Let’s talk about the CUPS Strategy for Student Editing — and no, not the kind that holds your coffee. CUPS stands for Capitalization, Usage, Punctuation, and Spelling, and it is one of those classroom tools that most know about but rarely feel confident teaching.

When I first started teaching, I would hand my students a CUPS checklist, tell them to edit, and then cross my fingers. I pretended that they knew what to do. Spoiler alert: they didn’t.

In all transparency, I didn’t really know how to teach CUPS. I knew what each letter stood for, but not how to model it, break it down, or help students understand what “check for usage” even meant. So instead of our writing/editing block being productive, we ended up wasting time circling random words and missing real errors.

Over the years, I taught myself and my students a simple way to teach the CUPS Strategy for Editing that made sense for my brain and theirs.

I created this method because I wanted my students to stop guessing and start understanding. I was tired of editing, feeling like a scavenger hunt, and seeing testing scores that reflected it. I wanted it to feel structured, clear, and more meaningful.

The routine I’m sharing in this episode is built around a simple pattern: Fix. Explain. Imitate.

When students fix a mistake, explain the rule, and imitate it in their own writing, they move beyond surface-level editing. They start noticing patterns and applying them in new contexts. It’s short, it’s structured, and it actually works.

The best part? It takes less than ten minutes a day.

• https://uniquelyupper.com/cups-strategy-for-student-editing/

• Instagram: @uniquelyupper
• Show Notes: www.uniquelyupper.com
• TpT Store: Uniquely Upper on TpT
• Email: uniquelyupper@gmail.com

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A quiet, sincere thank you from me to the teachers who support Commas in the Chaos. Your listens, messages, shares, and reviews shape this podcast and help more teachers find a steady space. Take a breath with me and know your support matters.

Let’s be honest. Teaching complex sentences can feel anything but simple. Students get tripped up on commas, mix up dependent and independent clauses, and before long, everyone is frustrated.

In this episode, I am sharing a strategy that completely changed how I taught this skill. It is a method that makes complex sentences finally click for students. The secret is two simple formulas that make a huge difference: DC, IC, and the combination ICDC.

These formulas help students see what a complex sentence actually looks like, how to label each part, and when to add that tricky comma.

This is the same method I used with my own students year after year, and it works because it gives them something visual to hold on to. Once they see the pattern, everything starts to make sense.

• How to teach complex sentences using two simple formulas
• Why visual patterns make grammar easier to understand
• A five-step process to guide students through labeling and punctuation
• The quick “Does it stand alone?” test that takes the guesswork out of commas
• Common mistakes students make and how to correct them early

• https://uniquelyupper.com/teaching-complex-sentences/

• Instagram: @uniquelyupper
• Show Notes: www.uniquelyupper.com
• TpT Store: Uniquely Upper on TpT
• Email: uniquelyupper@gmail.com

👉 Don’t forget to subscribe to Commas in the Chaos wherever you listen to podcasts so you never miss an episode!