Week at a glance March 26 - 30, 2012

Curriculum focus: identifies, interprets, and analyzes figurative language including: idiom, imagery, and symbolism (11.1.2.K4), uses information from the text to make inferences and draw conclusions (11.1.4.K5), compares/contrasts textual aspects: character traits, themes, character motives, and author's purpose (11.1.4.K7), analyzes and evaluates how the author's style (word choice and sentence structure) and use of literary devices work together to achieve his/her purpose by using tone, mood, and imagery (11.1.4.K11d, e, and h), and analyzes contextual aspects of setting and their influence on characters and events in the story including the contexts of history, society, and culture (11.2.1.K2a-c).

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

1. ambi/amphi - both- amphibian, ambidextrous
2. dom - house/home - domain, domestic
3. hema/hemo - blood- hemoglobin, hematoma
4. paleo - ancient - paleontology, paleoanthropology
5. xeno - foreign/alien - xenophobia, xenobiology

This week is a transitional week: we'll wrap up all remaining Career Project presentations, begin a brief unit over folklore and mythology, and begin our 4th Quarter Independent Reading Project.  The American Folklore unit will give students a bit of background and wrap up with an opportunity for some creative writing toward the end of next week.

• Mon: New root words - quiz on Friday.  Final Career Project Presentations.  Folklore Unit - definitions and background - notes in class.
• Tues: 4th Quarter Independent Reading Project - introduction and selecting a book.  Unit overview.
• Wed: American Folklore - examples and discussion.
• Thurs: Begin reading/discussing "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow"
• Fri: Root words quiz.  Finish reading/discussing "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" - questions due by the end of the hour.

Week at a glance March 12 - 16, 2012

Curriculum focus: organizing and planning a written piece (11.7.1.3), composes persuasive writing (11.7.2.1c), adapts writing by identifying, analyzing, and understanding audience (11.7.2.2), writes using one or more text structures when appropriate to a achieve a specific purpose or to address a specific audience: problem/solution (11.7.2.4d), and develops clear and purposeful ideas with sufficient evidence and/or relevant detail to satisfy purpose using sufficient evidence, examples, anecdotes, quotations, expert opinions, and/or statistics (11.7.2.1d)

This week we will wrap up our research project over a potential career in our future.  Students have spent one week already gathering research and information for the PowerPoint project.  Students will put the finishing touches on the presentation this week from Monday - Wednesday.  We'll end the week before spring break with students presenting their findings to the class.

• Mon: Career Project - meet in Lab D and continue putting together the PowerPoint
• Tues: Career Project - meet in Lab D and continue putting together the PowerPoint
• Wed: Career Project - finish the PowerPoint.  The Career Project must be completed and saved to the student drive.
• Thurs: Career Project presentations
• Fri: Career Project presentations

Week at a glance March 5 - 9, 2012

Curriculum focus: organizing and planning a written piece (11.7.1.3), composes persuasive writing (11.7.2.1c), adapts writing by identifying, analyzing, and understanding audience (11.7.2.2), writes using one or more text structures when appropriate to a achieve a specific purpose or to address a specific audience: problem/solution (11.7.2.4d), and develops clear and purposeful ideas with sufficient evidence and/or relevant detail to satisfy purpose using sufficient evidence, examples, anecdotes, quotations, expert opinions, and/or statistics (11.7.2.1d)

This week we will start working on the Career Project. The Career Project is a presentation students will assemble and create using research they gather this week in the library. The assignment, guidelines, rubric, and resources are all posted under the Course Materials section to the right. The main thing that students should keep in mind is that our time with computers is limited. Students will need to be focused and working efficiently in order to be successful with this project. If anyone has any questions, please don't hesitate to contact me.

• Mon: Career Project - overview, expectations, rubric, and guidelines. Begin research for the Annotated Bibliography.
• Tues: Career Project - meet in the Library. Continue the Annotated Bibliography. Aim to have at least one source and five facts by the end of the hour. Writing process grade assessed at the end of the hour for the first source.
• Wed: Career Project - meet in the Library. Wrap up the Annotated Bibliography.
• Thurs: Career Project - meet in the Library - annotated bibliography with a minimum of three sources with five citations each (15 citations total) due. Begin synthesizing the researched information into pieces to be on the presentation . Type facts with citations, headers, and Works Cited page.
• Fri: No school - End of the 3rd quarter - Teacher work day