Week at a glance January 30 - February 3, 2012

Curriculum focus: analyzing and interpreting figurative language: simile, metaphor, and symbol (11.1.3.K4a, b, i), identifying and analyzing the development of theme in a narrative text (11.1.4.K10d), identifying and analyzing the author's style: flashback, symbolism, tone, and mood (11.1.4.K11), comparing and contrasting narrative elements: character traits and character motives (11.1.4.K7), identifying and analyzing types of characters: flat, round, static, and dynamic (11.2.1.K1), and contextual aspects of setting: historical, social, and cultural (11.2.1.K2).

Root words for this week (root - definition - examples):

1. cis/cide - cut or kill- precise, homicide
2. crypto - secret/hidden - crypt, cryptography
3. lud/lus - play/tease - delusion, illusion, allude
4. necro - death - necropsy, necropolis
5. nihil - nothing - annihilate, nil, nihilism

"Attention must be paid..." This week we begin reading Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman. It's a tale of a salesman desperately aiming for the American dream brought down by his own tragic flaws. As we read the play in class, we'll be focusing on the relationships between the characters and how Miller shows how events in the past inescapably shape our future. We'll also pull from the five American themes we studied during our American Poetry Unit and analyze how the themes are developed in the play.  We'll wrap up the week with a trip to the Library to revise and type the final drafts of the Definition Essay and the American Poem.

• Mon: New root words.  DoaS - Background information and context.  Select parts.  Begin reading/discussing Act One.
• Tues: DoaS - Continue reading/discussing Act One.
• Wed: DoaS - Finish reading/discussing Act One.  Act One, part I study guide due by the end of the hour.
• Thurs: Meet in the library to revise and type the final drafts of the Definition Essay and American Poem.
• Fri: Final drafts - Definition Essay and American Poem due by the end of the hour.

Week at a glance January 23 - 27, 2012

Curriculum focus: identifies, interprets, and analyzes the use of figurative language (11.1.K3), uses information from the text to make inferences and draw conclusions (11.1.4.K5), compares/contrasts themes in texts (11.1.4.K7b), compares/contrasts author's use of literary devices (11.1.4.K7k), uses paraphrasing and organizational skills to summarize underlying meaning of the text (11.1.4.K9e), analyzes and evaluates how an author's style work together to achieve purpose: irony, symbolism, tone, mood, imagery, allusion (11.1.4.K11c, d, e, f, h, and j), and analyzes contextual aspects of setting: historical, social, cultural (11.2.1.K2).
Root words for this week (root - definition - examples):

1. cardio - heart - cardiac, cardiologist
2. cerb - brain - cerebral, cerebellum
3. gastr - stomach - gastric, gastritis
4. osteo - bone - osteoporosis, osteopathy
5. rhin - nose - rhinoceros, rhinoplasty

This week we'll do our final readings and assignments for our American Poetry unit.  Students have spent three weeks studying our authors' development of the unique American themes within their poetry.  On Wednesday, it's the students' turn: students will begin the American poem assignment.  This assignment challenges them to develop their own free verse American Poem and will serve as a unit exam for this assignment.  As always, we will also begin and end the week with root words and a quiz.

• Mon: New root words; quiz on Friday.  American Poetry - The Melting Pot, Okita and Hughes.  Study guide due by the end of the hour. 
• Tues: American Poetry - American Dreams, Hughes and Robinson.  Study guide due by the end of the hour.
• Wed: Pass back papers and current grades.  American Poem - assignment, expectations, and example.  Come to class on Thursday with a selected theme.
• Thurs: American Poem - identify the selected theme.  Begin shaping and drafting the free verse poem.
• Fri: Root words quiz.  Handwritten rough draft of the American Poem due by the end of the hour.

Week at a glance January 16-20, 2012

Curriculum focus: identifies, interprets, and analyzes the use of figurative language (11.1.K3), uses information from the text to make inferences and draw conclusions (11.1.4.K5), compares/contrasts themes in texts (11.1.4.K7b), compares/contrasts author's use of literary devices (11.1.4.K7k), uses paraphrasing and organizational skills to summarize underlying meaning of the text (11.1.4.K9e), analyzes and evaluates how an author's style work together to achieve purpose: irony, symbolism, tone, mood, imagery, allusion (11.1.4.K11c, d, e, f, h, and j), and analyzes contextual aspects of setting: historical, social, cultural (11.2.1.K2).


Root words for this week (root - definition - examples):

1. chrom - color - chromosome, monochromatic, chromograph
2. -cracy - rule by - democracy, aristocracy, bureaucrat
3. esth/aesth - sensation or feeling - aesthetic, anesthesiology, kinesthetic
4. flor - flower - flour, floral, Florida, fleur de lis
5. plas/plast - to form - plasma, plastic, protoplasm

This week we'll continue on with our American Poetry unit.  We'll begin with poets considering America's potential identity in the world.  We'll then move on to Modernist and Surrealist perspectives and writing techniques.  We'll wrap up the week with a look at how the Modernists and Surrealists influenced the later works of two more poets pondering America's potential identity.  As we work through the week, we'll also continue our second semester Root Words unit and take care of last week's quiz.

• Mon: No school - Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
• Tues: New root words, quiz on Friday.  American Poetry - The Search for Identity, part 1. Study guide due by the end of the hour.
• Wed: Root Words quiz.  American Poetry - begin reading poems on Modernism and Surrealism.
• Thurs: American Poetry - American Dreams - finish reading poems on Modernism and Surrealism.  Study guide due by the end of the hour.
• Fri: Root Words quiz. American Poetry - The Search for Identity, part 2.  Study guide due by the end of the hour.

Week at a glance January 9 - 13, 2012

Curriculum focus: differentiates between connotation and denotation, determines meaning of words based on context clues (11.1.3.K1), generates ideas from personal experience (11.7.1.1), selects a topic and relevant details for form, purpose, and audience (11.7.1.2), composes narrative writing (11.7.2.1a), writes using descriptive text structure (11.7.2.4a), develops clear and purposeful ideas with sufficient evidence and/or relevant details (11.7.1.1c), organizes ideas in a logical structure (11.7.3.2), writes with energy and enthusiasm using appropriate tone and word choice (11.7.3.4), creates text that flows easily with a variety of sentence structures (11.7.3.5), uses standard writing conventions effectively to enhance readability (11.7.3.6), and produces final written products that are of a quality to present to others (11.7.3.7).

Root words for this week (root - definition - examples):

1. cad/cide - to fall - accident, coincidence, deciduous
2. geno - creation - genesis, genetics, genocide
3. meta/muta - change - mutate, metamorphosis, metabolism
4. somn - sleep - insomnia, somnolent, somniloquacious
5. vor - eat - voracious, carnivore, herbivore, omnivore

This week, we launch into the second semester of our root words unit. Students will be learn five new roots, definitions, and examples, review them throughout the week, and have a quiz on Thursday. We'll also begin a brief poetry unit that highlights many famous poets in American literature and challenges students to analyze and interpret their poems. The purpose of the unit is to do a study of five themes common and unique to American literature, as well as to study American free verse as a poetic style. Our unit will eventually wrap up with students writing their own free verse poem centered around one of the five American themes. This week, however, will wrap up with students typing a rough draft of their Definition Essay.

• Mon: American Poetry - unit overview. Songs of America: Whitman and Hughes. Study guide due by the end of the hour.
• Tues: American Poetry - Free verse: Whitman and Frost. Study guide due by the end of the hour.
• Wed: Definition Essay - pass back the shaping packet.  Create an effective thesis for the essay and evaluate it.
• Thurs: Root Words quiz. Definition Essay - meet in the library to begin typing a rough draft of the essay. Definition Essay rough draft due Friday.
• Fri: Root Words quiz.  Meet in the library and type the Definition Essay. Typed rough draft due by the end of the hour.

Week at a glance January 2 - 6, 2012

Welcome back!

Curriculum focus: differentiates between connotation and denotation, determines meaning of words based on context clues (11.1.3.K1), generates ideas from personal experience (11.7.1.1), selects a topic and relevant details for form, purpose, and audience (11.7.1.2), composes narrative writing (11.7.2.1a), writes using descriptive text structure (11.7.2.4a), develops clear and purposeful ideas with sufficient evidence and/or relevant details (11.7.1.1c), organizes ideas in a logical structure (11.7.3.2), writes with energy and enthusiasm using appropriate tone and word choice (11.7.3.4), creates text that flows easily with a variety of sentence structures (11.7.3.5), uses standard writing conventions effectively to enhance readability (11.7.3.6), and produces final written products that are of a quality to present to others (11.7.3.7).

This week we'll hit the ground running with our first essay of the semester: a definition essay. A definition essay in an essay in which we thoroughly explain a word or phrase, including connotations, denotations, and personal connections. This may sound vague and abstract now, but it will make much more sense as we work step-by-step together in class. Look for a copy of the assignment and rubric to be posted on this site by Friday.

• Mon: Winter Break
• Tues: No school - staff work day
• Wed: 2nd Semester overview and review.  Definition Essay - assignment, strategies, and graphic organizer.
• Thurs: Definition Essay - complete the graphic organizer.  Begin shaping the essay.
• Fri: Definition Essay - outline/shaping packet due by the end of the hour.