18 April

English 10

I was very glad to be back with you all today. I'm still going through some challenges, but they're reaching some closure, and that helps with healing. Thank you for a really great class today. We began our reading of Persepolis by analyzing and reading Chapters One and Two. We'll study a few chapters every day of class. I was glad to see everyone reading and enjoying the story. The whole book is in two parts, but we're just reading Part One.

We focused today on characters and conflicts. We also dipped our toes into allusions since the book is filled with them - mostly history and culture from Iran. 

Be sure that you've completed the EdPuzzle on Iran. If you need a code, it's ficrova - I'll be checking EdPuzzle again and updating grades. Next week we'll have a grammar test, so be ready with some NoRedInk practice. See you Thursday for another round!

Homework for B-Day Students: 10/15/2015

English II

For homework over the weekend you have your four suras from The Koran to read and analyze. Remember that each sura teaches a lesson to the reader about how to live an upright life.  At the end of each one, write the rule for life as you understand it from the sura.  From each one, try to find two vocabulary words to add to your bookmarks.  If you can't define it, don't worry.  Just ask us in class.

Enjoy your study of The Koran!

Homework for A Day Students - 14 October 2015

English II

Tonight for homework you have five excerpts from The Koran to read and consider.  Remember that The Koran is the equivalent to The Bible or Torah - treat this text with some respect.  Read the excerpts that you have and at the end of each one try to get to the rule for life that this excerpt teaches.  You should be able to get four rules from the four surahs.  In addition, try to get eight vocabulary words from your reading - two from each surah is a good goal.

Russian I

For tonight you have to do some more work in your vocabulary lists for chapter one.  Tonight focus on the verbs.  Look at the verbs you have in chapter one and organize them by conjugation type using the rules that we learned today in class.  You should write out your words as it will help you to learn them better than just putting a number next to the word.

Russian II/III

Tonight for homework I want you to do some work in your exercises for Chapter Four.  Complete exercise G - make sure that you do the forms in both Russian and in standard transcription.  You can organize your work however you would like, but remember to focus on studying and learning your stems.  Hopefully today's warm up was helpful in going over some of these concepts.

Homework for B-Day Students: 13 October 2015

Sorry for the delay in posting this everyone; here are your reminders for our next class.

English II

Many of you were absent today, and I'll be checking on these absences tomorrow.  Everyone in class was able to complete the viewing guide for our film on Iran and its culture today, so there is no homework for you all to complete.  If you were absent, see me tomorrow to get the viewing guide.  I'll go ahead and post the video here so that you can watch it for yourselves or to watch it again for any of you who want to.

As you watch the video, focus on culture in Iran, important parts of the capital Tehran, and pay attention to any ideas about Iran which this video may challenge.

AP English III

Next class all of you have your test on Transcendentalism and Philosophy, so your key goal is to prepare yourselves for that.  Remember the ways that Ms. Ginocchio discussed today as to HOW to prepare for this type of examination.  You'll be asked specifically about our four key philosophical texts (King, DuBois, Emerson, Thoreau) as well as some overarching themes or ideas between all of them.  Review your notes and annotations as well as the text.  Include a look at your early notes on rhetoric as those are essential to this assessment as well.

You also have your first reading goal for The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn.  You need to be to the end of Chapter Six by Monday's class.  It's better to be ahead then a behind (get it...) so make sure to meet your goals and surpass them.  Continue using your vocabulary bookmarks with this text, you'll have cards due again soon!

Homework for A-Day Students: 12 October 2015

Happy Monday Everyone - Here's what you need to take care of for tonight.

Russian II/III

Spend some time looking over your quiz on Russian verbs and the One-Stem Verb System.  Many of you are making small mistakes in stem identification which then lead to major issues when it comes to the conjugation of the verbs - this led to bigger mistakes in your quizzes.  Make sure to study and review and to prepare yourself for a retest if you want to do that.

For your actual homework tonight, spend some time working with your vocabulary from our film.  You have several verbs in the new vocabulary as well as nouns and adjectives.  Work to create sentences which make predictions about the film and what will happen.  Make sure to review your stems with the verbs as that is our key grammar goal for this unit.  As a baseline, try to write about ten sentences.

Also, don't forget that we have a new song to learn:


Russian I

Two cities are left to present and we'll get to those on Wednesday.  For tonight's homework, spend time working on your vocabulary in Chapter One, especially the nouns.  Take time to look at the nouns and to identify/organize them by their gender.  Further, try to pair the nouns with possessive pronouns which match the gender of the word.  All of this studying will help to prepare you and refresh you for your retest opportunity.

Remember all Russian retests must be done by the end of this week!

English II

If you did not finish your viewing guide on Rick Steve's Iran then make sure that you finish up that work and show it to me next class for credit.  Everyone currently has a grade based on what I saw.  Also, several of you are still missing your project grades for our Russian literature unit and your quizzes on our Russian literature unit.  Those assignments need to be made up this week as we will be finishing the grading period next week!

Honors English II Homework - 11/18/2013

Honors English II

As you saw from our opening discussion on Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis you will need to have a good wealth of background knowledge on Iran and the events surrounding the narrator/author's life as she is heavily impacted by the drastic changes happening in her country, Iran.

In this online homework assignment, you will investigate at least one piece of non-fiction regarding this area of Iran's history, reflect on it, and then continue the conversation.

First - Read/Experience one of these online sources about Iran.  You may choose to explore any or all of them but you must select one for your comment/reflection.

Option I - An audio slideshow reflecting on the lessons of the 1979 Revolution.

Option II - A photo slideshow with informative captions of the important moments and people in the 1979 Revolution.

Option III - An NPR story/interview with an Iranian who remembers and discusses the 1979 Revolution.

Option IV - An article on the American Hostage crisis in Iran related to the 1979 Revolution.

Option V - A brief overview in text of the key players and events in the Revolution.

Second - Post a comment to this post in which you answer the following questions:

1. What is the author's purpose in writing this article.  Be specific and highlight a purpose linked explicitly to this article.
2. Explain what the author used in his/her writing/piece to alert you to the purpose.
3. What did this article help you to understand from the first excerpt of Persepolis?
4. Post a current event about Iran - there's a lot in the news right now - and explain how your current event continues the conversation with you and the topic of Iran.  What are you continuing to learn?  How are you fighting your preconceptions?

If you cannot post a comment, please do this assignment on paper and turn it in at the beginning of class on Wednesday.  Remember that you can complete this assignment from the school library.  Please sign your post with your name to receive credit.  Assignments are due at 9:00 am on Wednesday 11/20/2013.