Friday, September 30, 2016

Homework for the Weekend - B Day - 30 September 2016

L'shana tova!  Happy New Year!  

AP English III

Over the weekend you should be working on two things:  First, you need to read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, chapters one through six.  As you read, annotate.  Remember to add to your covers and investigate elements of humor and satire as well as repeated ideas.  Continue to focus on characters - their development and their conflicts.  Considering our discussion today around language and identity could also be helpful.

Second, we have your final drafts to begin developing.  Use the rubric you received today as well as the feedback from your conference to revise.  If you need/would like me or Ms. McCormick to look at your paper, let us know.  Come in for a conference before Wednesday afternoon.  Once Wednesday gets here we won't be talking about these papers with you.  Your final draft and the supporting documents will be collected on Thursday.

English II

Make sure that you are to page fifty-five in The Boy Who Dared for Tuesday's class.  We'll be getting back to Helmuth.  Hopefully our discussion on Dr. King over the last few classes gives you a lot to think about to connect these two men and times in history.

Thursday, September 29, 2016

Homework for A Day Students - 29 September 2016

Russian II, III, and IV

This weekend you should all spend time reviewing your new grammar that we have been learning over the past few days and familiarizing yourself with your cases.  We'll continue to review next week.  Additionally, you should be spending time preparing yourself for your resubmission of your one stem verb quizzes next week.

Russian I

Over the weekend continue to work on your vocabulary and your dialogues.  Practice reading aloud and speaking with proper stress.  You and your team can create a Google Doc and share it between yourselves to finish your scripts if you need to.

Remember that you also have written homework to do - on the back of the dialogues we studied you should write more of your own, filling in the blanks.  Do the work on your own paper.  Use your handwriting.  Remember to explain how the one dialogue would be different if you were speaking to a different person.

English II

If you have any missing assignments that didn't get in today you need to turn those in as soon as possible - we only have a few weeks left in the first quarter.  Also, we will be getting back to The Boy Who Dared next week.  Make sure that you have read through to page fifty-five and that you have completed your reading guide for the first part of the book.

Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Homework for B-Day Students: 28 September

AP English III

We've started with our unit on The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  Your first reading deadline for the book will be on Tuesday when you will be expected to read to the end of chapter six.  Make sure that you are thoroughly annotating and adding to your cover annotations as well as collecting vocabulary.

Tonight you should complete the drafting of your rough draft for our workshop on Friday and read Amy Tan's "Mother Tongue".  The essay by Tan is available at this link or in 50 Essays.  As you read, think about language and vernacular and how that is used to characterize a person in the view of society.  You can also collect vocabulary.

English II

Now that you have your progress reports you can move forward to complete any missing assignments that you may have.  Additionally, keep thinking about the reading from Dr. King that we completed in class today.  What do you think that Dr. King would say to Helmuth about breaking the law?

Tuesday, September 27, 2016

Homework for A Day Classes - 27 September 2016

Russian II

Tonight for homework I want you working with the new knowledge around ходить/быть/гулять and our review of cases.  Write five situations in Russian using one of these verbs.  Write a full sentence using the verb and the proper case.  Then, write a sentence which is synonymous with a new verb.  You will have to change cases most likely.  Total, you'll be turning in ten sentences.

Russian III

Tonight you are focusing on dates and times in your life.  First, think about five significant dates in your life and write them out in Russian.  Only use words, no numbers.  Follow the rules in your textbook for cases to use with this.  Then, from these dates, make them more simple and tell me only about a year or month on which the event occurred.

After that, tell me about three moments of your daily routine.  Write the times both in standard format (hour/minute) and then in the Russian way.

Russian IV

Tonight you should finish the exercises on verbal adverbs and study the information in your textbook on verbal adverbs and participles (they are related concepts).  Be able to understand how they are used and the meaning that they carry.  These show up rarely in Russian, but they are good to know.

Russian II-IV:  We will resubmit on the verb quiz next week - use this time to study and review and to ask me for help.

Russian I:

Tonight you should be spending time with your greetings and introductions vocabulary to prepare for our dialogue day next class.  Additionally, you may find it helpful to view this video about the Russian alphabet and the sounds of the alphabet.


Use the video here to help you review.  Remember that you have to find the space for yourself to review and work with the language in order to get stronger.

English II:

Tonight you should take the time to finish any of your missing assignments that you didn't finish during the in-class workshop.  Additionally, we have a question to consider.  From our reading today of Dr. King's "Letter from a Birmingham City Jail" what do you think that King would say to Helmuth about his internal conflict?  Why do you think that King would say that?

Monday, September 26, 2016

Homework for B-Day Students - 26 September 2016

English II

No official homework for tonight - however if you did not finish the rewrite of your paragraph then you should finish that tonight for Wednesday.  We'll be having a workshop on Wednesday to go over missing assignments and give you a chance to finish them in class.  We will also be going on to work on some reading next class related to our main idea on conformity and breaking laws.

AP English III

This week we have a large assignment due for us at the end of the week.  This Friday we will be working on our rough drafts from our outlines.  You will all need to bring a hard copy of your rough draft to class for workshopping.  On Friday you'll get your final draft rubric and cover sheet which will help you get everything together for the final draft.  Remember that as a minimum you should have a full introduction paragraph with argument as well as a completely developed topic (you understand that this is more than just one paragraph, I hope).

For Wednesday we will have the beginning of our work on The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  We will need to have books in class on Wednesday.  Bring them.  If you need to check one out, we will have some.

Thursday, September 22, 2016

B Day Homework - Weekend Edition - 22 September

English II

Another great day.  I appreciated the chance to conference with you all today about your writing and your progress so far in class.  Over the weekend you should be working on the rewrite of your paragraphs based on what we went over together during the conference.  Use the example paragraph to help you out.

You'll turn in the revised paragraph and the old one on Monday to us and get a new grade on it before your progress reports.

You should also be reading in The Boy Who Dared.  Getting to page fifty-five by Wednesday is our reading goal.

AP English III

I hope that you all appreciated the time and effort that went in to getting your outlines back to you so quickly.  Also, we're hoping that today's class focused on writing and developing paragraphs (both body and introduction) was good for you as we move on to our rough drafts.  A few reminders to take you into the weekend:

  1. Your rough drafts will be checked on Friday and we will have a workshop.  Keep working in your Google Doc and let us know if you need our help with something as you are working.  This is the joy of working in Google Docs.
  2. We'll be starting our study of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn on Wednesday.  You should bring your copy to class with you then.  If you do not purchase your own copy you can check one out from me, but you will need post-it notes or some other means to annotate
  3. Monday will be our Quest on Didion, Erickson, Capote, and Welty.  We will have one question on each of the minor pieces and then two questions on In Cold Blood.  You should be able to explain author's purpose, the use of the rhetorical triangle and the three classical appeals in order to be successful on this assessment.  One of the In Cold Blood questions is open book, so bring your copies of the text.  This will also be your final chance to resubmit annotations for In Cold Blood.
That will do it from me.  I hope you all enjoy your weekend.

Wednesday, September 21, 2016

A Day Homework - 21 September 2016

English II

We will have some time to finish up our vocabulary study on Monday.  For tonight, you should all focus on the rewrite of your paragraphs.  Take what comments I gave you and what I discussed with you during the conference to rewrite and resubmit your paragraph for a new grade.  Remember to use the statements, our class activity, and our example paragraph to help you with your rewrite.  You'll turn these in on Friday and get new grades before progress reports.

Russian I

Today we had our quiz on the alphabet.  If you need to resubmit or redo a part of it, start studying and reviewing now so that you can resubmit next week.  Keep reading and working on your vocabulary!  Next class we'll be watching a film.

Russian II - IV

You should be continuing to work on your Global Simulation character and developing him or her.  Don't forget that you will be working with new vocabulary next class and watching a Russian television show to develop your listening skills.  If you need to keep working on verbs and stems, keep up that work and see me next week to resubmit your quiz.

Tuesday, September 20, 2016

B-Day Homework: 20 September 2016

English II

Wonderful job today everyone!  Great writing!  Great thinking!  Great discussing!  Keep it going.  Tonight you should start reading in The Boy Who Dared to page fifty-five.  We will begin working on the book more next week.  This reading will be due on Wednesday.

AP English III

If you did not submit your resubmission of your outline today, please get that in ASAP so that we can get you your feedback.  On Thursday, we will begin working on rough drafts and developing introduction paragraphs.  On Monday, you will have your assessment on In Cold Blood as well as the pieces by Didion, Welty, and Erickson.  You'll want to bring your copy of In Cold Blood if you need your annotations checked or re-checked.

This assessment is going to focus on the rhetorical triangle and the rhetorical appeals (ethos, logos, pathos) with each of the texts we have studied in this introductory unit.  We will discuss more on Thursday to prepare you.

Lastly, we'll be starting Huck Finn next week - you may want to get yourself a copy sooner rather than later.

Monday, September 19, 2016

Homework for A-Day Students: 19 September 2016

English II

Next class we'll be reading a bit of Dr. Martin Luther King, Junior's "Letter from a Birmingham City Jail" - that way we can see what he thinks about breaking the law to do the right thing.  Tonight you should keep reading The Boy Who Dared.  We want you to be to the end of page fifty-five by next week.

Russian I

Next class we'll be having our quiz on the alphabet and your first vocabulary list.  You should be able to recognize and produce all of the letters of the Russian alphabet.  You should also feel comfortable with the classroom/school vocabulary and the phrases around greetings and introductions.

Also, don't forget to finish submitting your work on Google classroom.  I'll be checking everything again tomorrow morning.

Advanced Russian

You also have a quiz next class on verbs and their stems.  Remember today's warm-up as you study and prepare.  From an infinitive and conjugation you should be able to determine a stem.  We'll focus on this next class and then hopefully have time to keep working on our characters.

Don't forget to submit your work on Google classroom before midnight tonight.  That is when the assignments will close.

Friday, September 16, 2016

B-Day Homework - Weekend Edition - 16 September 2016

English II

No official homework this weekend, but do spend time thinking about our final question today related to breaking the law in order to do the right thing.  Do you know anyone who has done this?  Maybe in your social life or in history?  Why would someone do this?  Will we see Helmuth do this later?  Think and ask - and remember to keep reviewing the work we do in class every day!

AP English III

Every one should be submitting a new outline on Tuesday to me and Ms. McCormick that shows how you are already progressing as a writer.  Make sure to take our commentary into account as you are making your changes.  Many of you had great ideas and great evidence, you were just presenting it in a way that didn't go far enough or didn't connect clearly to a main idea.

If you need help, please see one of us on Monday.  Everyone should have something new to turn in on Tuesday - if you need additional time, that works, but make sure that you have something new so that we know you are working forward in good faith.

Also, we will soon be starting our study of The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - you may want to get your copy now to give time for shipping.  You can get any edition of the text you would like, but make sure that it is unabridged and complete.

Thursday, September 15, 2016

Homework for 15 September - A Day

English II

Keep thinking this weekend about our final question - Is it ever okay to break the law?  Think about examples of people in your life or in history who have done this.  Why are they doing it?  Were they successful in getting what they wanted?

Russian I

I hope that you all enjoyed the game today with Russian celebrities and greetings.  Keep practicing your new vocabulary - the goal would be for you to learn it this weekend.

If you finished your name poster then you have no real homework for the weekend other than to keep practicing your reading and writing of Russian.  If you have not turned in your name poster, then you would need to finish that to turn in on Monday.

Your quiz on the alphabet and handwriting will be on Wednesday.

Advanced Russian

Over the weekend practice with the various verbs and stems that you have been learning in advance of our quiz on WEDNESDAY of next week.  The quiz will cover transcription, verb conjugation in past and present tense as well as stem knowledge.  You should be using the level specific stems to guide your practice.  If I were to give you a verb with that stem or a conjugation of that verb you should be able to determine what to do with that verb.

Additionally, remember your new vocabulary lists.  Work with these regularly to learn your new words.

Wednesday, September 14, 2016

Homework for B-Day Students: 14 September 2016

English II

Tonight we have our next section of reading to complete.  Please read pages twenty-seven through to forty-one in The Boy Who Dared.  As you're reading, you may find it helpful to take notes about how Germany is changing as Hitler comes to power.  What is happening on the streets?  What is happening to Helmuth and his family?

Continue your reading!

AP English III

Today we have started the long and arduous process of developing our writing into college-ready writing.  Take all that you were taught today about arguments, topics, evidence, and explanation and apply it to your summer assignments.  Resubmissions of outlines will be collected on Tuesday.  You'll want to either retype and resubmit with the original, or mark changes on the original.  Make sure that your updates are clear to me and Ms. McCormick.  This will be our final step before we move on to developing these outlines into drafts.

Also, for Friday we have our vocabulary slides due (Google Classroom) and our reading of Welty (see the post below).  Make sure that you are ready for this.  If you need additional help revising your outline, please let me or Ms. McCormick know.

Tuesday, September 13, 2016

Homework for A-Day: 13 September 2016

English II

Given what Ms. McCormick and I saw today about reading outside of class, I think that we're going to follow through on Thursday about making sure that everyone has read.  Tonight you need to read from page twenty-seven to forty-one.  You'll want to pay attention to how things are changing for Helmuth and for Germany as a whole.  Take notes as you read - write things down as you notice these changes.

Remember to keep drawing what you say about the characters and events by tying your ideas back to what the book actually says.

Russian I

On Thursday I'll be handing back your handwriting packets and we'll spend some time looking at a few places where we need some improvement (hooked letters are a bother).  Don't forget that we'll have our first quiz on Monday which will cover the sounds of the alphabet and handwriting.

Tonight, you should keep practicing your reading and writing with our new vocabulary words.  You have words which are useful for names and around school as well as phrases.  Write each one at least once on your handout or in your notes (or both).  Mark stresses.  Read.  Use the words with your family and friends.  Add a Russian keyboard on your phones!  Listen to Russian music on Spotify and read the titles.  Use the Russian you're learning.

Advanced Russian

We started moving on to the new topics to cover in this unit (reviewing our last unit for Russian III and IV) and getting our new vocabulary together.  Tonight, we've got a few things to do with our vocabulary and with the new grammar.

Russian IV - Read the passages and hunt for participles.  Use the ending chart to organize them by types.  Work backwards.  What are the verbs?  What are the который phrases?  What do these things mean?  Where are cases?  Also, start reading Толстой - check out the first few pages.

Russian III - Complete the exercises on reflexive pronouns.  Remember to write out the sentences to practice fully with the grammar.  Translate and understand what is being said.  What cases are being used?  You may find it helpful to diagram the sentences and find the subject when using reflexive pronouns.

Russian II - Complete the verb work we started looking at today if you did not finish it already.  Also the exercise B which we nearly finished reviewing today.

All Classes II-IV - With your new vocabulary you will see verbs and their stems identified.  Hopefully now you are able to fully make sense of what the glossary is telling you.  Work with four new verbs, try to work with four different stems.  Do what we have been doing with our examples - What's the stem?  What are the endings?  How do mutations come into effect, if at all?  What is the meaning of the verb?  What are some cases we use with this?

Monday, September 12, 2016

Homework for 12 September - B Day

English II

Tonight for homework you have the next section of our book The Boy Who Dared to read.  You'll be reading from where we stopped on page fifteen on to page twenty-seven.  As you read, take note of the reading guide and complete it.  You have work to do on the characters and then assessing the positives and negatives of Hitler's leadership in Germany.

Remember that if we have a quiz on our reading, you'll be able to use the reading guide.

AP English III

You have nothing due next class.  Everything in this post is due for Friday's class.  First, please finish the work that we began today in Google Classroom - upload the rest of your word slides and have them finalized for Friday.  Remember to use your resources - www.dictionary.com and www.etymonline.com.  You should consider yourself a bit of an expert on these words by then.  Additionally, please read and annotate Eudora Welty's "Listening".  You can find it in 50 Essays or at this link.

Next class we will begin the process of revising our essay outlines for new grades.  Be ready for some heavy lifting!


Friday, September 9, 2016

Homework for the Weekend - 9 September - A Day

Russian II-IV

First things first we will have our first assessment on transcription and verb stems on Monday, September 19.  Make sure that you are preparing for this assessment.  To help you prepare and finish your learning on this concept, we have our homework this weekend.  Only complete parts A and B in the instructions.  We will continue to work on these verbs next week.  Remember that you have to complete the verbs for your level and below you.  My recommendation is to do each verb on a card, that way you have a study card for each type of verb stem.  Use your overview sheet to help you complete this.

Also, continue working on your Global Simulation work in Google Classroom.  Try to have that submitted if you can, if not, we'll have a chance to finish it in the computer lab soon.

Russian I

We also have Global Simulation work to try and finish if possible - you should be deciding on your Russian name as well as settling the debate between Moscow and St. Petersburg.  These assignments are in Google Classroom.  Beyond this, you should spend your weekend finishing your handwriting packet and practicing your reading of cognates and sounds.

I will be collecting your handwriting on Tuesday for a grade.

English II

Today we started reading our novel, The Boy Who Dared - we completed the first fifteen pages and discussed the main character (protagonist) and his family.  Over the weekend, read pages fifteen through twenty-seven and complete your reading guide as you do this.  Remember that if we have a quiz in class for our warm-up, it will cover these pages.  You may use your reading guide on the quiz if we have it.

Wednesday, September 7, 2016

Homework for A Day Students - 7 September 2016

Russian II-IV

As we are getting more comfortable with the different stems, I want you to continue to practice with them to learn this system.  Today we went over the (N/S -a) and (-a) stems.  Use your glossary to find a verb of each type and take it through its conjugations.  Work with these and learn them.

Don't forget you have a quiz coming next week.

Russian I

Tonight you will basically finish the whole handwriting packet with the exception of the word searches and the other exercises I told you to skip.  You should finish writing all of the letters of the Russian alphabet.

English II

Today as we worked in the computer lab, Ms. McCormick and I saw a lot of good things going on.  I'm glad you were all able to get logged in to our Google Classroom.  Please make sure that you have finished the front side of the worksheet/planning.  We'll be returning to the computer lab next week to keep working on these writing assignments.

Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Homework for B-Day Students: 6 September 2016

AP English III

Tonight you have a few things to complete to prepare for our next class meeting.  First, please read and annotate Stephanie Erickson's "The Ways We Lie".  It is available in the first edition of 50 Essays or at this link.  As you read, pay attention to the way that Erickson sections her piece and the way that she uses definitions in her article.  You may also want to consider how this piece relates to Didion and Capote, especially as regards their idea of truth and lies.

Following that, make sure that you have reviewed Section III of In Cold Blood as well as the vocabulary for that section on your sheet.  We'll be working on the vocabulary in earnest next class in the computer lab.

English II

Tonight for homework we have some writing to do and some planning to do.  Please follow the instructions on your assignment sheet to review the prompt and to then complete the planning on the front.  You should then use the back of the sheet to draft your response.  This will allow me and Ms. McCormick to understand where you're starting as a writer this year.

Friday, September 2, 2016

Homework for the Weekend - 2 September - A Day

Russian II-IV

This weekend I want you all to keep working with your verb knowledge.  Now you know (or have reviewed) the present and past tense endings for the conjugation patterns as well as knowing how the stems relate to the conjugation patterns - it's time to put all of this together.  Take the five verbs that you have been working on and conjugate them for present and past tense.  As you conjugate - do the conjugations in ST before going to Russian.  Show how the stem combines with the ending, show what process happens, and then show what this means in Russian letters.  It's my hope that things are starting to make sense to you with all of this.

Be prepared for a transcription quiz soon.

Russian I

We've now learned our three groups of letters - the friends, the false friends, and the Greeks - we only have one group left to finish the whole alphabet.  This weekend, work on your handwriting packets.  You should complete everything up through exercise thirteen on page six.  Feel free to work ahead if you would like.  I'll collect this when we finish learning our letters for a homework check.

English II

This weekend you have some writing to do for us.  Read the prompt on conformity carefully and go through the tasks on the front of the sheet.  Work through those tasks and complete them on the sheet.  They'll help you to put the paragraph together on the back.  Do your best with this writing - we'll spend time working on it to revise it and make it stronger.

Thursday, September 1, 2016

Homework for B-Day Students: 1 September 2016

Happy birthday to my Oma!  I'm calling her right after I finish writing this.  Here are your reminders for the long weekend in which we celebrate the Labor movement (go workers!) and my birthday!

English II

There's nothing for you to complete this weekend - if you were newly added to class, please complete your forms.  If you are interested in learning more about the Holocaust and other genocides around the world, the US Holocaust Memorial and Museum has some really great resources.  See their website at https://www.ushmm.org/learn.

On Tuesday we'll start watching our film and work more with new vocabulary.

AP English III

This weekend we're going to continue reviewing Capote's text and do some close study of new vocabulary from the text.  On Tuesday, we'll be discussing Section II of the text - "Persons Unknown" as well as getting to Didion.  To prepare, review your annotations and maybe reannotate some passages based on our very wonderful discussions today.

Also, you have your vocabulary for the book to begin to study.  As you look over the list, follow the instructions on the bottom to work through this assignment.  Find the context, decide the meaning, investigate the structure isolate any known word parts (including prefixes, roots, and suffixes - morphemes of all types).  I highly suggest working in that order.  We'll start to investigate them as a class on Tuesday and work with some very productive ones from the list.