Thursday, April 25, 2024

Writing 1 Class Notes--Week 14 (April 25)

Greetings!


This week was our penultimate class for the year -- the one before the last one!


We started the class period with a Quick Write, and today's prompt was connected with the fact that it is National Poem in Your Pocket Day coming up in April.  In fact, all of this month is National Poetry Month!  I gave the students a sheet of paper with an extra large pocket outline. They were to write a poem within the lines of that pocket.   


This week, they took the Sentence Patterns Final Test.  After having done the and corrected the Review from last week, they should have done really well on it!  


Their final writing assignment, a Reflection Paper, is due next week.   For this paper, they are to write about what they learned this year, what they learned about themselves this year, and what did and didn't work well this year.  At the bottom of this email is a link to an article about the value of reflection as a part of learning.


After all that business, we watched a few poetry performances and rated their poems and delivery style.  There were some insightful comments about how poets use their voice, style, gestures and facial expressions.  The point of this is to gather inspiration on how to effectively deliver their own poetry next week for our Poetry Event.  


The rest of the class time was dedicated to committee work for the big event next week.  As we discussed, it takes a lot of work to pull off a successful event.  When students have “skin in the game” with planning and organizing an event, I find there’s a high level of ownership and engagement.  After discussing how the committee work should flow,  they were split  into groups and got busy dividing and conquering their committee’s punch list.  As a requirement, they were to exchange contact information and fill out an Exit Ticket to hand in at the end of class.


Next week is the final week, and I will accept homework until Saturday, May 4 at 7:00 AM.  My experience is that once the CHAT classes are done, students really lose momentum for completing late homework.  My plan is to get final grades out within the week.  


Blessings on your weekend!

Mrs. G


Assignments for Next Week:

-- Any old homework

-- Reflection Paper

–Practice your poems!

–Committee work

--Poetry Event Slide Show (Canva)


Links for this Week:

Taylor Malli “Like, You Know”

Isabella Callery “Thoughtless Cruelty” by Charles Lamb

The Value of Reflection Papers


 

Friday, April 19, 2024

Writing 1 Class Notes–Week 13 (April 18)

 Hello There!

Today was another great day with this group.  They are such a blessing as we continue to work and learn together.


As usual, we started the day with a Quick Write–since we are working our way through poetry, the prompt today was to try their hands at Haiku.  I think we realized how challenging this seemingly simple art form is!


After that, students had the opportunity to try their hands at writing some original poetry.  We watched a video of local poet Rudy Francisco perform a piece called “My Honest Poem” and then read an example based on his performance.  Students had time in class to compose their own “My Poem” based on the examples.  I could tell some really got into “the zone” writing these and my hope is to hear some of these performed at our Poetry Event.  


Speaking of the  Poetry Event, which will be the last day of class , we spent the rest of the class getting into more details about this project.  It takes a lot of work to put on an event like this, and to split up the labor,  each student signed up for a role on a committee.  Their grade on this project will depend on not only their poetry performance techniques, but also how well they worked as a group. They are to answer a Discussion Question about their first and second preferences of which committee they’d like to participate in.  They should also begin to narrow down the poems they would like to perform. **A conversation regarding Poetry Event Dress Code came up in class.  I posted Poll in the form of a  Discussion Question asking students to give their opinion. 


To conclude our Grammar for the year, we finished our study of Simple and Compound sentences by completing two worksheets which they had time to work on in class.  I also passed out a review sheet that they should complete and then correct. (The Key is on the Google Classroom assignment.)  Correcting their own work will further help them review and will be much more beneficial than waiting a week to see if they got the answers right in preparation for a  Final Sentence Patterns Test that they will take in class next week. 


We didn’t touch on Writing in class today, because students are still working on their Essay ReWrite which is due next week.


We have a couple fun weeks planned to finish out our year, so let's make sure you get caught up on any late work.


Assignments for Next Week:

Which Committee? Discussion Question

--Dress Code Question

--Choose 2 poems for your contribution to the Poetry Jam (Here is the scoring/committee information)

–Finish composing “My Poem”( if not finished in class)

-- Complete the Essay Rewrite

Simple or Compound Sentences

Writing Compound Sentences

-- Complete the Sentence Patterns Review sheet and correct it. (Bring the corrected version to class)


Links for This Week

Rudy Fransisco’s “My Honest Poem” video



Thursday, April 11, 2024

Writing 1 Class Notes–Week 12 (4/11)

The weather is really starting to turn Springy now!  The buds are budding and the sun is shining–our spirits are lifted!  We had another great class with this group!


We started out with a great Quick Write today focused on rhyme schemes.  We discussed different styles of rhyming scheme–even Limericks!  After reading a few examples, they got to try their hands at crafting their own Limerick or lines of nature-based rhyme.


After that, I assigned our last Essay, which is an Essay Re-Write.  For this essay, students can choose any essay they have written this year for Writing 1, or they can choose an essay that they've written for another class.  They should take one of their final drafts and look for ways to improve it.  I often suggest that students choose the essay that they got the worst grade on or that they want to spend some more time on. This writing assignment is due Week 14–April 25, and students should hand in the original along with the rewrite.  (Note:  This isn't our regular pre-write to rough draft to final draft process.)


For the Literature part of the class, we had a Poetry Devices Scavenger Hunt.  After discussing different Poetic Devices like onomatopoeia, imagery, and enjambment, we took a poem by Walt Whtiman called “When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer”.  It was very timely given the recent eclipse!  After identifying devices together in the large group, we broke into small groups to “scavenge” their own poems for different devices.  We had time for a few rotations of this.


After that, we had a very brief Grammar teaching on Simple and Compound sentences and students had time to work on the two worksheets in class.  We talked about the fact that when a FANBOY is connecting two independent clauses, it is called a compound sentence–and in that case, you must put a comma BEFORE the FANBOY.  If there is a FANBOY, but it is not connecting two independent clauses, it is a simple sentence and there is no comma necessary.


That is all!  Blessings on your weekend!

Mrs. G


Homework

Week 13 Poems

Poetry Response Packets

Week 12 Grammar 

–Compound FANBOYS

–Compound Sentences & Commas

About the Essay Re-Write

Analogy Re-Write


End of the Year Wrap Up!

  Dear CHAT Writing 1 & 2 Students & Parents, I've just finished calculating the grades for the Spring semester, and you will be...