Georgia Scurletis : Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus

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Georgia Scurletis

Georgia Scurletis is Director of Curriculum and Training for the Visual Thesaurus and Vocabulary.com. Before coming to Thinkmap, she spent 18 years as a curriculum writer and classroom teacher. Georgia has written curriculum materials for a variety of Web sites (WGBH, The New York Times Learning Network, Edsitement) and various school districts. While teaching high school English in Brooklyn, she was a recipient of the New York State English Council's Educators of Excellence Award, the Brooklyn High Schools' Recognition Award, and The New York Times' Teachers Who Make a Difference Award.

Despite its popularity among teens, you're not going to find class sets of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series in the English department book rooms across the country. Even if most teachers don't incorporate trendy literature into their class syllabus, it doesn't mean that they can't take advantage of the excitement of the fad and harness it to teach some valuable lessons about writing, editing, and word choice. Continue reading...

Vocabulary, Reading, Books, Language arts, Teaching

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The bad news: SAT reading scores have reached an all-time low, and recently released NAEP scores reveal that American students' vocabulary growth is "flat." The good news: It's no longer 2012. It's 2013, a new year, a time to buy gym memberships and to overhaul your vocabulary instruction. Just do it. Continue reading...

Vocabulary, Language arts, Teaching

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As teachers begin to grapple with the demands of the Common Core State Standards, they may be overlooking a discrete language standard living in the shadows of those major shifts. Continue reading...

Vocabulary, Language arts, Words

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One way to help students grapple with more complex texts is to be more transparent about measurements of readability in the classroom. Reveal to students the readability of a text before reading it, and engage in meaningful discussions about what makes a text difficult. Continue reading...

Language arts, Teaching

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If "grammar is the skunk at the garden party of the language arts," how can teachers confront the skunk when it comes to explaining how verbs work? Continue reading...

Language arts

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Some writing students are taught that there is a four letter word that they should avoid using in their writing: S-A-I-D. They are cautioned that if they repeat the use of said (or say) for attributing quotes or for introducing dialogue, that this repetition will bog down their writing and bore their readers. Continue reading...

Language arts

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Lake Superior State University released its 2012 List of Banished Words this month — a collection of words they deem as "Banished from the Queen's English for Misuse, Overuse and General Uselessness." Teachers, if you shared this news with your students, however, they probably wouldn't recognize this list of words and phrases as "overused." Continue reading...

Language arts

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