The PBS News Hour just did this segment on "Amazing Grace," recently sung by President Obama in Charleston (see Video: "Watch President Obama deliver eulogy at Rev. Pinckney’s funeral"):

My wife shared this hilarious video with me - it’s perfect to show to English Language Learners and have them write and verbally describe what they see. You might also be interested in The Best Fun Videos For English Language Learners In 2015 - So Far.

© 2012 Daniel Schildt, Flickr | CC-BY-ND | via Wylio Here’s a new short video of Hans Rosling describing the world’s population. I’m adding it to The Best Hans Rosling Videos.  

Light Brigading via Compfight Here are new additions to A Collection Of Useful Posts, Articles & Videos On Race & Racism - Help Me Find More: How Educators Can Respond to Charleston is from Bright. Attitudes Toward Racism And Inequality Are Shifting is from Five Thirty Eight. Confronting Racial Injustice in Schools is from Ed Week. via John Holland Lots of white people ask how to be a good ally to the movement. So @michaelskolnik wrote a playbook for white people. http://t.co/wkWWbJNATj — Cornelius Minor (@MisterMinor) July 3, 2015 Teachers: @tanehisicoates' article on Confederate flag & Civil War, ideal 4 classroom. http://t.co/FBXXqneVna #sschat pic.twitter.com/u0QfCfTjpC — Zinn Ed Project (@ZinnEdProject) June 30, 2015 Not Just Us? Using Classrooms to Get (White) People to Talk about Race https://t.co/OiCZ1WeLL0 pic.twitter.com/jrIDnRK2kE — David E. Kirkland (@davidekirkland) June 29, 2015 Very thoughtful piece for culturally responsive educators. Whiteness: Guilt, Privilege, & Opportunity via @iserotope http://t.co/1FNqBO3719 — Zaretta Hammond (@Ready4rigor) June 26, 2015 As part of our teacher's guide to "The New Jim Crow," we have a section on how to talk about race and racism. http://t.co/stbv8MdA2x — Teaching Tolerance (@Tolerance_org) June 24, 2015 White Americans support the right to protest injustice — unless the protestors are black http://t.co/A7kfJyflTo pic.twitter.com/jXZQ9AUmQe — Vox (@voxdotcom) June 23, 2015

You may or may not be familiar with the book, They Say, I Say: The Moves That Matter in Academic Writing, but it’s a great resource for writing instruction. You can see its influence in a number of my posts at The Best Posts On Writing Instruction. You can also read more about it at these two Voice Of America Learning English pieces: Tips for Writing: ‘They Say, I Say’ Good Academic Writing Doesn’t Have to Be A Struggle In addition, all you have to do is search "they say i say templates" online and you’ll get a ton of excellent student resources. I just hope they’re posted legally.

I was searching online today to find simple tools for making online matching games (the ones that, for example, have questions on the left and mixed-up answers on the right) and was pleasantly surprised to find the SuperTeacherTools site. Not only does it let teacher and students create these kinds of matching games without having to register and very easily, it also has other game-making features. Here’s a quick one I did on a growth mindset. There were a few others, including Eduplay, but SuperTeacherTools was by far the best one. Also, if you’re interested, there were a few easy tools that let you create those kinds of matching worksheets for printing out, too, including Education.com, The Teachers Corner and Armored Penguin. I’m adding SuperTeacherTools to: The Best Websites For Creating Online Learning Games The "All-Time" Best 2.0 Tools For Beginning English Language Learners

© 2006 Procsilas Moscas, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio As regular readers know, I do an annual "The Best…" list on the "words of the year" that various organizations name. They usually don’t start making the announcements until the last few months of the year, but one group has already announced their words for 2015. So, I figured I’d get a head start on the list, post it now, and add links as new announcements are made. Here’s the first announcement: Hashtag is ‘children’s word of year’ is from The BBC. And here are links to my previous annual lists: The Best "Words Of The Year" Features For 2014 The Best "Words Of The Year" Features For 2013 The Best "Words Of The Year" Features For 2012 The Best "Words Of The Year" Features For 2011 The Best "Words Of The Year" Features For 2010

I’m adding this video to The Best "Language Maps":

© 2015 GotCredit, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio I just cleaned out a bunch of dead links from The Best Places Where Students Can Write For An "Authentic Audience." You might find it useful….

© 2015 Alan Levine, Flickr | CC-BY | via Wylio I guess I’m in a "cleaning" mood this morning - I’ve just cleaned out all the dead links at The Best Places Where Students Can Create Online Learning/Teaching Objects For An "Authentic Audience." This is a companion list to The Best Places Where Students Can Write For An "Authentic Audience," which I also just updated today.