Teachers at Work contributor Shannon Reed had a "bad class" this year at the Brooklyn public school where she teaches English and theater. Shannon describes how she found a way to engage with the students through "spoken word" poetry.  Continue reading...

When English scholar E.D. Hirsch, Jr. was called upon to try to figure out why the communication skills of contemporary Americans were deteriorating, he answered that call by bemoaning this generation's lack of "cultural literacy" — a cultural knowledge base that previous generations of well-educated folks supposedly shared.  Continue reading...

If, as Polonius proclaimed in Hamlet, "brevity is the soul of wit," then Shakespeare surely mastered the art of coming up with witty and brief expressions that have managed to stick around for centuries. This week's worksheet features sixteen Shakespearean phrases that students can explore using the Visual Thesaurus.  Continue reading...

Students tend to associate antonym pairs with adjectives — hot and cold, fast and slow, etc. This week's worksheet shows your students that verbs can have opposing meanings as well.  Continue reading...

The other night I was sitting next to an Austrian teacher of English at a restaurant in Brighton, in southern England. He was a bit puzzled by an item on the menu which offered "Pan roasted local skate wing, crushed ratte potatoes, sautéed spinach, caper, lemon & parsley butter."  Continue reading...

The truth is no one really knows when the great bard was born, but Shakespeare's fans celebrate his life and work on April 23rd (ironically, the date of his death). Join us in paying homage to Shakespeare this week by using the Visual Thesaurus to get to the heart of some of his more famous puns.  Continue reading...