20 December - Happy Break!

English 11

Great last day today, everyone! Thank you for your reflections on the year, advice to me about 2025, and your goals. I'm excited for what we have ahead of us next year. For today we went into our notebooks for reflection, then we did some book shopping to prepare for next year. If you weren't here for class, please make sure that you complete the book shopping form. I've also posted the recordings for the pitches on the books, if you'd like to listen.

We did some watching and reading and thinking today. It was a great day! I'm excited to see y'all in the new year. 

18 December - Wacky Wednesday!

English 11

Y'all gave me so many gifts today and that is records of your work and your thinking. Thank you for being so productive during our testing day. If you were absent, you'll want to schedule a Lion Time pass to take your reading test AFTER Winter Break. 

If you have missing major work, try to get that in. Let's make a plan for Lion Time when we return, if necessary. You can complete the vocabulary on your own, but please plan to work with me to do the letter. I'll be updating grades throughout the next few days, and I hope to have them finalized by the time we go out on Friday.

On Friday we'll do some book shopping to prepare for the next unit. If you'll be absent, please complete the Google Form, so I can make some recommendations for you. As always, reach out with any questions or concerns.

16 December - A Manic Monday!

English 11

Pretty good day today to start the week. We were focused on reading and reviewing for our test that we have next class. We focused on elements of reading non-fiction and key skills to demonstrate next class. It's most important that you remember the rhetorical situation: purpose, context, audience, writer, and message. Be sure that you read the text efficiently to identify these elements. Once you have the message, it's easy to see the evidence that is used to support that message. Also keep in mind the way in which these elements work together to support each other. One can help you find the other.

We also played Jeopardy today! You're all winners in my book, so we got some small prizes for participation. I've posted the Jeopardy slides if you want to review them again to help you study. Remember that the best way to study is to read, so it might be a good idea to read a bit more or review one of your research sources as you prepare for next class.

At the very end, we took some time to finish up our main work. The most important items are the letter, research write-up, and vocabulary project. Be sure that you're focused on these. Check your Gradebook in Schoology to keep up with what you have turned in and what's been scored. I'll be updating through the week. You'll have all class next time for the test, so you might have time to finish up tasks in class. Please make an LT pass for Wednesday if you need additional help. I'm also after school on Thursday.

12 December - Writing Day!

English 11

Great day today everyone! I'm so proud of all of you and excited to read what you wrote for me today. The goal of today's class was to complete our Research Write-Up OR the Summative Writing Assignment. I'm so glad to see that I have a good amount of work to grade. I'm planning to score on Sunday. If you have other items to submit like your Vocabulary Project/Test or your formatives (like your outline) try to get those in as soon as possible so that I can update your grades.

Next class we'll be doing a review activity for our reading test and then the test is going to occur on Wednesday. For this test you'll be reading and responding to questions to demonstrate your reading comprehension and interpretation skills.

If you need additional help, please make a LT appointment for Monday or Wednesday. I'm after school on Thursday for additional help. The goal is to complete all of our Unit 2 work before we go out on break so that we can do revisions and resubmissions after. 

6 December - Friday Feels

English 11

Solid end of the week in English 11; the only bad thing was that we were missing so many of you. I hope that all of you are doing well. Today we engaged in our final reading for Unit 2 and looked at Brent Staples and Langston Hughes. We chose our adventure for reading and then dove in. We explored ideas like racism and segregation and the way in which each author used personal experience to convey their argument on the topic. We also looked at some art that engaged in similar ideas. The end of class brought out a fantastic synthesizing conversation. See the recording for all of this.

We didn't quite have the time I wanted for the end of class, so I extended your Research Write-Up to Tuesday. Tuesday will be the last day to collect evidence for your letter. We're writing on Thursday. Complete and submit the Write-Up so that you're as prepared as possible. I'll be grading and providing feedback throughout the next few days. Enjoy your weekend and your time with the substitute on Tuesday. Make it a productive day! 

4 December - Wacky Wednesday

English 11

What a fantastic day today, everyone! You all were so productive during your catch-up day. I've got plenty of assignments to grade, and I'll get through them tomorrow and Friday morning. Everything in SiS will be updated before progress reports are sent out on Friday afternoon. There's no recording today because the slides really do a good job of covering what we did in class.

If you are still completing your reading (the documentary study) or writing (the outline) formative grades, be sure to turn those in as soon as you can. Remember to use the resources posted to help you with your outlining and writing. My goal in giving you those sentence frames is to make the writing a bit faster and easier for you.

On Friday we'll be focused on finishing our Research Write-Ups and discussing our sources. We'll also do a bit of reading on Friday to start to wrap up this unit of study on The Harlem Renaissance. On Tuesday of next week, I'll be out. You'll have your vocabulary assignment to complete. I posted the video with the assignment to help with it. We have a lot of major grades coming up! Thursday we'll be writing our letters and the week after we'll take our unit reading examination. You'll have more than enough time when we come back from Winter Break for revising or retesting.

2 December - Welcome Back!

English 11

Great day today in English 11 as we got back together to do some of the great work that we do. We started our day by listening to some jazz and understanding the power of Bessie Smith's lyrics and language. I loved the ideas that you all brought out connected to isolation and the change of fortunes. We then got into our work focused on James Baldwin and his article "Notes of a Native Son". We discussed the difference in genre from a letter to an essay and how that would lead to differences in Baldwin's approach to the text. We read together and studied in order to understand the text and Baldwin's arguments to Americans about racism and its effects.

When we came back from lunch, we were focused on individual tasks. The main focus right now is the Research Write-Up. You'll need to be focused this week on finalizing your research question, argument, and the evidence for your letter. We'll be writing next week on Thursday. You'll submit the Research Write-Up when it's finished, and I'll provide feedback. The goal is that we will finish all major grades before winter break and transition to a new unit when we return. It's time to lock in for a strong finish to the year!