Chavez
In this interview, Felicia Rose Chavez and poet and T&W writer Amanda Volel discuss Chavez’s new book “The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop: How to Decolonize the Creative Classroom” and how to incorporate anti-racist practices and mindfulness into your workshop classroom.
Talk to the Hand: A Creative Exercise in Seeing, Writing, and Making Spontaneous Broadsides
T&W writer Matthew Burgess brings a new creative writing exercise that refreshes “our perceptual apparatus.” Watch your students slip out of self-consciousness and into play and process with this activity.
Tribute to Dick Gallup (1941-2021)
photo credit: Poetry Society of America (on the right: Dick Gallup, 1961) Teachers & Writers Collaborative honors the work of poet Dick Gallup, who taught with T&W in the early 1970s. Ron Padgett writes in honor of his friend: “American poet Dick Gallup, once described as a kinder, gentler version of French poet Arthur Rimbaud,…
Four Women: At the Beginning of Teachers & Writers Collaborative
Profiles of Grace Paley, June Jordan,
Muriel Rukeyser and Anne Sexton, four women instrumental in the founding of Teachers & Writers Collaborative, one of the first ever Writers in the Schools programs.
Writing One’s Way to Shinrinyoko: Training Practicing Teachers in Creative Writing Methods
Sharoon writes about introducing a English creative writing workshop to international educators in Indian academic circles, as a model for nurturing creativity and language skills in their students.
She writes: “The workshop became the shinrinyoko for many participants. In writing, they made a journey: towards themselves and towards finding meaning in why they do what they do.”
Teaching James Baldwin
In this 1998 article from the archives by Phillip Lopate, he says “Of course I don’t wish to dilute their human feeling for this person who has suffered and witnessed great suffering; but I want them to understand the mastery of language that Baldwin accomplished, because this is part of the positive side of the ledger that helped him survive—and may help them survive.”
Teaching the Tritina and Unraveling Oppression with High School Students
In this article, T&W Editorial Fellow Trace Howard DePass writes about teaching the poetic form, the tritina to provide High School students with a platform for self expression and to further process their oppression with language and poetic tools.
The Map as Metaphor: Poetic Cartographies in the Virtual Classroom
In this virtual creative writing lesson plan by educator and poet Joanna Fuhrman, she asks students to choose meaningful objects from home to create the abstract landscape of a map, drawing on images and details from their inner lives to write a poem based on memory and location.