Two Weeks to Go in Term One!

Good morning! It's a blustery, rainy morning, but I'm listening to the weather man promise that the weather is moving out and our day will improve. We might even get some sunshine this afternoon! That will help brighten the moods, though with the win on Friday night, my guess is that the community is still enjoying local football and they have to be pretty cheery!

We're cruising along in English class. English 10 is finished reading Animal Farm and now we're doing the essay - we should be about done with the book by the end of the week. In English 9 we're over halfway through the play. I threw in a video assignment where they acted out a portion of Act III, Scene i, and the projects are pretty hilarious. I have a few photos I took while they were in the middle of the process:

And my favorite:

As you can probably tell, this scene was the first with fatalities, so there are a lot of bodies on the floor.  They had fun, I had fun, so it was worth taking the time to do it.

Coming up this week English 9 will work toward finishing the play, while English 10 works toward finishing Animal Farm. Please remember that there is no school on Friday.  Here's the schedule:

English 9

• Monday, 10/28 - bell work; 1st Hour finish Act III and do Quickwrite; 2nd and 6th Hours do Quickwrite for Scene ii and continue reading Act III
• Tuesday, 10/29 - Academic Advisory - bell work; 1st Hour - quiz for Act III and continue reading into Act IV; 2nd and 6th Hours finish Act III and do Quickwrite
• Wednesday, 10/30 - bell work; 1st Hour - read Act IV; 2nd and 6th Hours quiz for Act III and continue reading into Act IV
• Thursday, 10/31 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; turn in reading logs; 1st Hour - finish Act IV and start Act V; 2nd and 6th Hours read Act IV
• Friday, 11/1 - NO SCHOOL!

English 10

• Monday, 10/28 - bell work; 3rd Hour finish outline of paper and type it; 4th Hour does editing/revision stations
• Tuesday, 10/29 - Academic Advisory - bell work; 3rd Hour finishes typing and starts editing/revision stations; 4th Hour finishes editing/revision stations, turn paper into final copy - DUE BY MIDNIGHT ON TURNITIN.COM
• Wednesday, 10/30 - bell work; 3rd Hour finishes editing/revision stations, turn paper into final copy - DUE BY MIDNIGHT ON TURNITIN.COM; 4th Hour watches the movie filling in a compare/contrast sheet for text to movie
• Thursday, 10/31 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; watch movie and do compare/contrast sheet

So that's the plan. I hope everyone has a great week! Ciao!

Two Weeks to Go in Term One! by Laura Stubbs is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at https://www.laurastubbs.blogspot.com.

Continuing Forward

Now that we've found our rhythm I've had a chance to sit back and evaluate what is working and what needs to change. I also spent last Friday at a conference for English teachers at MSU and was able to converse with others in my field, particularly teachers in the middle schools, high schools and university levels. A big chunk of my day was about how we make their transitions work between all three levels. As such, I made some executive decisions about some changes (though I did email my co-teacher during the day to share and make sure he was on board), so here are a couple of things that I want to do differently:

• Instead of weekly vocab. quizzes for academic words - which are taking up a ton of time from the class and also dominating HAC - I plan to focus on 8 of them that are integral to being a critical thinker and student. They are also ideas that are integral to life habits, so they are called Habits of Mind: curiosity, openness, engagement, creativity, persistence, responsibility, flexibility, and metacognitive thinking. I'm going to present the ideas on Monday to my classes, and each day there will be an exit ticket asking them to focus on which habits they worked on that day. I will still focus on other academic words, but we'll spread them out with vocab. cards, so maybe a few times a term instead of every week.
• Each day instead of the weekly agenda (which changes constantly) I'm going to post three statements for each class: I Can..., Utilizing the Skills..., Important for Careers In... . I'm hoping that this will help them see in their day to day work that there's relevance in what we do. I'm frustrated because I feel like they're just doing what we do for a grade; there's no intrinsic motivation. I'm hoping this will give them more ownership over their learning.
• Because we'll have less focus on the academic vocabulary quizzes, we'll have more time to write, and a chance to write more than just essays. I'm tired of the read-a-book=write-an-essay rut I get into. This should help them with both writing skills and critical thinking.

Those are my thoughts for the moment. I'm hoping the changes will make my class more interesting and engaging for them.  So here are my plans for the week:

English 9

• Monday, 10/21 - bell work; Act III, Scene i Flipgrids; exit ticket
• Tuesday, 10/22 - Academic Advisory - bell work; finish Flipgrids; continue Act III; exit ticket
• Wednesday, 10/23 - bell work; quickwrite; continue Act III; exit ticket
• Thursday, 10/24 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; turn in Reading Logs; continue Act III; 1st Hour - quiz for Act III; exit ticket
• Friday, 10/25 - bell work; get new Reading Log; silent reading, exit ticket

English 10

• Monday, 10/21 - bell work; 3rd Hour - 10% Summary; 4th Hour - quickwrite, start Ch. 10; exit ticket
• Tuesday, 10/22 - Academic Advisory - bell work; 3rd Hour - quickwrite, read Ch. 10; 4th Hour - finish the book, final discussion; exit ticket
• Wednesday, 10/23 - bell work; 3rd Hour - EDP with Mrs. Edwards; 4th Hour - quiz for ch. 9/10; pre-write for essay; exit ticket
• Thursday, 10/24 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; 3rd Hour - finish the book, quiz for ch. 9/10; 4th Hour - finish pre-writing; set up document; start drafting; exit ticket
• Friday, 10/25 - bell work; 3rd Hour - pre-writing, set up document; 4th Hour - 1/2 Hour for drafting, 1/2 Hour for movie; exit ticket

So that's the plan. Thanks for all the patience and support I receive - I appreciate all of it! Ciao!

Continuing Forward by Laura Stubbs is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at https://www.laurastubbs.blogspot.com.

Finding that Rhythm

What I love about October in the classroom is that we finally get "normality". The interruptions die down, we're done with pep assemblies for a bit, there are no days off, so we hit a rhythm and really start to get things done.

Last week my English 9 classes took their first Romeo and Juliet quiz for Act I, and now we're well into Act II. In English 10, we continued reading, and I think I see the end of the book by the end of this week! Exciting times!

So here is what we're doing this coming week:

English 9

• Monday, 10/14 - bell work; 1st Hour - finish Act II; 2nd and 6th Hours - finish scene ii, and read scenes iii and iv
• Tuesday, 10/15 - Academic Advisory - bell work; 1st Hour - watch Act II and take Act II quiz; 2nd and 6th Hours - finish reading Act II
• Wednesday, 10/16 - bell work; 1st Hour - watch Act III, scene i and do the paperwork for the Flipgrid assignment; 2nd and 6th Hours - watch Act II and take Act II quiz
• Thursday, 10/17 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; turn in reading logs; 1st Hour - create Flipgrids; 2nd and 6th Hours - watch Act III, scene i, then do some reading for Friday's assignment
• Friday, 10/18 - get new reading log; read for 1/2 hour; reading activity

English 10

• Monday, 10/14 - bell work; 3rd Hour - read ch. 7 and take notes; 4th Hour - read ch. 8 and take notes - quiz Tuesday
• Tuesday, 10/15 - Academic Advisory - bell work; 3rd Hour - vocab. activity; start reading ch. 8; 4th Hour - finish discussing ch. 8 and take quiz for ch. 7/8 - turn in notes and vocab.
• Wednesday, 10/16 - bell work; 3rd Hour - finish ch. 8, quiz for ch. 7/8 - turn in notes and vocab.; 4th Hour - read ch. 9, take notes
• Thursday, 10/17 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; 3rd Hour - read ch. 9, take notes; 4th Hour - finish the book
• Friday, 10/18 - 3rd Hour - finish the book; 4th Hour - quiz for ch. 9/10, commonlit assignment

That's the plan as I see it. I hope everyone has a great week! Ciao!

Finding that Rhythm by Laura Stubbs is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at https://www.laurastubbs.blogspot.com.

Mid-Point, Term 1

Homecoming: exciting, enlightening, exhausting. I love seeing my students in different scenarios compared to sitting in my classroom - from dressing up, to pep assembly games, to football socializing, to all dressed up for the dance. It's wonderful. Here are a few pictures from the week:

I love your kids! Weeks like this make my job fantastic.

But now it's time to move forward. I am happy with the pace we've hit for Animal Farm in English 10, but I think we need to really push forward in English 9 with Romeo and Juliet; by the end of this week I hope to be in the middle of Act III.  Here's my tentative schedule:

English 9

• Monday, 10/7 - bell work; get vocab. words for week 6; 1st Hour - Act I quiz; 2nd & 6th Hours - finish scene v and do an annotation highlight activity on Google Classroom
• Tuesday, 10/8 - Academic Advisory - bell work; check in definitions; 1st Hour - move to Act II; 2nd & 6th Hours - Act I quiz, move to Act II
• Wednesday, 10/9 - bell work; Act II
• Thursday, 10/10 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; turn in reading log; finish Act II; do Act III - Scene i; Flipgrid activity
• Friday, 10/11 - bell work; vocab. quiz; get new reading log; silent reading

English 10

• Monday, 10/7 - bell work; get vocab. words for week 6; 3rd Hour - finish reading ch. 5, notes, do characterization activity; 4th Hour - finish characterization activity; read ch. 6
• Tuesday, 10/8 - Academic Advisory - bell work; check in definitions; 3rd Hour - finish characterization activity, read ch. 6; 4th Hour - finish ch. 6, quiz for ch. 5/6, start ch. 7
• Wednesday, 10/9 - bell work; 3rd Hour - finish ch. 6, quiz for ch. 5/6, start ch. 7; 4th Hour - vocab. activity for ch. 7/8, start ch. 8
• Thursday, 10/10 - PSAT Advisory - bell work; 3rd Hour - vocab. activity for ch. 7/8, start ch. 8; 4th Hour - finish ch. 8
• Friday, 10/11 - bell work; vocab. quiz; 3rd Hour - finish ch. 8; 4th Hour - quiz for ch. 8, start ch. 9

That's the plan and I'll try to stick to it. I'm either getting better at planning, or we're moving through material faster, but we're starting to stick to the plan better and are not getting as far behind, so I'm crossing my fingers that we can stick to it.  I hope everyone has a great week! Ciao!

Mid-Point, Term 1 by Laura Stubbs is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
Based on a work at https://www.laurastubbs.blogspot.com.