Writing 2: Writing 2 Class Notes

It was good to see your smiling faces back from break. We are officially halfway through the Fall semester now. Can you believe it?!?

After that, we had our Visual Vocabulary words of the day: rancor and denizen.

Writing

Before we started the Writing portion of today's class, I gave students some time to fill out the Decorations portion of their Style Sheets. Since the emphasis of this past narrative/descriptive essay was to use vivid language, it will be helpful to keep that list of literary devices handy as we move forward.

Speaking of Personal Essays: those were due before break. I have graded them and they were handed back today. Before they can move forward with editing their work, I gave the class a tutorial on how that should be done because I am doing the revision process a bit differently this year.

In order for students to improve their writing, they must learn to fix the mistakes they make so that they will not continue to commit the same errors. On your graded essays, you will see numbers/letters on the physical copy (and on GC copy) that correspond to the explanation of the errors. These explanations are the “Grammar & Content Codes”.)

Directions:

Number all the marked errors on your paper for both grammar and content issues.
On a lined sheet of binder paper, work through each of your errors by writing the rule you violated and show me what you would need to do to correct the error. You do NOT need to rewrite the entire essay. Instead, write the rule and isolate/fix the error.
These handwritten corrections are due on the Final Edits due date along with your original and graded essay.
Staple your Edits to your essay and hand in at class OR scan and turn in your handwritten Edits and submit a copy of your Essay (with numbered errors) on Google Classroom in the Final Edits assignment for that essay.
Please write neatly.
If you are not satisfied with the initial grade your essay earned, you may fix all the errors you isolated and resubmit your essay.

We practiced this process on a sample paragraph. Final Edits are due next week.

Last, I introduced the next essay which is a Process Essay. Kicked around some possible topic ideas and read about the parameters of this essay. Next week we will go into more detail on MLA citations and Works Cited pages.

Your KWO is due next week. Please note that the template for this one may not be that helpful depending on how many steps your process has. You may need to divide it differently than the template allows for. It actually may be super helpful to categorize your process into three stages. The template also has a place to record your sources and the visual.

Grammar

We’re continuing with a unit on phrases in sentences. Students have reviewed preposition phrases and we covered gerund phrases last week. For this week, students will be doing two worksheets dealing with infinitives.

Infinitive phrases combine the word “to” with a verb. (For example, to sing, to jump, to swim, etc.) Infinitive phrases can function as nouns, adjectives or adverbs. These phrases can also have adjectives or direct objects. One example from the worksheet had an infinitive phrase that was functioning as a noun, and in the sentence it was the direct object. No one said grammar was easy!!

Literature

This week, the Peace Like A River project was introduced. As homework, students should listen to my example and answer some questions about the assignment. For next week, students should post an answer to the question on Google Classroom about their project’s theme. Once approved, work can begin. Presentations will be 12/4 & 12/14.

Keep reading your books and complete the Quiz over chapters 15-17 on Google Classroom. Next week we’ll have another book discussion.