09.11 - Character Analysis

We started today's class with a focus on Mr. Jones, the farmer kicked off his farm in Animal Farm. Everyone responded to the following question in their writer's journal:

Were the animals right to kick Jones off of his farm? Why/why not? Explain your rationale.

After everyone had a chance to respond to this prompt, we discussed students' answers.
The majority of students felt that it was right for the animals to kick Jones off his farm because he was abusive towards them and negligent (often because he was out drinking).

We then shifted our focus to discussion and analysis of individual animal characters in the book. I paired students up with a partner and assigned them a character from the book. Working with their partner, each person used their book to complete the Animal Farm Character Sheet for their character.

If you were not in class and did not have a character assigned, use Napolean as your default character.

If you were in class and have forgotten who your character was, see or email Mr. Collins.

I handed out sticky notes to everyone so that each person could mark the pages on which they found information about their character. On the sticky note, everyone should also write a brief summary of the action that is being summarized. This makes returning to the section later and figuring out what the note was for much easier.

Everyone should use the sticky notes to continue to track and take note of what their character does in the book as we continue to read.

We will work more with the Animal Farm Character Sheet tomorrow.

We did not get to answering the question at the bottom of the sheet today.


Homework:

If you did not finish finding the description or actions for your assigned character, do so for homework.

Continue to read Animal Farm according to the class schedule.

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If you have not  yet typed and submitted your utopian story on Google Drive, do so for homework.

09.10 - Vocabulary and Story Typing

In today's class, everyone was typing up the stories they wrote in yesterday's class about their utopia (see yesterday's post for more details).

We talked about how typing the story out from the writer's journal is a good opportunity for revision (fixing any spelling or grammatical errors and adding to or changing elements of the story).

Typed stories were to be shared with me (caleb.collins.lhs@gmail.com) on Google Drive.

If people were not engaged in typing their story, they were completing our first root/prefix sheet for this year. We will be studying roots and prefixes as a way of improving vocabulary and word recognition so that when people come across new words when they read they have some background on how to figure out what the word means from its word parts.

An extra copy of this sheet is available here: Unit 1, Set 1 Roots and Prefixes


Homework:

If you did not do so in class, finish the Unit 1, Set 1 Roots and Prefixes sheet.

If you did not finishing typing and submitting your utopian story on Google Drive, do so for homework.

Continue to read Animal Farm according to the class schedule.

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9.09 - Utopia in Action

We started today's class with the following writing activity to be completed in everyone's individual writing journals:

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After everyone had a chance to write their seven commandments, we began an activity that would show what those commandments would look like in action in the utopian world for which they were designed. Specific details for this writing task were:

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In class, I clarified that the list does not have to be read nor each item explored in the story. It just has to appear in full in the story in some way (as a poster, written on a coffee cup, tattooed on someone's arm, printed on paper leaflets that are dropped over a city from a helicopter, etc.)

Everyone had the rest of the period to work on this story.

The story should be at least one full page in a writing journal. Stories can definitely be longer.

Homework:

If you did not finish your utopian story in class, do so for homework.

Continue to read Animal Farm according to the class schedule.

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09.06 - Utopias through Commandments

To start today's class, everyone was asked to consider the following list of rules:

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This list of rules (from the movie Fight Club) was designed to make the fight club into an ideal community. Everyone was asked to respond to the following question in their writing journal:

What can you tell about the values of this organization based on its rules?

After everyone had a chance to respond to this question, we discussed everyone's answers.

Next, I handed out a commandment comparison sheet and gave students a list of commandments/rules. All of these rules/commandments were designed for a group of people with the idea that following these rules would help to make life better. With this in mind, students were asked to use the comparison sheet to evaluate and compare these lists. 

If you are making this assignment up, feel free to choose any two lists.

After everyone had compared their lists, we reviewed the lists in general and identified what the original name of the list was.

Homework:

Read in Animal Farm according to our class schedule (see below).

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09.05 - Ideal Worlds

Everyone started class by responding to the following prompt in their writing journal:

What is one key element or ingredient for having an ideal world?

Before everyone responded to the prompt, we discussed how really a perfect world requires that a lot of things be in place. However, this question was asking people to simply identify and describe one of those things. Elements that people came up with were:

happy at work

no religion

lots of food

people aren't jerks

stable economy

social equality (class, race, sexuality, gender)

no politicians

sports/physical activity

everyone has good clothes

Next, we did a visualization activity in which everyone took a moment to relax and picture themselves in their own ideal world. The activity asked that everyone try to envision all of the information they would take in from their senses in that place (sight, feel, sound, smell, taste). At the end of the activity, everyone was asked to respond to the following in their writing journal:

Describe the ideal place that you just envisioned in this activity. 
Be sure to include as much detail as possible.

After everyone had a chance to do this, I had everyone share out their responses. We then looked at what these different ideals had in common. Similarities that people noticed included:

People are alone or with only a few people.

In their place, everyone is happy.

There is nature.

There are trees.

While not all of the ideal places had these features, these were elements that came up in most of the visions.

Everyone then got copies of Animal Farm which we will be reading and which brings all of our discussion about what it takes to make an ideal world into play.


Homework:

For next Monday, read through page 26 in Animal Farm.

09.04 - Marigolds (Writing)

For today's class, everyone had time to write their response to the short story "Marigolds" that we read in class yesterday. Everyone had the period to write their response. These essays will be assessed to help me plan and structure our work in English this year by showing me what people can already do well and what areas we should focus on improving. These essays will not be entered into the grade book. 

Materials for this writing are available here:

"Marigolds" by Eugenia Collier
Essay assignment and prompts
Essay assessment rubric

Additional information on this assignment is available through yesterday's post.

Homework:

If you did not do so in class, finish writing your essay for tomorrow.

09.03 - Marigolds (Reading)

At the beginning of class, everyone responded to the following prompt in their writing journal:

Have you moved from childhood to adulthood yet? How do you know or how will you know? Explain your response.

After everyone had a chance to respond to this prompt, students formed groups based on their general answer (yes, no, it's complicated). Groups discussed and then shared out the reasons they had for their choices.

We used this discussion to prepare us for our reading of the story "Marigolds" by Eugenia Collier in which a young woman transitions from childhood to adulthood.

We will be writing an in class essay using this story next class. Before reading the story, we looked at the assignment, prompt choices, and rubric that will be used to assess students' responses. This essay will not go in the grade book as a formal grade. The essay is an opportunity for me to see where everyone is at in terms of their essay writing.


I read the story aloud with the help of some students volunteers.

Handouts from today's class:

"Marigolds" by Eugenia Collier
Essay assignment and prompts
Essay assessment rubric


Homework:

Think about which essay prompt you would like to respond to next class.

Revisit the story to firm up your understanding of it and how you can use it to respond to one of the essay prompts.

If you do not have one already, be sure to get a writer's journal for class. See the posts on 08.29 and 08.30 for details.