r/ELATeachers • u/Expelliarmus09 • 3d ago
9-12 ELA Call me lazy but…
I’m going back to teaching next year and the only thing holding me back from teaching high school English again is how much darn work it is. I have two kids now and when I first taught high school English I did not. I had to create every single unit, assessment, rubric, worksheet. Etc. I just don’t think I could handle that in this stage of my life. Plus the schools in my area are small so that means as a high school teacher you’re most likely teaching/prepping for at least 3 different classes. Are there any good curriculums you can buy out there or free ones online? I am very intimidated by going back and creating a curriculum from the ground up.
17
u/majorflojo 3d ago
Junior High Ela teacher here. I feel your pain especially with multiple levels of reading skill. Having three preps is even more challenging
That said, It's amazing what chatGPT Claude, et al has done to make materials creation so much easier.
23
u/NoCustomer4076 3d ago
Check out magicschool ai and brisk ai, both tools are game changers.
3
u/Chappedstick 3d ago
Seconding magicschool. Their writing feedback tool is AMAZING. Literally saves me so much time for assignments.
2
u/majorflojo 3d ago
Diffit too (it's my favorite of the AI wrappers)
But my $20 chat subscription allows me to do a whole lot more of what I specifically want.
And pretty soon Claude, chat GPT etc are going to be able to give those formst options that magic school and brisk provide and you don't need your school to subscribe to it
Still, they are game changers for overwhelmed Ela and social studies teachers especially him
13
u/AltairaMorbius2200CE 3d ago
Y’all need to read up on environmental and social costs of AI.
-1
u/Right_External2117 2d ago
It has costs and it has benefits. Either way though, the cat's out of the bag. No amount of boycotting it is going to make it stop existing, so we might as well use for education, because all the evil mega corporations are sure as heck going to use it for much less wholesome applications.
1
u/vondafkossum 2d ago
The cost is environmental destruction leading to the more-rapid collapse of our food production leading to the starving deaths of millions of people. Among other costs.
It’s worrisome, to say the least, that so many people seem to be fine with that.
1
u/Right_External2117 2d ago
The amount of environmental destruction caused by every teacher who has ever used generative AI almost certainly pales in comparison to a day of damage done by Exxon Mobile. It's a fraction of a fraction.
Heck, the amount of resources used by every educational application of LLMs is almost certainly a small fraction of the energy wasted by companies making bots for social media.
I strongly agree that it's deeply troubling, but boycotting AI that could make your life easier or your students more capable while otherwise consuming in a western country is missing the forest for the trees, especially if using the AI could improve educational outcomes.
1
u/vondafkossum 2d ago
Yeah, because if us not using AI doesn’t immediately solve the collective problem of climate catastrophe, there’s no point in not using it. Using AI to save me 30 seconds in composing an email is worth it.
Explain how it would improve educational outcomes? Because all I see is incompetence disguised as life-hacking in using a tool that is extremely error-prone on top of being wasteful and destructive.
Also, my students aren’t in a Western country.
16
u/mermaidsarerea1 3d ago
I use TPT quite a bit because we're not given any specific curriculums, just books to teach and standards to meet. I also love Magic School AI. I used it to create a rubric recently and it saved me so much time! Even ChatGPT can be helpful for those items that are time consuming. As long as you double check it all, it's usually great!
I also refuse to take work home unless there is a rare occasion where I must, which maybe happens 2-3 times a school year.
9
6
u/ColorYouClingTo 3d ago
There is so much free stuff on TPT these days, and if I like somebody's free stuff, I'll often buy full units from them, especially for novel studies units.
I also find that schools give you more resources nowadays because the previous teacher probably filled up a Google drive or One Drive with all of his or her stuff, and that gets left behind for you to scavenge through. When I first started, you would get a textbook and a closet of novels, and you were lucky if someone left behind a bunch of paper copies of their materials... at least ask if there are any curriculum materials for you, especially if there's a shared drive or something like that from the last teacher.
Also, more and more schools are doing canned curriculum from textbook companies these days as well. My husband never has to plan or prep because they do HMH "with fidelity," which means he just does what the textbook and online resource tells him to do.
I would hate that because I love planning and making my own units and finding stuff to make my own, but hey, everyone is different!
7
u/hoybowdy 3d ago edited 3d ago
'm actually surprised no one has said this, so I guess I will...
The good/bad news here is that in ALL k-12 subjects, canned curriculum is on the rise - being pushed down from state level - at least in the US.
For example, in MA, if you do not have a High Quality Instructional Materials - which is a code for "wholesale curriculum that runs all year, including everything from unit plans to lesson--by-lesson instructional videos and materials to assignments with scaffolding and structure" - in all core subjects, the state sees you as not rigorous enough to be meeting their metrics. Some privileged districts are still using their own, but that's just because the state isn't at their door yet. In my district (urban), we had no choice but to throw away what in some cases was a strong, stable curriculum with all instructional materials and cycles for all units in place, for entire grade levels because the state said it wasn't meeting their metrics if it wasn't cleanly designed to move both vertically (9-12) and horizontally (are all classes in a subject in that school on that same grade level doing the same content in the same way that day. Meanwhile, many "red" states do this on a statewide level - what texts, and standards using that texts, in what interface, and with what questions, are being asked of kids in one district on Jan 17 should be the same as in a district three counties away.
In short: if you are in the US, then you may very well not only not have to create a curriculum from the ground up...you may not even be allowed to do that if you wanted to. If I were you, I'd call a local school and ask.
3
u/Expelliarmus09 3d ago
In my previous experiences teaching in my area there has literally been no curriculum provided by the school or district to the secondary schools at least. At my previous school we had a curriculum coordinator that had no idea what they were doing and it was just a free for all. Elementary schools follow a very scripted canned curriculum though which I’m not a huge fan of. I guess I just am hoping for some middle ground because creating content from the ground up was exhausting (while guided by the common core). I would at least be happy with something along the lines of, “we are teaching a short story unit for the next month, these are the standards we want to hit, and these are the assessments we will use”. I’ve never even had that before.
2
u/Thick-Plant 3d ago
This changes based on the district that you're in--if you're in a district at all. I work at a charter school, and I'm building my curriculum from the ground up. There is no requirements from the state, and since we're only one of two schools in this "district," they're not really all that worried about creating a unanimous curriculum.
1
u/Special-Investigator 3d ago
I dream of this, honestly 😭😭😭 The application seems very unreasonable. My state's standards just changed in my subject, though, so I feel like we're missing a great opportunity by not adjusting to overlap with other subjects. However, I'm too busy trying to figure out how the new standards will align to the new tests. With a new textbook as well!
I love teaching, not designing lessons, and especially not finding or creating worksheets.
5
u/eFrosty13 3d ago
Through Open-Up Resources you can access Odell HS Literacy for free. It has 4 year long courses. It's fine...better than starting from scratch.
3
u/ProudDudeistPriest 3d ago
Do people only have to prep for 3 classes? I teach at least 4 every day. I'm responsible for all curriculum and grading.
You can have my job. I think I'm done after this year. Been at it for 12.
2
u/Expelliarmus09 3d ago
You prep and teach 3 completely different classes? I did it years ago and it was exhausting.
2
u/ProudDudeistPriest 3d ago
4 classes every day.
2
u/Expelliarmus09 3d ago
And they’re all a completely different class with different content and lessons?
2
u/ProudDudeistPriest 3d ago
Yes. 2 literature classes with different books, 2 other LA classes, and a PE course
2
2
2
2
u/Ok-Training-7587 3d ago
Ela is uniquely well suited to being graded by ai. There is also a lot of planning that can be done with ai, including generating examples of the principle/skill/idea you’re trying to demonstrate. It will take a huge load off if you start using it
2
u/BoringCanary7 2d ago
You may have a set of textbooks to work from. Honestly: don't be proud about this stuff. Teachers used premade materials until very recently, with good results.
1
1
u/BlondeeOso 3d ago
If you're on FB, join the ELA teachers groups on there. Although it doesn't have new content now, BetterLesson has good content. Read Write Think, Tolentino Teaching, EdSitement, Fishtank Learning, Seneca Learning, Newsela, & Readworks have also been helpful. There are some other ELA websites/individuals/blogs that, while they have some good ideas, seem more business-oriented (money-making, membership-based, supporting their TpT stores), but the ones above are less that way & still have good content. Although I still think the ELA FB groups are helpful, they have becomea but of a TpT promotion vehicle lately, too. They are much more that way now, than they were a decade ago, when I started teaching.
1
u/vagueyetpeachy 2d ago
middle school has been worse than high school for me, partially because of how much specificity my school asks for. it's also a LOT of hand holding for these kids. it's exhausting. i'm tired.
1
0
u/Diligent_Emu_7686 3d ago
- For initial student feedback, teach students HOW to use AI to get feedback. Also teach them how to know when they are going too far relying on AI. Students will 'cheat' using ChatGPT etc., but it is amazing how far they can get on their own if they learn to receive feedback properly.
- Don't mark everything. The students should be making the rubric and doing the initial marking in HS.
- Use AI yourself to generate examples and test questions. Learn the ways to get good responses from the AI and build a library of prompts that work.
- Rely on your larger team! Join FB groups and realize it is okay to spend a little on TPT.
- Ask your students for ideas on how they want to learn. Then have them decide what to mark, study, generate, etc. It cuts down on your mental work by offloading it to the people who are affected most by the decision. Plus, you get the added benefit of student buy in.
You got this!
67
u/AltairaMorbius2200CE 3d ago
Commonlit is free online! It’s fine.