English Companion
By Kathy Ishizuka -- School Library Journal, 2/1/2009
When teacher Lisa Park needed help, she turned to the online community of English Companion. With the spare subject line “Macbeth,” she wrote: “Ninth grade. It’ll be my first time teaching this text. Any help would be greatly appreciated.” By the next day, Park, who works at the Episcopal Academy in Newtown Square, PA, heard back from six teacher peers, who provided online resources and offers to share their original lesson plans on Shakespeare’s classic tragedy.
Providing a place “where English teachers meet to help each other” is, in fact, the slogan of English Companion. A network on the free Web platform Ning, the online community is an offshoot of the popular English Companion online resource, created by high school teacher Jim Burke.
The 1,000-member network offers blog posts, video, and event listings, but the real value, as usual with Ning pages, is the conversation. Many discussions cry out for a response from librarians and media specialists, as in the inquiry “Children’s picture books that are historical in nature?” Meanwhile, another teacher seeks assistance with a challenge to the book Bless Me, Ultima.
