Writing 2: Writing 2 Class Notes -- Week 12 (April 16)

Greetings!

What a great, flexible, mostly engaged group of students. I say "mostly" because sometimes it's hard to be sitting in the same room all day, looking at a screen, and keep paying attention. They're doing great!

Our Quick Write prompt inspired by National Laundry Day: a picture of a woman in laundromat dryer. I didn't get to hear much about what the students wrote, but they had a chance to share with one another in a Breakout Room. (By the way, today was National Wear Your Pajamas to Work Day, which seems apropos for this quarantine season.)

For most of the semester, we've been doing Words of the Day to explore unusual words and etymologies. Next week we will finish up this part of the class with a rollicking game of "Vocabulary Bingo." To prepare for that, students should review the Words of the Day in order to be familiar with them. (No memorizing definitions is required.)

Following our beginning of class activities, we did a Homework Check. On Wednesday I scanned and emailed homework that included the final drafts of their Cause/Effect or Problem/Solution essays, various worksheets, and rough drafts of their Evaluation Essays. Students have done well in emailing their homework in. When students hand in homework, the photos of worksheets and Quick Writes are clear enough for me to read, but not enough to be worth scanning and sending back. When possible, I will scan work and send it back.

The class has done a good job with the Evaluation Essay, and they are to do the final drafts for next week. A number of students needed to expand their papers with more details about the criteria in their essays. (See the notes that have organization options.) The final drafts are due next week.

For the Poetry section of class, I sent students again to the Breakout Rooms to 1) choose 2 poems to discuss; 2) try to figure out why Mrs Prichard likes the poem "The Red Wheelbarrow" and 3) choose a poem to recite as a group. While none of the groups figured out my quirky fascination for this poem, they were thoughtful and had good discussions. Next week I will introduce our Poetry Slam -- a recitation competition.

Finally, for Grammar, I used my Aver document camera to work on two more comma-related worksheets. (This lesson was a mix of technology and old school pen and paper.) We've been reviewing comma usage with the Edpuzzle videos. The worksheets I've made can be finished with Word or Google Docs. (Note: Some students have already done this and don't need to do it again.)

Blessings on all of you and your families.

See you next week!

Mrs. Prichard

Assignments for Next Week

-- Final Draft of the Evaluation Essay

-- Read the handout with T.S. Eliot, William Carlos Williams, and Lewis Carroll poems

-- Grammar Worksheets:

-- Appositives & Parenthetical Phrases -- last 5 only

-- Appositives -- top half only

-- Date &Addresses (top half only)

-- Complements Worksheet (both sides)

Links for this Week