Greetings!
We had a wonderful day today. I try to get most of the hard work of the class done before this last week so that we could have some fun on this final day.
Homework & Grades
Students handed in their final drafts of their Advertisement Projects and Advertisement Endnotes. I will grade those projects and any other homework that was handed in; my goal is to have final grades out soon. I mentioned to the class that I will take any homework submitted by December 17 at 11:59 p.m. If there are any questions, please contact me. Because I have final drafts and projects from all of the classes, I know that I won't have the work ready for final grades until after Christmas. Look for them some time after the New Year.
The Wrap-Up
We had few loose ends to tie up work-wise. They used their One-Pager assignments to drive a discussion about the genre of Magical Realism based on two short stories they had been assigned to read–”Chivalry” by Neil Gaiman and “The Paper Menagerie” by Ken Liu. The discussion was a more formal “Four Square” style where each student answered and asked a question in order to hear from all voices. They went “around the square” until they felt like all the questions had been discussed adequately. To close out, each group shared their best insight–I was impressed at some of their observations and how they were able to think critically about how each work we read did or didn’t fit into the genre of Magical Realism.
After that, they got split into groups again and Jack led us in his Peace Like A River presentation which was (another) rousing game of Jeopardy! The clues were well-written and the students enjoyed playing.
Finally, as I mentioned, the Advertisement Final Projects were due today. I had planned to have a “Viewing Party” where we would watch all the ads together and assess their success using those rhetorical devices we had been learning in this unit. However, in the interest of time, we decided to make this viewing party optional and I opened up the floor to students who wanted to share their work.
I am SO glad we decided to do that because the ads that were shared were SO impressive! It was obvious that these students had put HOURS of hard work into crafting their pieces. They displayed a high level of understanding of persuasive techniques and amazing technology skills (that far surpass mine.) There was a mix of platforms used to video edit: Imovie, Canva, and WeVideo–James used something none of us were familiar with–to amazing results (his Ad is posted on our Class Stream–as per request!) I have to say I am very proud of the results of this assignment–students learned about persuasive writing and used their creativity to produce products that might have pushed them out of their comfort zone a little bit. This assignment is exactly the kind of assignment that they will be given in their future academic careers. I am confident that in this rapidly changing world, it is vital that students are able to communicate their message using various techniques and platforms and I want my students to be prepared for that.
A Contest
During the truncated “Ad Viewing Party,” we had the Annual Writing 1 Ugly Christmas Sweater Contest–there were some other choices for coloring and word searches too (as per their request last week.) They were pretty intent on their drawing and coloring, for the hotly contested 1st Prize: a quality Spork! Thank you, Esther, for impartially judging the winner. We also enjoyed some Christmas music, a Hot Chocolate Bar and cookies–thanks to the students who brought treats to share. The class really enjoyed this wrapping up time together.
Links for this Week
Ugly Christmas Sweater Template
Final Draft: Advertising Assignment
Writing 1 Class Notes (on blog)
My prayer is that all of you have a great Christmas that includes lots of love and laughter!
Blessings,
Mrs. G
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