Homework over the Break - A Day Students

I'm sorry that I didn't get this up on Friday.  Here's what you all need to get done over break.

Russian Students

All of you should be spending time over break to study and review the grammar and vocabulary that we have been learning so far.  There are some essential grammar skills and more specialized grammar skills for you too.

• Russian I - You should be focused on unit one.  The information on cases, verb conjugation, and the vocabulary too.  Don't forget gender and possessive pronouns.
• Russian II - You've been doing a lot with verbs so stay focused there.  Don't forget all of your vocabulary and the expressions related to time.
• Russian III - You've had a lot in this unit - also related to verbs and aspect and modals and imperatives.  That's a big unit.  There's your vocabulary too.

Russian I all got their drafts of the family writing back - make sure that you are going back and revising these assignments as well as finishing them up so that they are complete.  See my previous post about the example regarding my mom.

English II Students

No official homework over break but a LOT of you have make-up work to complete.  The priority in make-up work is the Persepolis movie review or graphic novel project.  There's the quizzes and tests too, which you'd have to do in school.  Make sure if these big projects are missing that you have them when you get back from break as we'll only have two weeks left in the quarter.  If you have questions about your make-up work you can send me them:  mrmillerjhs @ gmail (dot) com or daniel (dot) miller @ dpsnc (dot) net.

Enjoy the break!  Happy 2016!

Homework for B-Day students over break

AP English III

• Read The Great Gatsby. Be sure to read carefully and annotate.
• Complete a second draft of your essay for Monday, January 4.
• Final drafts of essays are due Friday, January 8. 

English II

Make up any work that you are missing. Your priorities should be your graphic novel project and your movie review, as these are big test grades and worth most for your quarter grade.

Homework for A Day Students - 16 December 2015

It's almost the last A day of the year!  You've just got one more left!

Russian II/III

Your homework for tonight is to prepare for your presentations.  The instructions are below for each of the sections -

Russian II - You should submit to me your first and second draft as well as a final draft.  You should also submit your verb analysis in which you tell me: 1) the aspect of your chosen verb; 2) the pair for the verb; 3) the tense of the verb in your writing; and 4) the meaning of the verb's tense and aspect in your writing.

Don't forget that you are also completing images of your verbal actions.

Russian III - You should submit to me your final draft of your script which you will present before the class as well as your verb analysis.  The verb analysis instructions are the same as what Russian II will complete.  Make sure that you have practiced your lines and reading before you come to class - don't let your fluency and comprehensibility score suffer since you haven't practiced.

Russian I

For homework you should continue to work on your family writing and paragraphs.  You'll see a grade in your PowerSchool which will reflect your work on the three paragraphs you gave me today.  Make sure on Friday when you get your notes back that you apply these to the rest of your writing.  Remember to follow the model in the previous blog entry.

English II

For homework tonight many of you need to turn in missing work or assignments.  You all got progress reports which outline what is missing and where you currently stand in class.  Don't allow these blanks to become zeroes.  Get ahead of things and get it settled.  The most important things are the movie review on Persepolis, the graphic novel project, and any missing quizzes or tests.  You'll have to see us to take care of a quiz or test, but the major projects you can simply just turn in.

Homework for B-Day Students - 15 December 2015

AP English III

For homework tonight you have three stories by Ernest Hemingway to read and annotate.  Make sure that you've read and considered "Hills Like White Elephants", "The Killers", and "Old Man at the Bridge".  Hemingway is known for his plain style, but don't be fooled - there's a lot going on beneath the surface.  Spend your time looking at his choices as a writer and considering their meaning.

You should also get yourself a copy of The Great Gatsby - you'll be reading this over break.

Lastly, make sure that you have completed the peer editing requirement for your literary analysis paper.  If you are unsure about this requirement see Ms. Ginocchio or contact her directly.

English II

For all of you on Thursday we will collect the final drafts of your movie reviews.  For these you will need to use your writing envelope to submit your documents.  You will need to turn in:

• the viewing guide for Persepolis
• the rough draft
• the feedback chart from editing 
• the final draft

If you were absent on draft workshop day you should see me, Ms. Ginocchio, or a peer for essay feedback.  You will then be exempt from the feedback chart.  Many thanks to those students who have already given me a draft to read.  

Lastly, some of you are still missing other major work or projects.  Get these things settled.

Homework for A Day Students - 14 December 2015

English II

For tonight you need to get your draft packets together for your movie reviews.  Remember that in your packet you need to have the following items:

• your viewing guide to Persepolis
• your rough draft
• your notes from peer editing
• your final draft

Make sure that your packet is complete so that you can get all of your possible points.  Your movie reviews will be test grades, so make sure that they're reflective of the work you've done this quarter.

Russian II/III

You have second drafts of your writing due for me on Wednesday.  Make sure that you've corrected your mistakes and that you've really focused on your spelling.  You need to make sure that you will have your verb analysis due for me on Friday.  Remember for the verb analysis you will need to tell me about the aspect, the tense, and the choice of aspect for the particular situation.  

We'll meet in small groups/partners to go over these pieces on Wednesday.

Lastly, don't forget your exercises (III) or your reading analysis (II).

Russian I

Tonight you need to add two sentences to your family writing.  Tell me what a member of your family has and what they do not have.  Remember the following information should be in your paragraphs:

• the name of the person, their relationship to you
• where the person lives
• what the person does as a hobby/activity
• possessions and lack of possessions

Here is an example of what you can make - 

Это моя мама.  Ее зовут Патриция.  Она живет на Аляске.  Она смотрит телевизор.  У мамы есть кошка.  У Патриции нет друга.

AP English III Rough Draft Peer Review

This post is for students who were absent on Friday, December 11th. Other students can ignore. 

Click through to see the entry and your instructions.

Weekend homework for B-Day Students: December 11

AP English III
Your main homework is to review for your test. Your study guide can be accessed here.

For students who were absent today, you missed our peer review workshop of our rough drafts. You will have to complete this outside of class. Tomorrow I will compile a list of everybody who was absent across both sections and try to organize some way for all of you to do this. If you have not sent me a draft of your paper, please do so. I will send out a message tomorrow with instructions about your peer editing and giving you the document we used to give our feedback.

English II

Your homework is simple: study for your grammar quiz! This quiz will cover apostrophes in general and the following words: whose/who's, it's/its, and there/they're/their.

Here are some helpful web comics from the Oatmeal if you are still confused:
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/apostrophe
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/misspelling

Also, do not forget to be working on your final drafts of you movie reviews. Those are due before break!

Homework for the weekend: English 2A

English II

Your homework is simple: study for your grammar quiz! This quiz will cover apostrophes in general and the following words: whose/who's, it's/its, and there/they're/their.

Here are some helpful web comics from the Oatmeal if you are still confused:
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/apostrophe
http://theoatmeal.com/comics/misspelling

Homework for the Weekend - Russian Students - 12/10/15

Russian I, II, and III

There is no required homework this weekend but all of you have the ability to reassess on standards and submit your reassessment work to me on Monday/Tuesday to earn new scores in the gradebook.  Below are the reassessment options.

Russian II and III

Служебный Роман - Viewing Guide G/SC/V - Write a brief paragraph (3-4 sentences) using vocabulary from the film which expresses your opinion on a theme or character from the film.  Cu - In English, compare the film to an American film.


Journals - Select one entry and make corrections.  Complete one entry for missing credit.

Quiz 9.1 (III) - Using food vocabulary and modals write a brief dialogue between a waiter and customer. The waiter should express what can and can't be ordered (заказать). The customer should express wants, needs, and preferences.

Russian I

If missing the family writing workshop - complete this first. Write your paragraphs on six family members including yourself.


Quiz 1.3 - Make a chart for the following ten words and identify their gender, declension pattern, and then identify the words in the nominative, prepositional, and accusative
cases. (G/V)

урок, озеро, карандаш, ручка, мать, девочка, кошка, конспект, площадь, письмо


Take two of these items and state your ownership of them. (SC)


Read this brief dialogue and explain the relationship between these two people. With whom would you speak this way? With whom would you not? (IR/Cu)


1: Здравствуйте Владимир Владимирович.

2: Здравствуйте Алла Сергеевна.

Homework for B-Day Students - 9 December 2015

English II

For homework tonight you should be able to complete the rough draft of your movie review assignments.  Keep in mind the four paragraph layout and the use of your viewing guides to help you write your reviews.  Remember that your thesis will be found in question six and your analysis of the device in the film will be seen in questions three and four.  Bring your review to class with you on Friday so that we can have our editing workshop for these.

AP English III

Excellent work today with your literary criticism work; I hope that you enjoyed reading and evaluating these different pieces.  For tonight, you should be focused on finishing your rough drafts.  If you're still having issues in the development of your topics then please try to see Ms. Ginocchio tomorrow to work through these questions.  Remember that you must have a hard copy of your writing for Friday.

Homework for A Day Students - 8 December 2015

English II

Your main goal for tonight is to finish your rough draft for your movie reviews of Persepolis.  Remember that you need to have all four paragraphs (introduction, plot summary, analysis, and conclusion).  Use your viewing guides to help you especially with the analysis work - you'll need your viewing guides for those ideas and to fill in the paragraphs.

Make sure that you have your rough draft in class on Thursday - we'll work through the drafts and work to make them stronger.  Your final drafts and viewing guides are due on Wednesday of next week!  Don't forget, you have a grammar quiz on Monday!

Russian I

You have a quiz on cases next class.  Make sure that you are studying your chapter one vocabulary - the nouns - and that you know your declension patterns as well as your declensions for Nominative case, Accusative case, and Prepositional case.

Outside of this, you will want to know your vocabulary around greetings, introductions, and farewells.  Lastly, make sure you know your pronouns.

Russian II/III

All of you have your final first drafts of your writing assignments due at the beginning of class on Thursday.  Make sure that you can meet this deadline.  There will also be our quizzes on Thursday - here are your studying goals:

• Russian II - know your aspectual pairs and the meaning of each of the aspects; know your types of verbal action (there are five), know your conjugation patterns and be able to identify tenses.
• Russian III - know the types of imperatives and how to form each type - hopefully the practice today helped; know the difference in tone with imperatives between aspects; know your conjugations.

See you all on Thursday, then we're just one week away from break!

Homework for B-Day Students: December 7, 2015

AP English III

Your homework is to work on your rough drafts (due this Friday) and prepare for your Huck Finn unit test (next Tuesday). You can access a PDF of your study guide here. If that link does not work for you, e-mail me and I will send it to you as an attachment.

Remember, you must have a rough draft printed for class Friday!! Plan ahead for this.

English II
Your homework is to continue working on your drafts of your movie reviews and prepare for your quiz on vocabulary and image analysis. Your quiz is Wednesday, and rough drafts of your movie review are due Friday.

Homework for the Weekend - A Day Students - 4 December

Russian II/III

You have writing assignments to complete this weekend.  For the level threes it's your dialogues - remember to have all five modal expressions as well as different forms of imperatives.  I'll collect these from you on Tuesday for a completion grade and to give you feedback on your writing.  For the level twos it's your aspect situations.  Remember that all I need is the writing; don't worry about the images as we'll do those later on.  The writing is the more important part.

Also, don't forget to translate the chorus of our song!  Focus on aspect and the tone created through the use of aspect.

Russian I

You should be able to finish page one and two of our review packet now - make sure that these are done for Tuesday's class so that we can finish with page three.  Also, we went through the family writing - make sure that this is complete for all of your family members.  You're writing about four people and yourself.  We're building these paragraphs each time we learn a case, so it's important to hang on to all your drafts.

Make sure that you're ready for the quiz on Thursday - it'll cover chapter one vocabulary and our three cases - nominative, accusative, prepositional.

English II

On Tuesday you'll have your quiz on Persepolis and vocabulary.  Study your reading guides and the vocabulary words that we've reviewed in class.  Today we finished watching the film and began writing our movie reviews - these drafts are due on Thursday.  Remember that it's a four paragraph assignment.  Follow the outline I gave you in class and use your viewing guide to help you with the writing of the assignment.  If you need help, please come and see me.

Homework for B-Day students- Thursday, December 3

AP English III

Your homework is to read the essay by Toni Morrison. As you read, answer the questions:

1. What is her opinion of Huck Finn and why?
2. Do you agree with her opinion? Why or why not? (Use textual evidence.)

The text at the top of the page that got cut off is as follows:

1. "Then, in the mid-fiftes, I read it again--or sort of read it. Actually I..."
2. "...some,' tolls like an evening bell; the moments when nothing is said,"

Other upcoming work due and assessments:

• Rough drafts due Friday, December 11th.
• Huck Finn test on Tuesday, December, 15th.

Students with pre-excused absences, I will create a new blog post for you next week with links to all the PDFs and materials you need to get caught up. 

English II

You have no homework for next class unless you are missing work on your progress reports. There will be a quiz on Persepolis next Wednesday, covering image analysis and vocabulary. There will be a quiz on apostrophes and grammar on Tuesday, December 15. 

For those of you missing the paragraph, here is the prompt:

How was your childhood similar and different from Marji's childhood? Write a well-developed paragraph (with topic sentence, evidence, explanation, and conclusion) comparing and contrasting your childhood with Marji's. Include examples from your life and the text. Be sure to include one example of something you have in common and of something different between you.

Homework for A Day Classes - 2 December 2015

English II

Today we finished reading Persepolis.  Next class we'll finish the movie.  Since we're done with the book there are a few important dates coming up for you all:

• December 8th - Tuesday - Quiz on Persepolis (second half) and vocabulary
• December 14th - Monday - Quiz on Grammar (apostrophes and other common mistakes)

Some of you are still missing your projects and other work.  Make sure that these are turned in sooner, not later so that you can get as many points as possible.  If work is still missing on Friday, we will convert those to zeroes for your progress reports.

Russian II/III

All of you should be working on your writing assignments tonight in advance of our workshop day on Friday.  Friday's class will be spent writing, reviewing, and working so that we can meet our first deadlines for our writing assignments.  Additionally, we will spend some time looking at a few related grammar topics and perhaps singing!  Please make sure that you have done the planning work you need to do so that you can be productive on Friday.

Russian I

You need to complete all of the exercises on page one of our packet.  We will move on to the other pages of the packet on Friday, but make sure page one is done.

Tuesday, December 1: Homework for B-Day Students

AP English III
You have no homework due next class, but you need to be working on your rough drafts. These are due Friday, December 11th. As a reminder, these rough drafts must:

• Be 5-7 pages in length (not including a works cited page, which is unnecessary for this draft).
• Be typed and double-spaced.
• Be printed out by class time when they are due.
• Include an introduction, conclusion, all body paragraphs, and a title.
• Include citations for quotes.

3B only- please remember to turn in your Duke MAT permission forms to Ms. Ginocchio. This is a 5-point completion grade. 

English II

You have no new assignments due next class, but many of you have late work that is due this week before progress reports. Please check Powerschool to make sure you don't have anything missing. These will be converted to zeroes at the end of this week. Assignments that you need to complete are:

• Personal narrative graphic project
• Paragraphs comparing and contrasting your life with Marji's (homework from late October).
• Persepolis Test
• Persepolis Test corrections (optional, but highly recommended).
• Duke MAT program permission form (applies to 4B only).