This Week in Language Arts...

We're now deep into the fiction world of Lois Lowry's The Giver, discussing the themes of the novel and making connections to our own society.  It's been great listening to all of the great ideas!

This week, we'll explore the concept of imagery in writing, with a focus on sensory details.  Students will analyze the sensory details in a piece of description, and they'll create visual representations of the place described, using specific quotations to identify the details that they found most powerful and memorable.  Here's a link to the piece we'll read: from Springboard's "Coming to Your Senses" Lesson.    Students will also draw on earlier lessons about film techniques of framing and angles to create their visual representations.

We'll also use the piece to write found poems.

All classes will be continuing to read and discuss the novel, engaging in close reading, analysis, and Socratic Seminars.  It's going to be another great quarter!

This Week in Language Arts...

Believe it or not: it's the last week of the first quarter!  Time goes so quickly!
This week, students will continue to read Lois Lowry's The Giver, examining Lowry's fictional dystopia.  We'll compare and contrast the rules and customs of Lowry's fictional society with the rules and customs of our own society.  After some brainstorming and discussion, students will write a two paragraph Compare/Contrast piece, comparing and contrasting the two societies and weighing the benefits and drawbacks of each system.  There's a link to the assignment overview and guidelines available HERE.
Note: This is a short week for students, as they have Friday off.

This Week in Language Arts...

Having wrapped up our first major essay of the year, this week we'll begin reading our first novel: The Giver by Lois Lowry.  The novel will bring us back to our exploration of the archetype of the Hero's Journey, and we'll be focusing on the imagery in Lowry's fictional world.  Eventually, students will be creating visual representations of events in the novel.
In addition to beginning the novel, students will read an excerpt from Thomas More's classic--and challenging!--Utopia.  We'll also focus on the concepts of tone and diction.
One final note: as I read and gave feedback to students on their draft essays, I noticed a common thread through many of their pieces.  The essay focused on  defining heroism, and it was great to see how many students honored their parents as heroes in their essays.  Students should have graded final drafts back by the end of this week, and I encourage parents and students to read the finished pieces together; they're really wonderful!

This Week in Language Arts...

This week students are working through the writing process with their definition essays.  Last week, we outlined the essays, focusing on using a variety of definition strategies for the concept of heroism.  This week students will draft essays and work in critique groups to revise and edit the essays.  There's a link to a list of qualities for student editors to consider here.  I also have a list of suggestions for students to extend their writing beyond the five-paragraph form.  There's a link to the list of suggestions here.
Students will be using their school district Google Drive accounts to type their work, so they may work on it at home as well.  I encourage students to get as many readers as possible, getting feedback from those readers as to what's working in their essays and what can be improved.  That's one of the things good writers do: they work with editors to improve their work.
I'm looking forward to reading the essays!