What it is. MLA is a set of conventions for presenting a paper and naming its sources.
Why our test works. Format is the part of academic writing children find most arbitrary, and it IS arbitrary in its details — which is exactly why the test must be about the purpose rather than the details. A reader who can locate every source unaided is what the whole apparatus is for, and a child who holds that purpose can look up the details forever. From Grade 9 this is assumed, not taught, which is why it is taught here.
Leans on. Grade 7 built a reference list. This standardizes it.
Watch for. Do not grade a first MLA attempt on punctuation of the entries. Grade it on whether every source can be found. Details come next time.
Read and use The Basics of an MLA Paper from Advanced Academic Writing, pp.8–8. The worked example is the one you build on the board: Teacher reads the key passage of The Basics of an MLA Paper aloud with the book open and m The class reads Writing Book 8, p.62 — our own page, so a child who was absent can still get the lesson.
You open by saying where this sits — what it follows and what it is part of — in one sentence, and then you give them the reason it matters, in your own words, for about ten seconds. Before anything new, sixty seconds of retrieval on U6 set 1, U8 set 1, U9 set 1: ask, take the answers from boards rather than hands so you see all thirty, and do not re-teach — note who has lost it and carry on.
Then you do one yourself, building it on the board and leaving it up: Teacher reads the key passage of The Basics of an MLA Paper aloud with the book open and models the move it teaches on one sentence. The board copy is what they look back at when they stall, so it stays there for the whole lesson.
The We-do is the main whiteboard moment of the lesson — short answers, boards up on your signal, every child visible at once. Class applies the move from The Basics of an MLA Paper to two sentences together, checking against the book's own example. If the answer is a whole sentence rather than a word, take it on their notebooks instead, because a sentence written on a whiteboard is written once and destroyed.
They open Writing Book 8 to page 62 and read it with you. Stop at the worked example and let them look at it.
Exit directions in full, standing still, before anyone moves. Then they work alone: In your notebook: apply The Basics of an MLA Paper to three sentences of your own, double-spaced.
You close on the exit direction — Read out one sentence that uses The Basics of an MLA Paper. — taken from every child before anyone stands, and then the line you want them to still have tomorrow: A format exists so a reader never has to wonder where to look.
Do not grade a first MLA attempt on punctuation of the entries. Grade it on whether every source can be found. Details come next time.