Writing Is My Jam

Leslie Hall

  • Blog
  • About Me
  • What I Do
  • Contact
  • Subscribe

What I Do


What I Do

Write. Edit. Mentor. Educate. Train. Develop content. Proselytize for quality.

Writing

I write. A lot. I write reading passages (stories, poems, articles, functional text) for K-12 assessments and curriculum materials. I write test items. I write test specifications and ancillary materials. I write short stories (published) and novels (not yet published) and articles. I write proposals and abstracts and once took a shot at a white paper. I write test analyses, emails, memos, notes, comments, rants, raves (I Yelp like nobody’s business), reviews, journal entries, grocery lists, thank-you notes. (I didn’t used to write thank-you notes. Not writing thank-you notes was one of the eleventy-million things I felt bad about until it seemed easier to write them than feel bad about not writing them. I never felt anything about grocery lists.)

Editing

I edit. I edit all kinds of text, although my specialities are ELA content, and any manner of narrative prose. I’d rather not edit highly technical or numbers-intensive text. Numbers and I have a relationship best described as wary.

Mentorship

I’m a mentor. I recruit likeminded, talented writers into the field and support them as they learn what they need to know to succeed in ELA assessment and curriculum content development. 

Education

I teach writing. I work with writers, individually or in groups, to develop their skills and knowledge of the craft. Narrative prose is my first true love, so my Most Favorite Thing is working with writers of narrative fiction and narrative nonfiction.

Training

I provide training, individually or in groups, on item writing, content editing, test assembly, and all aspects of English language arts content development and evaluation.

Test Content Development

I develop tests: summative, formative, norm-referenced, criterion-referenced, achievement, high-stakes, low-stakes, standardized, classroom performance, portfolio, you name it. I develop tests of various kinds and for various purposes and for various clients. 

Quality Evangelist

I speak up for quality, and for giving our kids–they are all our kids, it takes a village–the best work we can do. I believe to do otherwise is immoral. 

Leslie Hall

Leslie Hall

Writer, editor, educator, mentor, consultant. English language arts educational assessment and curriculum expert. [About Me]

  • Facebook
  • Google+
  • Linkedin
  • Twitter

Search

Email UpdatesWIMJ updates are irregularly scheduled. If you like this post, sign up. I'll write more.

Other Posts

From The Guide to Wrangling Freelancers: Help Freelancers Love Their Work

Follow Your Dream: How I Got Started in K-12 Test Development

From The Guide to Wrangling Freelancers: Sweet Talk the Talent by Showing Appreciation

Mark-up: Annotating Text for Item Writing

The Dunce Is Us: The Real Problem with the Common Core Standards

Go Deep: How to Avoid Writing Superficial Reading Comprehension and Literary Analysis Items

How Can We Test Better?

Saturday Round Up: Free Resources for Teachers

Tags

assessment Blog CCSS common core standards content development creativity curriculum discipline editing editors education education reform ELA ELA content development employment free online college classes fun high-stakes integrity intention item writing language mistakes multiple choice national novel writing month nclb on writing well opportunity poetry quality quality controls reading reading comprehension reading passages recommended reading rigor school segregation teaching test preparation test publishing test scores william faulkner writers writing writing conventions

Post History

File Under Fun Friday

For fun. Because it's Friday, and because when you're a writer, you need to wander sometimes. Always … [Read More...]

Occupational Hazards for Writers and Editors

That title of occupational hazards for writers and editors almost sounds like a joke, doesn't it? Courtesy of … [Read More...]

How to Accept Rejection

How to Accept Rejection

Got my first rejection of this round of submissions: from The View from Here. Boilerplate. It's not fun, but … [Read More...]

Words to Live By

Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose -- a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye.
-- Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Our own lives are the instruments with which we experiment with the truth.
-- Thich Nhat Hanh

If you tell the truth, you don't have to remember anything.
-- Mark Twain

...it is always the best policy to tell the truth, unless, of course, you are an exceptionally good liar.
-- Jerome K. Jerome

Latest Post

From The Guide to Wrangling Freelancers: Help Freelancers Love Their Work

September 11, 2014 By Leslie Hall Leave a Comment


screenshot
“All paid jobs absorb and degrade the mind.” In the immortal words of Aristotle. The question is does work have to make people miserable? (If you don’t know whether you hate your job, you can take this quiz to find out.) I propose that it doesn’t; we don’t all have to feel like drafthorses harnessed to pull wagons of concrete. Bearing in mind that drafthorses have no choice. We do.
[Read More…]

Copyright © 2018 · Daily Dish Pro Theme on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in