☕️ Ah! Fresh Paste! (Blog Starter Pack 5/2025)

New to the blog? Not sure where to start?

Why The Paste Eaters Blog?

All the good blog names were taken. Next question.

Who are you? What do you write about?

I’m a second generation teacher with experience across middle school, high school, and college admissions. I love teaching writing and showing other teachers why it’s easier than they think. In elementary school I carried my notebook to recess and dreamed of being a writer. As an adult, blogging just sort of makes sense.

I’ve been in education closer to fifteen years and speak at local and national conferences about teaching writing, evidence-based reading comprehension strategies, dual coding theory, and integrating technology. I binge read research papers and collect old schoolbooks. Which means I think about academic essays as much as obscure nineteenth century books.

Where do I start?

If you’re new to the blog, this contains most everything from the past year. Everything is categorized and fan favorites are marked.

As you read, feel free to leave feedback! A like or a comment go a long ways!

✏️ Teach Writing Tomorrow

My talk “Help! I don’t know how to teach writing!” always goes over well, but leaves many wanting first steps and next steps. My series Teach Writing Tomorrow addresses those by moving from mindsets to methods.

• TWT: Tell Your Story: How Did You Learn to Teach Writing? (10/2024)

• TWT: Preview: “Help! I don’t know how to teach writing!” (10/2024)

• 🏆 TWT: 20 Tips for Teaching Writing Tomorrow (#1-10) (10/2024)

• 🏆 TWT: 20 Tips for Teaching Writing Tomorrow (#11-20) (11/2024)

• TWT: Breathing Isn’t a Standard (Data-Driven Band Class) (12/2024)

• TWT: How to Write Every Day (Student Writing Notebooks) (1/3) (1/2025)

• TWT: What to Write Every Day (And How to Grade It) (1/2025)

• TWT: Couch to 5K Writing (1/2025)

• 🏆 TWT: Student Writing Notebooks: The Starter Pack (ft. 50+ Example Journals) (1/2025)

• 🏆 TWT: 101 Random Lesson Plans (No AI) (2/2025)

• TWT: Let Speaking Teach Writing (James Moffett on Discourse) (2/2025)

• TWT: Five Ways to Let Speaking Teach Writing (3/2025)

• TWT: Lesson Plan Randomizer Beta (+ Download) (3/2025)

• TWT: Teaching & Habitual Re-Creation (4/2025)

• 🏆 TWT: How to Lesson Plan Once (And Never Again) (4/2025)

• TWT: Three Cards to Chaos: A Lesson Planning Game (+ Download) (5/2025)

🚌 Teaching and Life

• What Really Happens in the Classroom (Notes 8/4 to 10/11) (10/2024)

• On 9/11: From “Never Forget” to “Not Born Yet” (9/2024)

• Teachers, Begin Your School Year with Regrets (And Hope) (7/2024)

• 🏆 Ten Life Lessons I Wish I Knew at Seventeen (6/2024)

• Summer Begins in Exhaustion (6/2024)

• 🏆 Teachers do NOT make 1,500 decisions per day* (5/2024)

• The Roar (Last Days of School) (5/2024)

• CBS Won’t Interview Teachers About Teaching Shortage (5/2024)

• Schools Should Teach Letter Writing (Part 2) (4/2024)

• Schools Should Teach Letter Writing (Part 1) (4/2024)

• Fast Food Workers of the Mind (3/2024)

📓 Teaching Tips and Resources

Looking for hands-on resources and tips for tomorrow?

• Off topic essays? Try this easy intervention (12/2024)

• Q+A: Writing Every Day, Grading, and Giving Feedback (AMLE 2024) (11/2024)

• Round Pegs, Square Holes, and Google Forms (11/2024)

• Three Big Benefits to Teaching with Student Writing (9/2024)

• 🏆 Five Ways Google Forms Help Teach Writing (9/2024)

• AI in the Classroom: Improving Semester Reflection Letters (4/2024)

• 🏆 50 Free Metaphorical Writing Prompts (4/2024)

• AI in the Classroom: Metaphorical Writing Prompts (4/2024)

• Free Essay Feedback: Letters and Emails (4/2024)

• Free Essay Feedback: Summarizing (3/2024)

• Free Essay Feedback: MLA Formatting (3/2024)

• Need Essay Feedback? Hit ‘Print’ (3/2024)

• Stop Grading Essays with Amnesia (3/2024)

🧠 Evidence-Based and Teaching with Technology

• 🏆 13 1/2 Evidence-Based Reading Comprehension Strategies (3/2025)

• 🏆 What is Dual Coding Theory? (Hint: Not Computer Related) (9/2024)

• Blue Trucks and Reading Dances: Five Fast Implications of Dual Coding Theory (9/2024)

• Dual Coding Theory, Old Schoolbooks, and Flan (An Interview) (5/2024)

• Quilted Writing (Conference Preview) (7/2024)

• Touchscreens are intuitive. Word processors aren’t (8/2024)

• How We Failed the First Digital Generation (The Dead Desktop Metaphor) (2/2025)

📰 Humor: The Honest School Times

• They always had pencils (5/2025)

• Student Walks Paper to Basket, Immediately Checks Grade (4/2025)

• Entire Midwest Town Drives to Madeira Beach (3/2025)

• Crime Beat: Illegal K-Cup Found in Teacher’s Trash Can (3/2025)

• Gen Z Doesn’t Understand the movie “Snow Day” (1/2025)

• Local School Uses AI Grief Counselors after TikTok Ban (1/2025)

• Teachers Gather on New Years to Watch Pendulum Swing (1/2025)

• 4th Grade Teacher Receives Record Breaking 34 Christmas Mugs (12/2024)

• Amazing! Teachers Discover Dinosaur During Data Dig (12/2024)

• Local Teachers Fall through the Ice During Icebreaker (12/2024)

• Ten MORE Things I Keep in my Desk (Folgers, Sponsor Me!) (5/2024)

• Ten Things I Keep in my Desk (Folgers, Sponsor Me!) (4/2024)