Commercial Break!! Creative Play With Media Influence
Purpose: Works well to introduce a personal visual media paper, or other media analysis paper, because it encourages students to think...
TV Personalities: Trying on Voices
Purpose: This icebreaker makes a great first day introduction, getting students interested in and excited about writing by exploring...
Alphabet Lists—Getting to Know Your Classmates
Purpose: The aim of this exercise is to get students to introduce themselves and to initiate collaborative working relationships...
Would You Rather...
Purpose: This ice breaker is a great activity for students and I have found that it gives students a chance to get to know more about...
Guess Who?
Purpose of Exercise: The purpose of this exercise is three-fold: to introduce students to each other, to show the variety of experiences...
Learning to Lie—The Importance of Including Details
Purpose: This exercise encourages students to discover and invent convincing details. This is a good exercise to use in the beginning of...
Grammar Remediated
Purpose of Exercise: Teaching grammar rules to your students can be painstakingly boring—not only for them, but for you. Covering this...
Exquisite Corpse: Fun with Syntax
Purpose: This Mad-Libs-style exercise gets students thinking about how language works via an underhanded grammar refresher, and jarring...
Chaos is (Not) Our Friend: Editing for Clarity
Purpose: This handout and exercise is designed get students to consider, and read for, clarity. Use it if careless errors in student...
One-of-a-Kind Apostrophe Test
Purpose: This exercise is designed as a fun class "test" in the use of apostrophes. Use it if you're finding many such errors in student...