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Teachers’ Lounge

A Resource for Teachers of Creative Writing

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Swapping Student-Teacher Dynamics in Juvenile Detention Centers
Chelsea Lebron, Nicholas Ritter, & Katey Funderburgh

Pedagogy Papers

Using the OCEAN Model to Develop Characters
Sarah Joy Adams

Building Characters: Method as Form, Madness as Content
Thomas Allbaugh

Ruin/Repair/Rewrite: A Creative Writing Activity Sequence
Rebecca Arrowsmith

Method Writing and Stanislavski: Experience and Immersion in Fiction
Garrett Ashley

Poetry As Conversation: Renga As a Class Project
Roy Beckemeyer

Write a Bad Poem Contest
Elizabeth Bodien

Multilayered Poetry Prompts for Intermediate Poetry Students
Jacob Butlett

To See the Poem Again: Teaching Revision
Wendy Call

Harnessing the Muse with Unlikely Duos
Miriam Calleja

Refrigerator Masterpieces: Pre-K Artists and Productive Feedback
Neil Connelly

The Worst Mother’s Day Poem Ever: A Quick Lesson in the Power of Imagery
Neil Connelly

Nonfiction as Truth-Writing
Jacey de la Torre

“I Feel Like I’ve Heard This Somewhere”: A Digital Dialogue Exercise
Michael Dean Clark

A Case for Workshop Alternatives
Karen Craigo

The Case for Exploring Popular Texts in Writing
Jason D. DeHart

Painting Language: Writing with Words and Pictures
Jason D. DeHart

It’s 10 PM: Do You Know Where Your Character Is?
Margot DeSalvo

Collaborative Genre Fiction: A Group Writing Exercise
John Gerard Fagan

Using Letter Writing to Find Balance in Creative Nonfiction
John Gerard Fagan

A Vygotskian Creative Writing Frame
John Gerard Fagan

A House Is a Home Is a Human: A Writing Prompt
John Findura

The Mindful Zombie: An Exercise to Enhance Tone
Kristen Figgins

Calming the Inner Critic
Diane Forman

The Whole Elephant
Diane Forman

Get Real: Ethnography for Writers
Sandra Giles

Writing for Your Life: A Final Assignment
Mary Gilliland

Setting up an Afterschool Elementary Poetry Club
Vicky MacDonald Harris

Crafting after Inspiration: Using Sylvia Plath’s “Stings” to Teach Revision
Ann Hart

On Teaching Students to Love Their Darlings
Melody Heide

Deliberate Omission: Compositional Ellipsis in Visual Art and Writing
Caitlin Horrocks

Keeping to Our Sources: Craft Interviews with Students
Brent House

Atmospheric Pressure: A Ready-to-Go Lesson Plan
Destiny Howell

Poetry by Vote: Group Villanelles
Melissa Fite Johnson

Sijo: Teaching Korean Poetry through Examples and Discussion
Elizabeth Jorgensen

Learning to Throw Away…Or Maybe Not: Writing a Collective Poem to Teach Revision
Les Kay

Stick Figures in Action: Teaching Revision through Storyboarding
Barbara Krasner

Centering Agency and Emotion: Craft Sheets for Building Whole-Person Protagonists in Fiction
Rebecca Lauren

Tipping the Scales of Creative Nonfiction: Rating Systems in the Wild
Bethany Lee

New Alchemy: Using Poetry to Reimagine Disciplinary Knowledge
Angelo J. Letizia

One and Done: Tips for Running a Virtual Drop-In Workshop
Alison Lowenstein

In the Middle of Missouri, in the Middle of Pennsylvania: A Portable Exercise on Place
Marjorie Maddox & Gary R. Hafer

Word Lab: Micro-Experiments with Craft
Laura Malafarina

The Writing Laboratory: A Group Exercise
Katie Manning

Process, Not Product
Adrian Markle

How to Write and Perform Multi-Voice Poetry
Ashby McGowan

The Slanted Truth as Told Through Fabulism
Catherine Moore

Creative Writing “Fieldwork”: Responding to the World Beyond the Classroom
Jennifer Moore

Get the Banana: A Lesson in Action
Mike Moran

The Class You Want I Do Not Teach
N. West Moss

Defining Characters through Negation of Action
Katie Darby Mullins

I Can’t Be Held Responsible: Using 90s Rock for Creation
Katie Darby Mullins

Teaching Form & Meaning as a Foundation for Figurative Language
Annaleta Nichols

Approaches in Community Education
Robert Nisbet

Seven Days of Strangeness (and Index Cards)
Julie Platt

The Golden Shovel: An Introduction to Formal Poetry
Jeremy Michael Reed

Writing What You Know: Drawing on Students’ Quirky Expertise to Create Authority in Creative Nonfiction
Nancy Reddy

What I Learned Teaching at the Retirement Home
Rob Roensch

Replica as New Revision: A Flash Technique
Forrest Roth

Concluding Lines: Image, Color, and a Prompt
Margaret Rozga

Permission to Suck: Trust the Process
Ki Russell

Take Your Reader to Work Day: Writing Detail and Description
Richard Ryal

Five Lessons to Generate Ideas, Content, and Discussion
Aaron Sandberg

But This Is a History Class: Yelp Reviews, Ghost Stories, & Multi-Genre Writing
Brett Jordan Schmoll

Translating Hip-Hop into Shakespeare: A Code-Switching Exercise
Candice Kaup Scioscia

Descriptive Writing and Mindfulness: How One Reinforces the Other
Bupinder Singh

Illustrated Limericks: A Service-Learning Project
Kristen Sipper-Denlinger

The Trapeze: Teaching Trust in Creative Writing
Cassie Premo Steele

Divine Reading for Reflective Writing
Jacob Stratman

Flipping the Map: Lessons in Place Writing
Julija Šukys

Self-Portrait as an Opera Girl: A Lesson in Collecting Material
Laura Sweeney

Improving Peer Critique Through Focused Speed Dating
E. K. Taylor

Teaching Style Through Stylistic Destruction
E. K. Taylor

Snowball Dialogue
Donnie Welch

The Story Pattern: Plotting Short Stories Made Easy
Gary Charles Wilkens

168-Hour Endeavor
Beverly Army Williams

Contract Grading in the Creative Writing Classroom
Beverly Army Williams

Dance Moves: Using Video Clips to Surprise Students into Writing
Keri Withington

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