Greetings,

If you're viewing this page, you might be a parent, guardian, 8th-grade Dunkirk Middle School student, or college student enrolled in my Fredonia State course. You might be a coworker, or teacher from another district to whom I presented a workshop. You might be an aspiring or practicing teacher who heard about The Interdisciplinary Educator blog who wants to simplify or refine your practice. I sincerely welcome you all to my classroom, or more appropriately, my digital classroom. Here, you'll find every resource I provide, every policy I enforce, and every lesson and material I teach during the year. I encourage you to read deeply, click curiously, and explore the farthest reaches of this site. It represents my life's work, and as such it evolves as rapidly as my learning in the field of education.

I bid you my sincerest welcome.

Mr. Karpie
Enjoy the images of my classroom above. It's a great place to hang out and learn. If those images pique your interest, click the image below to take an in-depth, digital field trip of my classroom complete with explanations describing the reasoning behind its student-centered, spartan aesthetic.

This week's news: 8th Grade ELA

Zen Classroom 

Managing a classroom is both an art and a science. I've found that the best way to manage a classroom is to set crystal clear expectations that define what success looks like for both yourself and your students, and then to measure the rate of success with incredible accuracy. When it is clear how to be successful, it makes it much more difficult to fail, whether behaviorally or academically..
Our beautiful, Dunkirk waterfront. What other district enjoys these views?

Our ELA Year at a Glance: 2020-2021

During the tumult of the COVID-19 pandemic, it's hard to predict exactly how the sequence of our year will go. I'm not sure whether we'll see each other sometimes, always, or not at all, and those factors will massively impact our curriculum. That being  said, the unit pages linked below show an approximate calendar of our learning throughout the school year.

Zen Classroom

September 8 - September 11
Managing a classroom is both an art and a science. I've found that the best way to manage a classroom is to set crystal clear expectations that define what success looks like for both yourself and your students, and then to measure the rate of success with incredible accuracy. When it is clear how to be successful, it makes it much more difficult to fail, whether behaviorally or academically.

The Universal Refugee Experience

September 14 - October 30
In this, our first serious unit, students read the book ​Inside Out and Back Again​ as the central text for learning about how all refugees experience the tragedy of life twisting inside out, and how only the "Lucky Few" ever enjoy life coming back again.

​We link this novel with a series of news articles, Ted Talks, and documentaries to learn about refugees' experiences across countries and decades.

Unconscious Bias 

November 2 - December 22
Our unconscious bias unit traces inequality from the 1860's through today. Specifically, the unit focuses on unconscious bias, and how much of the inequality that lingers in our country isn't the blatant, purposeful racism of the 1960's, but is in fact more subtle, and in some ways, more insidious than that. We'll even engage in a Harvard Study to measure our own unconscious bias, and to help advance the field of inequality research.

Short Story

January 4 - January 29
​Our first creative writing mini-unit will center around traditional, short stories. Students will use a plot structure chart, and some mrkarpie.com exclusive, original tools to create an amazing 3-5 page story. This first week is dedicated entirely to developing the skills necessary to produce a well-written story. We'll look at conflict, "showing" vs. "telling," characterization, setting, and imagery while simultaneously refining our story ideas through daily, individualized teacher feedback.

Food Chains

February 1- March 12
In our "Food Chains" unit we learn about the food chains that feed America, and we attempt to identify the problems our current food system causes, while uncovering some possible solutions to fix our food system in the future. This unit culminates in students creating a website which will share information, and attempt to guide the eating choices of their fellow Americans. While we use some supplemental texts, this unit is based on the book The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan. ​

Free-Verse Poetry

March 15 - March 26
During our free-verse poetry unit, we'll study the intricacies of language for its own sake. We'll make language as beautiful as it's possible for language to be. We will capture the essence of the meaning of life, whether that essence is reflected in finishing a marathon, climbing Kilimanjaro, or the feeling right before you finally ask out that SUPER cute dude in your science class that you've ALWAYS had a massive crush on!

Short Story 2

Optional - Depending on COVID-19
Our second short story unit will be a challenge, because everyone is going to be at home, avoiding COVID-19. All materials will be available both in paper and digitally. Students can access them whichever way is easier for them. This iteration of the unit we'll use some more difficult skills: building suspense, dramatic irony, and linking the concept of "showing" details directly to setting and rising action skills practiced during our first short story unit. Just like our first short story unit, the end result will be a completely original, absolutely awesome 3-5 page short story that the students create.

COVID-19 Journal

Optional - Depending on COVID-19
​So much of what we know about history, we learned through the journals and primary documents created by the normal people who struggled through difficult times. We are in the midst of a historically difficult time in our country.

We're going to do our part to document our feelings and experiences just like any other stalwart group of pioneers have done at any other time in our country's history.

Short Story 3

Optional - Depending on COVID-19
For our third, and final short story unit, we're focusing on dialogue. Nothing brings a character to life like listening to what they say, and nothing makes a story flow like engaging dialogue tags. Let's avoid the "he said, she said" game and move our writing forward towards excellence. Likewise, nothing kills a story like poorly-punctuated dialogue and bland dialogue tags.

Inquiry-Based Research

Timing TBD Based on COVID-19
In our inquiry-based research unit, students ask their own questions, find and evaluate their own sources, organize and complete their own close reads, and basically drive their own learning, at their own pace.

​This is our capstone, where everything that's been learned all year comes together to allow students to take their learning beyond the confines of the classroom.

End of Year Wrapup

Last Week of the School Year
The last "unit" in our curriculum is all about reflection. Not necessarily academic reflection, but that plays a part. We'll think about our experiences in 8th grade, what we learned, both in school and about ourselves and our friends. You'll notice this unit page is rather less organized and academic than the rest. Each year it looks a little different.

The Interdisciplinary Educator Blog
I maintain an education-based blog to chronicle my learning in the field of education. It's not necessarily right. It's intentionally not research based, but it does apply deep interdisciplinary connections from all the crazy books I read to the field of education.

All the writing in the field of education is done by educational researchers at universities, who don't teach real students, or textbook and education-software corporations, who don't teach real students.

I believe that teaching real students is important when claiming to understand how to teach real students.

If you agree, click the link or button above to read my blog.
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