Writing

Friday 10/10

I was unable to be in class again on Friday, so Miss Cocker kindly covered the class. Students completed the first vocabulary quiz and I believe they went over the Checklist for the Meal Review. I was going to have them work on final drafts for the Meal Review over the break, but I have no way to access the mailbox where they turned them in, or to get them back to students until the break is over. Since they cannot work on their finals with their drafts in my mailbox, I will have them continue work on the final drafts after break. There will be no homework over the break. Please enjoy the fall weather, and I look forward to seeing everyone when we return!

Tuesday 10/7

Today I was unable to be in class, so Miss Russell kindly filled in for me. The class covered prepositions. Students completed exercises identifying prepositional phrases and how to begin sentences with prepositional phrases. Since I was not in class, I was not able to hand out the checklist for the Meal Review assignment, or grade the rough drafts of that assignment. Since I would like the students to have the opportunity to edit their work, I will have them turn the rough drafts in on Friday, and will go over the checklist in that class. The final drafts will be due the following Tuesday. If you have any questions, please email me. 

Friday 10/3 

In class we went over coordinating conjunctions and the comma formulas for both coordinating conjunctions and subordinate conjunctions. We reviewed for the vocab quiz, which will be on Tuesday. If a student is absent, I will place a quiz in their mailbox to be taken home and completed when they have the time. We covered the who/which clause and completed an exercise where students practiced joining two sentences using who/which. 

Homework for Tuesday is the rough draft of the Meal Review. It should be 3 paragraphs. one on the setting, one on the food, and one on the service. I will paste the prompt below:

Meal Review Description

The first step of this assignment is to write three body paragraphs. The first one will be on the setting, the second on the food, and the third on the service. This will NOT be a review of a restaurant that you have been to. You must think of a situation in the late modern period of history you are studying and write as if you had a meal in that time period. Some ideas would be a countryside inn, aboard a sailing ship, in an army camp, or at a farmhouse table. Maybe you are a prisoner of war or a colonist during the starving time. Perhaps you are an Indian!

The first paragraph on setting should describe the situation you are in. What are the tables and dishware like. It is cozy, with a fireplace and candlelight, or dark and foul-smelling? Are you indoors or outdoors? Describe the room or environs that you are in for your meal.

The second paragraph is about the food. I want lots of quality adjectives. You may NOT use the words good, tasty, or delicious. Make my mouth water! For example, you could say a restaurant had good bread, but if you said the bread was warm from the oven and dripping with garlic butter, had a fluffy texture, and a crunchy outside crust that would really make me want to eat it!

Finally the third paragraph should be about the service. Who made the meal? Who served it? Did they do a good job? Were the plates and cups clean? Did you have anything to wipe your mouth? Did they serve you right away? Were they polite? Was the meal priced correctly if you had to pay for it? 

Class 7, Tuesday 9/30

In class we covered subordinate conjunctions. Then we completed an exercise where we practiced joining two sentences using a subordinate conjunction. We also covered the checklist for the Literature paragraphs, which are due Friday. On the checklist, you will see that I have included in the stylistic techniques section the use of a subordinate conjunction in each paragraph. 

Remember that subordinate conjunctions are:

"When, While,  Where,  As,  Since,  If,  Although"

The comma formula for subordinate conjunctions is below: 

I = independent clause

Sub = subordinate conjunction

Sub I, I (Comma after the first independent clause if the subordinate conjunction begins the sentence) 

"While I was in Florida(, )I went to the zoo"

I Sub I (No comma if the subordinate conjunction is between the independent clauses)

"I went to the zoo while I was in Florida"

Next class we will review the vocab for the upcoming quiz since we did not have time this class. 

Due Friday: Final Draft of Literature Paragraphs

Class 5, Tuesday 9/23

In class we discussed strong verbs and adverbs. A list of quality adverbs can be found on one side of the orange laminates sheet I gave to the students. We discussed how adverbs answer questions like "how", "when", and "how much", for the verbs they modify. We also covered the difference between weak and strong verbs. Strong verbs often are verbs with more descriptive power. Note the difference between "she ran away" and "she scurried away". 

Homework is to edit our spider paragraph (key word outline) from last class, using the checklist handed out in class, which I will attach below. These corrected drafts are due Friday. On the checklist you will see that the paragraph must include one strong verb and one adverb.

Happy writing!

Class 4, Friday 9/19

Homework to finish for Tuesday: 

• Spider paragraph (only the one we went over in class)

• Finish the rest of the grammar exercise from class

*See below for notes about the homework

In class, students turned in their final drafts of the poem, which I hope to have graded by next Tuesday. We discussed key word outlines today. We took a paragraph about spiders that was 7 sentences and distilled it down into 3 key words per sentence. The students listed the key words next to the sentence numbers in their notes. the students could pick any words for their 3 key words, but they needed to be words that would help them remember the main thrust of the sentence. For homework, students will need to write a paragraph about spiders using the information from the key words in their notes. This exercise helps us practice efficiency in note taking when doing research on a topic, as well as practice constructing their own original paragraph using only key pieces of information for reference. Please Note: the syllabus might say that they need to write two paragraphs about spiders, but since we only got through one in class, we will only be writing one for homework. We also began the first grammar exercise during class, which the students should finish for homework as well. The exercise is on punctuation and capitalization. 

Class 3, Tuesday Sep. 16th

In class, we spoke more about Iambic rhythm, focusing on how to correct lines in their poems that don't fit within the rhythm. We used examples of regular sentences, changing the wording or adding and subtracting syllables to make the sentence fit into Iambic rhythm. 

Remember for your final poem drafts that we want a pattern that goes: breve, stress, breve, stress, repeatedly. In other words, each line should begin with a breve and end with a stress, using at least 6 syllables per line.

We also went over all items on the checklist for the final draft of the poem, which is due Friday. Each student should staple their checklist to the final draft of their poem and staple the rough draft to the back, so I can compare when grading. Please email with any questions. 

Class 2, Friday Sep. 12th

In class, students turned in their paragraphs, then we discussed the next assignment: a poem in iambic rhythm. We spent the rest of class covering iambic rhythm and coming up with examples on which to practice the breves and stresses. As a reminder: 1 iamb = a breve and a stress. The breves ( v ) are the unstressed syllables of the line and the stresses ( / ) are the stressed syllables of a line. For example: America is split into 4 syllables     v    /      v    /      with stresses on the "-mer" and the "-ca". 

     A -mer  -i  -ca

The assignment is to write a poem between 10 and 12 lines which must have at least 3 iambs per line, [meaning at least 6 syllables per line, since an iamb is the collection of 2 syllables: a breve (v) and a stress (/)]. The poems can be about anything, but remember to follow the rhythm pattern of   v  /  v  /  v  /  and each line should begin with a breve, not a stress. The rough drafts are due Tuesday and we will have another class to discuss the poems before the students turn in their final drafts next Friday. 

Email with any questions. Have a great weekend!

Class 1, Tuesday Sep. 9th

In class we went over the general plan for the semester and discussed the syllabus, the laminated handouts, and the first assignment. We also had time to cover concrete vs. abstract nouns. Students received four handouts in class: the syllabus, our stylistic techniques sheet (yellow laminated), our prepositions/ adverbs sheet (orange laminated), and our vocabulary list (green laminated). The homework due Friday, as we discussed in class, is for the students to write three paragraphs: 1) about their  family and home, 2) about their interests, and 3) about their thoughts on writing. This assignment is intended both for me to get to know our students a little better, but also for me to get a sense of their writing style. Feel free to email me if you have any questions.