Mrs. Stubbs's English Blog: What a Fantastic Week!

What a wonderful week I've had! It was immensely busy, but immensely rewarding, too. It began on Monday when I chaperoned my son's 6th grade fieldtrip to the Holocaust Museum in Farmington Hills:

We were able to follow a docent who was a survivor of the Kindertransport. Her parents put she and her sister on a train in Germany and sent them to live in England. They died in the Holocaust, and so she moved to the United States to live with an aunt and uncle, eventually arriving here in Detroit, and now she guides people through this amazing museum, and her story is recorded here. At the end of the tour, we were able to hear a survivor of ten (10!) concentration camps in Poland. Remarkably, he and his parents all made it through, but his story was amazing, and our kids were so respectful, and so appreciative, that they all gave him hugs at the end of it.

I won't talk about how my youngest got a stomach bug on Thursday and how I had to stay home with him. I'll let you use your own experiences to know what my day was like; however, he was able to recover in time for his extra special day at school on Friday.

His teacher is passionate about the Holocaust, and she created this amazing unit which revolved around reading texts about the Holocaust (including The Diary of Anne Frank), but she also introduced them to a survivor named Eva Kor. Mrs. Kor is a twin, and she and her sister Miriam survived Auschwitz and Dr. Mengele and his twin experiments. They were taken into Auschwitz in 1944 (it was liberated in January of 1945), separated from their family (who all perished), and then subjected to horrific experiments. Despite this, her message is one of peace and forgiveness, and she gives a powerful presentation. She has founded a museum in Terre Haute, called the CANDLES museum, and speaks internationally about her experiences and lessons. My son's teacher has gotten to know this remarkable lady and brought her to school on Friday, and she spent the day with the 6th graders. My son was so excited! Then I had the chance to listen to her and meet her on Friday night when she spoke to the community. I'm so glad I had this opportunity; I've tried to impress upon my students that they need to listen to these survivors and meet them, because they won't be around much longer. Here is a picture of Eva Kor speaking to us on Friday night:

Then I got up super early on Saturday morning, and I took my older son and parents to Stratford Ontario for the Stratford Festival. I spent the day at a Michigan Teacher's Workshop, learning an abundance of techniques for teaching Shakespeare (this is my second time attending, and I truly think it's the best workshop I've ever attended), and my parents and son wandered around town shopping, eating, and finding all the parks and hidden gardens. Then we grabbed dinner together, and off we went to see Hamlet. I think Stratford is the best live theater within a day's drive, and this production didn't let me down. We all loved it! Here's a collage from the trip:

We just got back, and it's been a rewarding and eventful weekend, and I'm exhausted! As a result, I haven't graded any papers yet this weekend, but I will have everything handled by early this week. While I was super busy personally last week, my students continued to work hard, so here's what they accomplished:

They all focused on vocabulary and took quizzes. My freshmen read poems and wrote poems; my juniors did some pre-reading work for Night, and then we began reading the book. As they read, they were taking notes and doing a study guide.

This week, here's what's coming up:

English 9 will be transitioning to The Odyssey, an epic narrative poem. We'll take what we talked about for the last two weeks and apply it in. They'll focus on vocabulary, take a quiz, and begin learning how to read epic poetry. I'm going to bring in some new ideas I got at my workshop this weekend, since the techniques used for teaching Shakespeare can be applied to any text.
English 11 will continue to read Night. By the end of the week, we should be close to having it finished. They'll do some vocabulary and take a quiz, and they'll continue with notes and a study guide.