English+II+Honors


 * ==Date ==

2014
||= ==Today's Lesson & Homework == ||= ==Future Assignments == ||  ||
 * 8/29 || SR In-class essay.

You won't need your SR texts anymore.

This is the last time I'll update this website. Please use Google Classroom.

Read the first chapter of Tim O'Brien's TTTC for Tuesday. A list of military terms I passed out to you will be useful as you read.

Also, bring your 2nd Writing to Show assignment and Crafting the Expository Argument book with you to class all next week. ||  ||   ||
 * 8/28 || Introduction to Tim O'Brien's __The Things They Carried__. Read the first chapter (same title as the book) for Tuesday, 9/2.

Finish __Maid's Version__ and __The Gangster We Are All Looking For__ Last __Glass Castle__ group--I'm sorry we ran out of time with Ms. Douthit's Google Classroom lesson.

Tomorrow-- Your In-class essay over summer reading. I'm going to post rubric and Google Presentations to Google Classroom, so look for your work there. We're going to try this and see how it goes. Remember, your Sion email is the first letter of your name and your last name with a few exceptions--sisters with same initials, etc. Then, the administrators used first two letters. If you have questions, email ldouthit@ndsion.edu

Remember, the code for 1st hour is 1u8nkc & 2nd hour is 31n6nj

Check Google Classroom for my rubric and SR presentations. Please let me know ASAP if you couldn't open them. I shared them, so you should be able to do so. || You'll need __ Crafting the Expository Argument __ texts with you in class this week.

For Tuesday, 9/2 read the first chapter from the novel by Tim O' Brien "The Things They Carried" (also the title of the book). Hang onto the 2nd writing assignment. Bring back to class Tuesday. ||  ||
 * 8/27 || A bit of a break from the norm. Ms. Douthit is here to share with you the new features of Google classroom (which is what we'll be transitioning over to shortly).

If you were absent today, please be sure to pick up a handout from me.

We will continue SR presentations tomorrow.

Hold onto your #2 Showing vs Telling writing (driving, roller coaster, or some similar experience) and bring it to class Thursday.

SR In-class essays will take place Friday in class. You may use one page of hand-written notes (front & back). The notes you took from class will work as well as any notes you take yourself, including quotes you from the works you want to include.

Remember: you may write over one of the works you did not present.

Coming up: __The Things They Carried.__ You'll have a short reading assignment over the weekend. To prepare, I'll provide you with an introduction Thursday. || You'll need __ Crafting the Expository Argument __ texts with you in class this week.

For Tuesday, 9/2 read the first chapter from the novel by Tim O' Brien "The Things They Carried" (also the title of the book). ||  || Look over what you wrote, star or put a check next to a sentence you know is strong, one that stands out from the rest of the writing. Share it with two or three people around you. Take some volunteers to hear examples.
 * 8/26 || #1 Showing vs Telling writing. Take out your homework--what was easy, what was difficult?

We will stick with similar format. This time as you begin to write, consider using a mind map to jot down your ideas. When you begin to "tell," substitute more active verbs and build from there. Your assignment tonight is to recall a driving experience. This could be a first driving lesson from a parent, sibling, or someone else. Try to set the scene. Put us in your shows but don't tell us "The first time I drove..." (If you haven't driven yet, describe a roller coaster ride or the water slide at Schlitterbahn. The rest applies:
 * don't use telling sentences
 * begin in the middle of the action
 * show all the sense detail (sight, sound, touch, taste, smell, internal sensation (hunger, thirst, nausea), kinesthetic, or others
 * show each specific movement, detailed action, as if you were filming it frame by frame
 * avoid plurals
 * use imaginative vocabulary, vivid verbs, specific nouns (stay away from flowery adjectives/adverbs.
 * vary the beginnings of the sentences
 * use present tense only

SR Presentations: __The Maid's Version__.

SR Essays will take place on Thursday. || You'll need __ Crafting the Expository Argument __ texts with you in class this week. ||  ||
 * 8/25 || Today: __ The Glass Castle __ Presentations

Take copious notes. Remember, you may use one page of hand-written notes on your in-class essay.

Homework--__Crafting Expository Argument__, 5 ed. Read pages 38-40. Complete the first "Writing to Show Assignment #1" on page 48. "He is scared" or "She is scared." Make sure to follow the instructions on page 48: Complete this on a piece of paper or composition notebook. || You'll need __Crafting the Expository Argument__ texts with you in class this week. ||  || 8/22 || Time in class to work on your SR presentations. Complete the plot summary. Make sure the theme statement is concise, has a subject and a predicate, is a generalization about life, but still relevant to the story. It's the central point from which the rest of the story expands.
 * don't use telling sentences (can't use scared, frightened, horrified, terrified, etc.)
 * begin in the middle of the action
 * show all the sense detail (sight, sound, touch, taste, smell, internal sensation (hunger, thirst, nausea), kinesthetic, or others
 * show each specific movement, detailed action, as if you were filming it frame by frame
 * avoid plurals
 * use imaginative vocabulary, vivid verbs, specific nouns (stay away from flowery adjectives/adverbs.
 * vary the beginnings of the sentences
 * use present tense only
 * 8/21 &

Make sure you've shared your presentation with me and your group members and you've given it a title with the following information: English II H, 2nd Hour, The Maid's Version#2 (for example). Make sure your name is at the top of your slides.

Remember to be mindful of your theme as your looking for evidence in the novel. You are doing the thinking step, connecting the passages to the theme. Write down your insight, connecting the passages (evidence) to the theme.

With the example from __The Maid's Version__ on page 18-19. So much can be gleaned from the diction, syntax, and detail (as well as the author's attitude toward the subject). "Ethan and Virginia clomped into the kitchen and told her [Alma] they were famished suddenly terribly famished, and would Alma oblige them each with another plate of supper..." The children are clomping, conveying what? A heaviness, a disregard for the care she's just taken in cleaning the kitchen, yet they're polite when they ask for more. They're carefree, hungry children yet they've had the opportunity to eat with their family but did not take it when they had the chance. "Her own sons waited at home, stomachs __pinging__, hoping tonight there'd be food that had a bone in it, or at least food that had once lived on a bone." The contrast between the Glencross children provided with plenty, even their own parents to sit down and eat a warm meal contrasts sharply to the loneliness of Alma's boys waiting at home alone for a paltry meal which if they're lucky, might include the flavor of meat, not even the substance of meat, their stomachs "pinging," or ricocheting with hunger. Through Woodrell's sharp diction and detail he's conveyed the disparity between the privileged and the poor, setting up what's to come when justice is too messy to be served to some, but not others. || For Monday, along with your SR books, please bring your __Crafting the Expository Argument__ texts with you to class.

You should be ready to present on Monday; I'll give you 10-15 minutes to gather with your groups.

Remember, the order should include the following: 1. Introductory slides 2. plot summary 3. theme 4. setting 5. characters 4. plot 5. POV 6. style ||  ||
 * 8/20 || __Glass Castle__ quiz &__Maid's Version__ (enrichment ?)

New seating chart--these will be your SR presentation groups over the next few days.

Summer Reading Book Reviews & Presentations--you and your group members will be creating the Spark/Cliff (We'll call the **Sion Scholar Guide(s) to Summer Reading.** However, it won't be over the entire book. You and your group members are honing in on an important theme and focusing your analysis around that theme. See the handout for details.

Tonight's homework: write your own **5-10 sentence summary** over the entire work (we'll embrace the plot and move beyond it early to get it out of your systems). Make sure you bring it to class with you tomorrow along with your assigned work (__Glass Castle__, __Maid's Version__, or __Gangster)__. || Sion Scholar Guides to Summer Reading.

Eventually, you'll write an In-class essay over a work your group did not present, so if you present __The Glass Castle,__ you have a choice to write over __The Maid's Version__ or __The Gangster We Are All Looking For.__ ||  ||
 * 8/19 || Turn in your SR surveys

Discuss theme statements & have a large class SR discussion.

Homework--prepare from SR quiz over Glass Castle tomorrow. Bring your summer reading texts with you to class Wednesday. ||  ||   ||
 * 8/18 || Finish the SR survey for homework--find 3 passages and record why those passages are integral to the story.

Turn in tomorrow.

Depending on __Glass Castle__ discussion and __Maid's Version__, we'll either have the check-for-reading quiz on Tuesday or Wednesday.

Bring all of the SR texts to class Tuesday/Wednesday. ||  ||   ||
 * 8/15 || SR check-for-reading quiz (__The Maid's Version & The Gangster We are All Looking For__).

We're going to go over the my course expectations on Monday; however, many of you have already come by to speak with me as I've encouraged you to do so. If you don't do well on something, there's no shame if you did what you were supposed to do (the reading) and didn't quite catch onto something. Growth will happen this year, I promise. Learning how to think, making connections, and establishing your own perceptive insights are all skills we're going to hone this year. Be patient with yourselves. You're just starting out the year. While I trust many of you did read, __The Maid's Version__ was a more challenging text and it did take more analytical thinking which you might not have been doing as you were reading. That's OK--we will get there.

On Tuesday, you're going to take your check-for-reading quiz over __The Glass Castle__ and I'm going to give an optional short answer/short essay question over __The Maid's Version.__ You don't have to answer it but if you choose to, I'd suggest you do some thinking about the text in preparation for it. Consider the narrator (s)--both of them (why does Alec begin to tell the story? It's a frame narrative which begins in contemporary times (Alec's) but reverts back to his grandmother's story. Why? Consider the major conflicts among some of the characters as well as those within the town between classes of people. While the obituary-like epigraphs in between the main story provide life history to those who lost their lives in the explosion, they aren't integral to our understanding of the plot. Woodrell's syntax and style of writing ranks right up there with the very best. We'll look at that more closely next week, so don't worry about it for Tuesday.

Attached is a link to a document if you'd like to record some of your questions/observations about __The Maid's Version__. This will be the basis for part of our discussion Monday before the question on Tuesday. [|The Maid's Version--your observations and/or questions]

OK-so new revised schedule. Monday: Q&A as well as English II H course expectations and guidelines. Tuesday: check-for-reading over __Glass Castle__ and a short, option question over __Maid's Version__ || __Glass Castle__ quiz will take place Tuesday or Wednesday, depending on discussion. ||  ||
 * 8/14 || Q&A over summer reading ||  ||   ||
 * 8/13 || Poem by Billy Collins, "Marginalia"

Welcome back. Items you'll need: binder, composition notebook, blue/black pens, notebook paper, flash drive (maybe), post-it notes.

Listen to Sandra Cisneros "My Name," from The House on Mango Street. Spend five minutes freewriting about your own name.

Now, interview one another and ask the following: 1. Question/fact about your name. 2. Something you learned/enjoyed this summer. 3. Ask a ? to discover something you did not know: a passion, an interest, acquired taste. 4. Next, compose a well-constructed question about the summer reading. || Check-for-reading quiz will take place on Friday.

Make sure you bring all of your novels to class tomorrow and the rest of the week. ||  ||