Preparing for Black History Month?

The Teacher's Discovery English and Social Studies divisions are interested in making your planning for Black History Month a little easier.



This DVD, "Martin Luther King: I Have a Dream," is a great piece for reviewing one of the most important speeches in American History. King's speech is also a great example of a truly remarkable rhetorician at work.

You'll find a sample of the video, and a free quiz to accompany it, at the link above.




Speaking of Martin Luther King, Jr., this great Talking Poster would be a fine addition to your classroom decor. Press the button on the poster for an audio clip of his famous speech.



And speaking of classroom decor (we are apparently all about the segues today), this poster set will let the words of African American poets resonate with your students every time the pass by. Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and others speak across generations, right into your students' hearts.



If you're interested in covering the Harlem Renaissance from all the angles, our set of three Harlem Renaissance PowerPoint presentations lead your students through the literary, musical, and artistic movements withing the Harlem Renaissance. The images and sounds in these presentations make them something really special.

If these pieces aren't quite what you're looking for, head over to the Teacher's Discovery website and give it a search.

As always, feel free to give us a call or drop us an email at teachersbrunch @ teachersdiscovery. com.

It's Catalog Season

Hello again, from Teacher's Brunch HQ in freezing fog-stricken Auburn Hills, MI.

(As Mike, our tech guy said, if smoke and foggy makes smoggy, do freezing and foggy equal froggy?)

Teachers across the country will soon find in their mailboxes our Spring Teacher's Discovery catalogs.

We've seen them, and they look great--full of ideas and awesome stuff to make teachers' days a little easier.

If you don't think you're going to get a catalog from us, and want to make sure you get one, head over to this link for English, Social Studies, and Science teachers, and over here for our Foreign Language friends.

When it does arrive in your mailbox, let us know what you think.

Spell Well. . . but you already knew that

So here's a convoluted way to toot our own horns. . . .

Ron Siliman's Blog (a very interesting spot on the net about all things poetic and more, even when you disagree with Mr. Siliman) posted a link to this comic blog, The Oatmeal.

If you look carefully, you'll see that the posters we featured in this post pretty much have your students covered.

It's dangerous to be so cutting edge, but we don't mind buying the Band-Aids.

New "Shakespeare at the Movies" Poster

The Bard returns to your classroom walls in this Teacher's Discovery exclusive poster, "Shakespeare at the Movies."






You'll see that the poster features a lot of well-known Shakespearean adaptations, along with some films with surprising bard roots.







We're particularly pleased that the poster gives props to "Forbidden Planet." Your kids will love it, too!






(Blogger's note: the last image isn't on the poster, but it made you smile.)

Another New Poster: Periodic Table of Loved and Admired

Our Periodic Table of Loved and Admired is the perfect to companion to our Teacher-Favorite Periodic Table of Dictators, Despots, and the Despised.

We hear pretty often from teachers who use our periodic tables to inspire discussion and writing assignments.

This new one will definitely be a nice addition to the line.

We bundled the two posters in a sort of "Best and Worst" packaged deal, that English teachers can find here, and social studies teachers can find here.



Take a look and let us know how you use them in your classroom.

Even More Great English Class Posters! Shakespeare Quote Posters This Time!

We have a bumper crop of English posters this week.

Inspired by a Shakespeare class at Wayne State University, we created these seemingly simple posters that feature quotes from every single Shakespeare play we can find. That includes acknowledgment of the so-called "lost" plays.



The posters are split into Tragedies, Comedies, and Histories, using the Oxford arrangement.

Of course, all of the most-famous quotes are included, along with fun bits and baubles from well-known and unknown Shakespeare plays.



The titles of the plays are color-coded to the colors of the quotes, so your students will know where each quote can be found.



Of course, we have a little fun, too, so we invented three Shakespeare plays, and included fake quoted from them. See if you and your students can find them!

You can get the Tragedies poster, the Histories poster, the Comedies poster, or get all three Shakespeare Quotes posters as a complete set.

Some New Literary Term Posters

We're pretty excited about a new batch of posters we're carrying. As you can see from the sample, they're really evocative and get attention when displayed on a wall.

You can order the poster in the sample here.

To find the rest of them, search our English site for the following SKUs: P1901E, P1902E, P1903E, P1904E, P1905E, or P1915E for a complete set with a nice bit of savings.

Two New Posters for English Classrooms

Stephanie, who is getting married this weekend, managed to stop thinking about dress alterations, family-style dinners, and chair covers long enough to put the finishing touches on these two posters for English teachers.

Not only is it impressive that she kept her wits about her given the upcoming nuptials, these were her first poster projects, and they are awesome!





The piece above is our 100 Misspelled Words poster. Put this on the wall and your students will always get those tough-to-master words correct.






The second poster is for Commonly Misused Words. Is it correct to use affect, or effect? Are your students' allusions all too often illusions?


Place both of these posters on the wall at the beginning of the year, and let them serve as gentle reminders right through to standardized tests.

And a big Teacher's Brunch "congratulations" to Stephanie and her fiance, special education teacher Brandon.

[insert "pitter-patter of little feet" joke here]

Got a favorite Shakespeare quote? Share it here!

We here at TB HQ in sunny (finally!) Auburn Hills, MI are elbows-deep in Shakespeare, and not just because Jason's 20-page paper for his class at Wayne State University is due next week, but because we're working on a poster set featuring favorite and surprising quotes from the Bard's tragedies, histories, and comedies.

So if you've got one that you love--or your students love--share it here, and we'll try to get it on the poster.

Because if a little Bardolatry is a good thing, then a lot of it is crazy good!


5/29/09 Update:

Just a little taste of what these will include, here's some, we think, interesting web pages that your students may some day stumble upon:


The Most Lamentable Life and Tragical Death of Bob
http://www.teachersdiscovery-english.com/ads/new/fakeShake/bob/bob1.html

The Second Part of Good King George (2 George)
http://www.teachersdiscovery-english.com/ads/new/fakeShake/george/george1.html

The Charming Twins of Dorchester
http://www.teachersdiscovery-english.com/ads/new/fakeShake/twins/twins1.html

Periodic Table of Inventors

In this post I write about our then-new Periodic Table of Scientists.

Now we have the Periodic Table of Inventors.



It's every bit as fun and informative as its sister chart.



We also have a special two-fer set. You can buy both charts at once and save money!

As always, we welcome your suggestions and success stories.

We think these charts are perfect for research paper brainstorming, class projects, "Scientist (or Inventor) of the Day" activities, or discussion starters.

Plus, they look great.

How will you use yours?

Teacher's Discovery Catalogs Hitting

Catalogs for all of our divisions at Teacher's Discovery are just about in the hands of teachers across the country.

For those of us who work hard creating and finding great stuff for teachers, and then work hard to get it all between the covers of our catalogs, the catalogs hitting always mark the end of one long process and the beginning of the next one.

Games and books and posters that aren't in the most recent catalogs are already in the works for the next ones, waiting to make big debuts in the Fall.

One of the neatest aspects of the making of a catalog is picking our covers. Our Foreign Language division has one for each language we support, English has two, Science will have five, and Social Studies has five. That's a lot of time spent sifting through tons of great pictures.

If you've gotten your catalog, drop us a line and tell us what you think. If you'd like one, give us a call and we'll be happy to send one to you. Our contact information is here.

By the way, I am partial to the U.S. History cover, but that's just me.

Periodic Table of World Literature Chart

This just arrived--our Periodic Table of World Literature.