Tuesday - ReviMo Classroom Style Day 2 with Jane Feber, Secondary

Teachers and Secondary Students
by Jane Feber

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Writing is not my strong suit; I’m more of a right brain kinda’ gal. I learn most when I am able to apply skills and concepts. Thus the ideas that are in my books are all activities and strategies aimed at engaging students in the learning process.

As with all of the teacher resources I have written, it’s the creative, hands-on activities that are the highlights of each book. Yet the publishers are intent on the front matter – the introduction, rationale behind the book, and the directions on how to use the book.

When I was a contributing author for Pearson, my editor, after reading my first draft, took me out to dinner to discuss my pieces. What I thought was concise, my editor informed me lacked voice. After a long dinner conversation, I was told that I had so much voice in my speaking and needed to learn to transfer this voice to my writing.

At this point I became cognizant of the elements that form good writing. I became more aware of sentence structure. As I read I began looking for introductory elements – participle phrases, subordinate clauses, and prepositional phrases. I began to realize that quite often a short sentence can pack a powerful punch. I learned to better develop my ideas using research as a basis. All of these elements are modeled in good writing by well-know authors. The more I read and became aware of how proficient writers used these elements of good writing, the better I became at using them in my own writing.

I have now authored four books all published by Maupin House/Capstone. I continuously refer to my books as I gather activities to share activities for presenting to teachers. As I read through the front matter in each book, I can see the improvement in my writing style. I learned that the more you read and observe the traits of proficient writing, the better writer you become. Writing is most definitely a recursive process. The more you write, the better writer you become.

As a middle school language arts teacher for 36 years, Jane Feber’s innovative approach to instruction has earned her several awards including the AMLE Distinguished Educator Award, the Gladys Prior Award for Teaching Excellence, Florida Council of Teachers of English Teacher of the Year, Duval County, FL, Teacher of the Year, and the NCTE Edwin A. Hoey Award. Jane was a National Board Certified Teacher and is also the author of Creative Book Reports: Fun Projects with Rubrics for Fiction and Nonfiction, Active Word Play, Student Engagement is FUNdamental, and Engage Striving Students in the Common Core Classroom published by Maupin House/Capstone. You can contact Jane through her website at www.thebetterteacher.com.