Ms. Dean's Blog

Final Days on Newspaper Project

MONDAY-FRIDAY: This week the students will type their persuasive essays and put together the newspaper project which is a group project. Each member of the group contributes one article (their persuasive essay with attention-getting headline) as well as an additional element such as a picture, game, comic, ad, or chart. These elements were divided among the group members last Friday. 

The project is due on Thursday. If you know that you are taking your child out of school early for the Thanksgiving break, please ensure that his or her portion of the project has been given to the group members so that they can complete the front page of the newspaper. Guidelines for this project, the rubric that will be used to assess it, the outline of the lessons taught, and the due date were sent home five weeks ago for parent signature. 

On Friday, we will create a "newspaper gallery" with all completed projects. Students will be given rubrics and required to assess their peers' finished project. 

Skills Tutor

FRIDAY: The students turned-in their DGP and spelling words and then took the spelling quiz. After that, they took a few notes about run-on sentences (Download Run-on Sentences). We'll work more on that when we come back from the Thanksgiving break. The rest of the class was spent analyzing the front page of real newspapers so we could have a better understanding of what is required for our newspaper project. Within each small group, students decided who would be responsible for particular parts of the project (Download Newspaper-guidelines-1). One student in each group has volunteered to bring in a half sheet of poster board for the group to use. 

HOMEWORK: Students MUST complete the third draft of their persuasive essay by Monday. It is important that they come in with the paragraphs written in Nestorian Order using appropriate transitions between the paragraphs. 

SKILLS TUTOR: I have added each student to the Skills Tutor list and given differentiated assignments based on current grades and current readiness for the CRCT. During the first week of December, I will take the students to the computer lab for two days of Skills Tutor work to ensure everyone can log-in and is working on the appropriate assignments. Prior to that, however, students may begin working on their assignments at home. Please download the attached instructions (Download Skillstutor_instructions) to access the website. Students who use Skills Tutor at home can receive extra credit towards low quiz grades if they earn an "A" on a Skills Tutor quiz. 

SEVENTH PERIOD STUDENTS:  Due to too many students talking during Friday's spelling quiz, all papers were discarded. Students should be prepared to retake the quiz on Monday prior to starting work on their projects. 

Checklist for Persuasive Writing

After completing the DGP, the students were given a checklist (Download Checklist for persuasive for essay) that is meant to remind them of all of the required elements for their final persuasive essay. During class, they used the checklist as a guide while they read their second drafts and added what was needed for their third drafts. This is the last draft before we start typing the final version for the front of the newspaper project on Monday. 

Spelling quiz tomorrow!!! Please ensure your son or daughter is prepared for this quiz. I've been very disappointed in the recent spelling quiz grades. Tomorrow they will turn-in this week's DGP as well as the spelling homework they have been doing all week. They should have written the three new words six times each and write each word in a complex sentence.

Drafting the Intro

After completing the DGP, the students reviewed engaging leads they had been taught previously and added a new strategy to their writer's toolkit--asking the audience to "imagine." We started by trying to revise two or three intros students had written for the persuasive benchmark paper, and then we moved on to a list of four writing prompts. Students were asked to use the imagine lead to create an engaging lead for one prompt from the list, and then continue to practice this strategy tonight by drafting the intro for their junk food essays. I will check these tomorrow in class.

"Call to Action"

Today the students were given their new DGP sentence and their new spelling words. Please encourage your son or daughter to complete the daily activity for his or her spelling words AND STUDY FOR FRIDAY'S QUIZ. Too many students are not preparing properly for the quizzes. I only give them three new words each week. This week's words are appropriate, courage, and guarantee. The review words are definitely and opposite. 

After the DGP, the students reviewed notes previously taken regarding closing paragraphs. They then added five steps to those notes that will help them write a closing that is a "call to action." We analyzed two paragraphs (Download Acalltoaction) that effectively follow these steps. Students were rewarded with tickets if they could match a step to a sentence in the paragraph. This lays the groundwork for actually writing our own closings tomorrow. 

HOMEWORK: Write each spelling word three times each. Also, be sure that your three revised paragraphs have been completed. You must have the first drafts as well so that I know which have been revised and which are the originals. 

Revisions due by Monday

On Friday, the students took the sentence types post test and a spelling quiz. After that, they had the entire class period to revise the three body paragraphs they had drafted during the week. I asked them to focus on a few key areas during revision (revise three dead words, identify or create a total of five compound and complex sentences, include one fact, statistic, expert opinion, and personal experience, and include at least one piece of research with the appropriate parenthetical citation). Students who did not complete these revisions in class must do them for homework and show them to me on Monday.

Overall, most students did better on the post test than they did on the pre-test. If you check Pinnacle, you will see the pre-test score listed in the comment column. I'm disappointed in the spelling quiz grades, however, and I feel that students are not taking this quiz seriously. They are given three new words each Monday and quizzed on those words plus two review words every Friday. Please encourage your child to review nightly to prepare for this weekly quiz.

POST TEST TOMORROW

Today we spent time reviewing for tomorrow's sentence types post test. We also wrote our opposing argument paragraph Download Opposing argument framed. The DGP and the spelling words & sentences are due tomorrow. 

EXTRA CREDIT OPPORTUNITY: If the students write one simple, one compound, and one complex sentence and explain to an adult why each of these sentences is classified as it is, they can earn extra credit on the post test. Parents, please sign the student's agenda indicating he or she has explained these sentence types to you.

Best Argument

Wednesday: Today the students drafted the "best argument" paragraph. It needs to be completed at home if it was not finished in class. Also, students reviewed Tuesday and Wednesday's DGP answers and wrote their spelling words two more times. I also made sure that we discussed portions of last night's complex sentence worksheet to make sure students were on the right track. 

HOMEWORK: Complete the paragraph AND the back side of the complex sentence worksheet. Both will be collected tomorrow for a grade. 

POST TEST ON FRIDAY: If your child has a failing grade in language arts right now, it may be because he or she failed the sentence types pretest. A study session for Friday's post test will begin promptly at 8:15 on Friday morning. Any student who would like to participate can ask me for a pass. 

HOMEWORK, HOMEWORK, HOMEWORK!

Because the students are not in school tomorrow, I have given them SEVERAL assignments to work on so that we don't fall behind when they return on Wednesday.

Assignment #1: Complete Tuesday's DGP.

Assignment #2: Write your three spelling words five times each. (immediately, convenient, accessible)

Assignment #3: Do the front side of the complex sentence sheet. We will review it on Wednesday to help prepare for the Friday post test on sentence types.

Assignment #4: Ms. Dean and Ms. Ruh's writing groups should write body paragraph number one using the model we created today as a GUIDELINE. Use your own ideas and information from your research. Mr. Franco's writing groups should draft a body paragraph that addresses your BEST ARGUMENT. 

T-charts and Drafts

THURSDAY: The students completed today's DGP and wrote their spelling words into three sentences. Then they participated in a large group activity that helped them recognize the difference between a statement that sounds believable and one that doesn't. When the students write an essay for the Grade Eight Writing Assessment in January, they will have to come up with relevant ideas that support the topic, and they will have to do so without the benefit of time to do research. By examining fictitious statements that sound real, the students could understand what they will need to include in their own essays and what they will need to avoid.

Fictitious Facts Download Fictitious Facts absent 

No So Fictitious Facts Download Not so real fictious facts absent

For homework, the students needed to create four statements that could be used in their own essay about junk food in schools. One statement needs to sound like a fact, one like an expert opinion, one like a personal experience, and one must use a statistic. Download Ticket out the door support

FRIDAY: Students had a spelling quiz today. Then we did a quick check for understanding of dependent clauses Download Dependent:indy clause quiz. After this, we handed in this week's DGP and last night's homework. I also checked to see if the students had asked a parent to sign the project guidelines Download Newspaper guidelines. This sheet was given to them on Monday for a signature, and they had until Friday to get it signed. 

Next, we practiced using a T-chart as a prewriting strategy for persuasive writing and moving the ideas from the prewriting stage to the drafting stage. We drafted one body paragraph with the info from one section of our T-charts Download School uniform prompt .