Thanksgiving Break

Amazingly enough we have made it to the Thanksgiving break.  My classes have been busy and probably are welcoming a few days to rest their minds.

Seniors have finished their term papers and have turned them over to me for assessment. We have had several power points this week.

10th graders have been reading about John Steinbeck and the novel Of Mice and Men.

8th grade have finished up their unit on The Diary of Anne Frank and this week we contemplated the matter of who came out of the door--the lady or the tiger?  Students wrote an analysis of the ending of the story and what they thought the character of the princess would signal to her lover the courtier.

One Act Play is getting off the ground.  We are proud to present a fantastic play first performed at the Minneapolis Children's Theater --Little Women--an adaptation of the Louisa May Alcott novel.  Now our work lies ahead of us over the next few weeks.

Quarter will be ending before long-- even though the end of the quarter is January 6 and that seems like a long time from now, the truth is that we only have 20 contact days left this quarter. We have a lot to accomplish in the coming weeks.

The home stretch

Wow! I have noticed that time is flying by! Homecoming  is done, Pumpkin Fest is histoey and the next one in the record books is the first quarter.

We have exactly 10  class days left in the quarter, which ends on October 25.

Sophomores are finishing speeches, 8th grade are reading Touching Spirit Bear and are finishing the Part of Speech, while the seniors have finished Hamlet and now will be busy preparing their knowledge base for the research paper which will be starting in quarter 2.

Enjoy the last days of fall!

Thursday September 15

Wow!! It was a busy four days this week!! If you stopped by the class, you may have heard a flutes, Hamlet being acted out, and lots of fun sound effects for a radio play.

10th graders are finishing up there demonstration speeches, but we didn't quite get them all finished.  We have three that will carry over to Monday. I saw some fun speeches on saddling a horse, cleaning fish, making cookies, and even a few athletic endeavors.

8th grade read the radio play "The Hitchhiker".  We were lucky enough to make lots of sound effects for the play.  From trains, cars, slamming doors to running feet and slapping... and even a few cows mooing. Radio plays are always fun because they make the sound effects are a treat to make to have the play come alive.

"The serpent who stung your father, now wears his crown."  Oh, that evil Claudius!! This week we began reading Hamlet.  The amazing story of the Danish prince and his struggle with the matter of life and death is always an intriguing unit. Next week we should progress to the poing of learning about the famous soliloquy beginning with "To be, or not to be...."

Friday September 9

Another hectic week is under our belts. This week things seemed to go backwards as well as forwards but we worked out a lot of bugs.

Seniors began taking assessments in Blackboard Learn. While some areas went completely smoothly, others had a few technical glitches.  I feel much more confident that next time these glitches will not be a problem, but we will keep working on it if it does come up.

10th grade shared their personal experience speeches.  I learned some interesting details about the students both through the Ten Items About Me Speech and the Personal Experience Speech. It is fun to get to know the students better.

8th grade continued to review pronouns.  Parents please remember to review the parts of speech with your child so they are not forgotten as we move forward. This week we worked on adjectives.  Next week we will be reviewing Nouns, Pronouns, and Adjectives. Then we will move on to Verbs. We had the thrilling opportunity to read one of Edgar Allan Poe's stories "The Tell-Tale Heart" and I have to say we kind of liked the creepinesss of this story. Next week we will be reading the Radio Play "The Hitchiker" and the poem "Paul Revere's Ride".  Then there will probably be a test on Friday if we are able to stay on schedule.

See you next week for a Monday through Thursday week.  Make sure that you are coming in on Fridays for extra help.

Monday September

I hope everyone had a great Labor Day weekend. Back to work tomorrow.  Seniors are finishing up Beowulf and beginning Hamlet this week. Sophomores have Personal Experience Speeches this week.  8th graders are working on pronouns and the first unit in the literature book.

August 23

What a whirlwind!! We have had a great couple days of class. It has been quite warm in class this week, but it's not too bad until the afternoon.

10th grade speech class has completed their first speech this week. They introduced a classmate to the group.  It is always a relief to get the first speech done.  Now off to the ones that will be graded a little more specifically.  Next Monday and Tuesday, students will be performing their 10 Items About Me Speeches! Be ready to go!

8th grade

So far we have done some pre-testing for the parts of speech in the hopes that we can see where their strngths and weaknesses are. Today we began working on nouns and compound nouns.

Seniors are off and running on resumes and their first writing assignment "A Personal Reflection".  Tomorrow we begin Beowulf.