Hello Class!
We had a great, fast paced class today where students were engaged and learning well. I love working with this group!
For our QuickWrite today students watched a short video by Canadian psychologist, author, and media commentator Jordan Peterson. After watching, they responded to whether they agree with Peterson’s claim that:
Writing is Thinking
We discussed whether they agreed or disagreed and I hope they were inspired to take more ownership of their writing–to learn to be articulate and deadly as Mr. Peterson asserts!
For today’s Grammar discussion, we segued away from the verbal phrases we’ve been learning about and are doing a little detour to discuss active and passive voice. We talked about the fact that our writing is almost always improved when we use active voice. It’s more clear, exciting and concise. However, there are times when we need to use passive voice: when the force of the action/actor is unclear, and when you intentionally choose to be vague. A good example is when you want to avoid referring to yourself (using I, me, we pronouns) in academic writing.
In some quick examples, students identified how to tell which voice is being used, and wrote sentences using the two voices. They were given two homework sheets as homework and got a good start on these during class today.
Next, we had the culminating exam on Peace Like A River to finish out our novel unit. After they completed that, we briefly discussed the Literature Presentations which will be due the last two weeks of class. The schedule of presentations is posted below.
With the remaining class time was devoted to Writing–and our last “essay” of the semester was introduced. It’s actually not an essay, but rather it’s a persuasive writing project. Since the assignment varies from our usual writing deadline structure, here’s an overview of the timeline:
First, they will learn about persuasive techniques and common rhetorical devices. Next, they will use that knowledge to analyze a TV commercial for homework this week. After that, students will use what they have learned about the power of persuasion and write a script for, and produce an advertisement of their own. This will be due the last week of class.
For homework this week, they are to read and watch two presentations: a Rhetorical Devices Edpuzzle and a Google Slideshow on Ethos, Logos and Pathos and take the Quiz. After that, they should write up an analysis and post it to our class forum.
Enjoy the next few warmer fall days!
Blessings,
Mrs. G
Homework
Ethos, Logos, Pathos Slide Show
Brief Advertisement Analysis–(instructions and an example on how to write your analysis)
Advertisement Analysis Forum Response
Links for This Week
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