You don’t feel like yourself lecturing. You don’t like teaching straight to the test. You want to teach creatively, but you don’t want to alienate students who hate art or administrators afraid of change.
You are not alone. Thousands of teachers around the world feel the same way, and I’m here to tell you they are not giving up or giving in! I know because I talk to them almost every day inside my Facebook group, Creative High School English.
Helping you innovate and put together the creative classroom and curriculum you dream of is what I’m all about. I spent almost a decade teaching at every high school grade level – regular, honors, AND I.B. Now I channel my experience and love for education into making the way easier for you.
I can offer you five kinds of help…
The Spark Creativity Teacher Podcast
Here you’ll find quick and creative options for your classroom delivered through your earbuds. Several times a month I’ll share with you something exciting to put into practice in your classroom. You can find past episodes on classroom murder mysteries, book clubs, poetry slam, escape rooms, choice reading, Google classroom, and much more.
The Creative High School English Facebook Group
In this group, you’ll find a community of teachers from around the world pursuing creativity and supporting each other in the process. It always made me sad how little I could actually talk to any of my colleagues at work, so I designed this group to be the faculty room we all dream of (minus the frozen yogurt bar!). Post questions and needs and share wins and ideas in this group and you’ll be amazed by how supportive it is. Teachers regularly tell me they love being in this group. I hope you’ll be the next to join.
Curriculum Resources
My first year of teaching I worked most days from seven a.m. to midnight. There always seemed to be one more thing to do. One more poetry slam clip to preview, one more option to add to my activity menu, one more photo to put in my video. At the end of the year I almost left the profession. I don’t want this for you. You can be a creative teacher who connects, innovates, AND gets a little help so your life can stay sane. I design stand-alone units you can put into place during gaps in your curriculum like the Short Story Maker Project, full curriculum units like my Complete Curriculum for The Outsiders, fun creative final projects like The Literary Food Truck Project, and many more items you can browse through over at TPT.
The Website
Well, you’ve already found it! This is my main base of operations, where I post strategies, round-ups, freebies, and podcast show notes. I generally write here one or two times a week, sharing creative classroom ideas and inspiration from far and wide. You can always check the “Popular Posts” on the sidebar to see what’s trending, or explore the sidebar tags to find topics that interest you. If you’re in search of information on a creative teaching strategy and you can’t find a post about it, feel free to e-mail me at betsy@nowsparkcreativity.com and suggest it! I’m always looking for ways to help.
The Membership
Inside my membership, The Lighthouse, you’ll find curriculum, community and collaboration to help you as a creative English teacher. Each month, I’ll share new curriculum resources with you, then guide you along the way and answer your questions through weekly emails and conversation inside The Lighthouse community.
You can sign up for The Lighthouse waitlist right here, so you’ll be the first to hear about it when the doors open again.
Finally, I suggest you sign up for my Friday e-mails. Pop your info in below for insider freebies, fun classroom ideas, and podcast and blog post highlights delivered to your inbox, and you’ll also get four free one-pager templates with complete instructions. This is one of the most popular pieces of curriculum I’ve ever designed, and I often hear from teachers who are using (and loving) it.
