50 Awesome Blogs for Middle School Teachers

It’s become more than a smidge cliche to ruminate on the difficulties facing tweens and teens as they attempt to navigate the tempestuous sea of hormones and middle school. But teaching them isn’t exactly lollipops and sugar pies, either — even for fresh-faced graduates straight off their student teaching assignments. Fortunately, the Internet allows even the most combat-hardened middle school veteran a place to exchange ideas, insights and pretty much everything else relevant to their industry, and some of the best do just that on these blogs.

Arts and Crafts

1. Art Projects for Kids: Kathy Barbro posts up engaging, educational art projects suitable for kindergartners through fifth graders, though many work well in higher-level middle school classrooms as well.

2. The Art Teacher’s Guide to the Internet: Discover neat digital strategies for getting kids interested in art using the internet and other common classroom technologies.

3. Teach Kids Art: Great for teachers and homeschooling parents alike, Teach Kids Art features a plethora of suggestions and projects that stimulate creativity.

4. The Crafty Crow: This parent, teacher and student collective focuses on amazing art and craft lessons and activities suitable up to age 12.

5. Craft Jr: Check out Craft Jr. for classroom-friendly projects — even recipes! — especially tailored to students of all ages.

6. Art Lessons for Kids: The vast majority of activities featured here cover kindergartner, elementary and middle school kids alike.

7. Dollar Store Crafts: It’s a sad reality that many school districts slash funding for the arts before any other subject. But just because the money stops flowing doesn’t mean education and creativity will follow suit.

8. One Pretty Thing: Silence difficult middle schoolers constantly griping about art having no bearing on the "real world" with these excellent, practical DIY projects.

9. Deep Space Sparkle: Patty Palmer keeps an essential blog and website combo for kindergarten, elementary and middle school teachers looking for inspiration.

10. Zakka Life: Cash-strapped classrooms can ask students to bring in bits of home detritus and fashion them into wonderfully creative works.

Education Issues and Policy

11. Education Week Blogs: A plethora of contributors offer up their thoughts on anything and everything related to the education industry — not just middle school.

12. The Jose Vilson: An incredibly passionate middle school teacher and poet works tirelessly to inspire education reform, especially in urban areas.

13. Eduwonk: Catch up with all the latest news, issues and opinions from the wide world of education, courtesy of this popular resource.

14. Flypaper: The Education Gadfly team at Fordham University talks policy and solutions for improving the nation’s schools.

15. Education Policy Blog: This blog hopes to shock teachers and administrators alike out of their complacency and into education reform activism.

16. Schools Matter: Visit Schools Matter for a comprehensive glimpse into public education policy and what needs to be done to improve them.

17. Change Agency: Teachers wanting to learn more about the policies affecting them and their students and what they can do to improve themselves and their schools would do well to explore this blog.

18. Thoughts on Education: Former middle School instructor Corey Bunje Bower painstakingly dissects the latest new stories and policy issues directly impacting the education industry.

19. The Quick and The Ed: Both a podcast and a blog, The Quick and The Ed provides many different perspectives on contemporary education problems and their possible solutions.

20. The EdNext Blog: Multiple professionals discuss recent trends, issues and news shaping today’s public school system.

Literature

21. YA Books Central: Read raves and rants about the latest in young adult literature — perfect for teachers wanting to stock their classroom libraries with suitable books.

22. YA Highway: Another resource crammed full of information on young adult publications spanning a lovely, wide spectrum of genres.

23. Ramblings of a Teenage Bookworm: The eponymous blogger shares her opinions on various young adult novels, which may be appropriate for older or more mature middle school students.

24. "YA" Need Books: Give this blog a visit when looking for a librarian’s perspective on what young adult books to read and which ones need ignoring.

25. ReaderGirls: Books for teens and tweens take the spotlight here, where two girls in the age brackets open up about their favorite reads.

26. YA Fresh: A spunky pair of young adult authors post not only book reviews, but interviews, giveaways and perspectives on youth literature as well.

27. The YA YA YAs: Visit the YA YA YAs for a librarians’-eye-view of trends, topics and writers shaping the literary world for teens and tweens alike.

28. Reading Rants! Out of the Ordinary Teen Booklists!: For over a decade, this Greenwich Village librarian has been discussing anything and everything related to young adult literature, catering to students, parents and teachers.

29. YA Outside the Lines: Creativity doesn’t exist in a vacuum, and YA Outside the Lines peers into how today’s youthful reads pull inspiration from a wide variety of different sources.

30. Librarina: Pack classroom libraries with these teen and tween reads — and suggestions on getting kids interested in even picking them up.

Math and Science

31. Steve Spangler Blog: The popular scientist known for making such principles accessible to elementary and middle school students also finds time to blog about topics fascinating to teachers, parents and kids alike.

32. My Science Lessons Blog: It may not update as frequently as some of the other resources listed here, but My Science Lessons Blog still offers up some great projects for middle school teachers.

33. Homeschool Math Blog: In spite of the title, even public and private school teachers can benefit from Maria Miller’s advice — which spans from kindergarten all the way to ninth grade.

34. Science Lab for Kids Blog: Get some great suggestions about great field trips and activities suitable for budding young scientists, especially younger middle school students.

35. Math Teacher Life: The blog here pales in comparison to the website, which serves as a neat network for math teachers of all grade levels.

36. Let’s Play Math!: Stop by this incredibly useful resource for excellent games and mnemonics to make math more accessible to students.

37. Growing with Science Blog: Try some of these awesome tips, tricks, facts and activities in the classroom. And enjoy the bug of the week, too!

38. Urban Science Adventures!: Schools in major metropolitan areas don’t have to miss out on scientific exploration just because there’s fewer animals and plants around.

39. MathNotations: Older and advanced middle school students can benefit greatly from the problems, theories, puzzles and other mathematical lessons found at this indispensable resource.

40. SimplyScience Blog: When looking for inspiration to get kids interested in science, check out the sterling book and project recommendations here.

Special Needs

41. Lillie’s Pad: Special education teachers with a love of Apple’s mobile technologies should bookmark Lillie’s Pad for some great tips and tricks.

42. Shut Up About Your Perfect Kid: By parents, for parents, this provocative blog and website is a must-read for special education teachers needing to see challenges from their perspective.

43. Teachers at Risk: Teacher of Distinction Elona Hartjes dishes out highly acclaimed advice to her fellow special needs educators.

44. Special Education Law Blog: Both parents and teachers dealing with special needs kids would do well to keep abreast of the laws and policies affecting them.

45. Special Education MangoMon Blog: It may sound like a badly translated anime title, but this blog actually provides parents and teachers both with valuable information on assistive technologies.

46. On Special Education: Nirvi Shah at Education Week updates visitors on all the latest news, views and developments from around the special education sector.

47. Teacher SOL: Special education teachers with a passion for activism will find this clarion call towards change and a shift away from marginalization inspiring.

48. Jerry’s Special Education Blog: About.com’s Jerry Webster covers stories relating to special education teachers at every grade level.

49. Special Education Law Blog: A different one this time, but featuring similar content for special education teachers hoping to improve their knowledge of their career’s policies and legalities.

50. The Assistive Technology Blog: Virginia Commonwealth University and Virginia Department of Education’s Training and Technical Assistance Center brings special education professionals an inside view of valuable, up-and-coming assistive tools.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 22nd, 2011 at 6:02 pm and is filed under Features. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.