Grammar quiz tomorrow and extended narrative drafts due on Monday!

We continued drafting our extended narratives today.  We also did an important grammar lesson on quotation marks.

The grade nines received their immunization needles today during English class.  A reminder that storyboards are due tomorrow.  Remember, these do not have to be "perfected" pieces of art - they are simply sketches of scenes that might be used in your extended narratives.

The students received their quizzes back today.  They are doing a great job reading like writers!  I am including a photo gallery with examples of strong work on the quiz. Homework: Choose a topic for your extended narrative.  Prewriting will begin tomorrow.  Remember that you can write a fictional narrative, a place narrative, or a personal narrative.

We have been working hard on "reading like writers".  On Friday, we will have a quiz on this skill.  You will be given a snapshot moment and you will highlight particular writing strategies in the piece and make comments in the margins.  You will be looking for places where the writer uses voice, sensory details, conventional artistry, and slows time down.

We had some very deep discussions today based on the short story, "A Sound of Thunder".  Never in my career as a language arts teacher, have we discussed the space time continuum in so much detail!  Our brains were hurting by the end, but it was worth it.  We came up with some new understandings about how veering off our path, even minutely, can greatly affect the future. Oh, and Nathan Matchett is a time traveler from the future who has been sent back to rescue the JV Boys soccer team. Homework: Highlight "A Sound of Thunder", looking for places where the author effectively: 1. uses sensory details 2. creates snapshot moments 3. writes - other things that stick out to you about the author's writing -Mrs.Cabel

Today we focused on a very important reading skill - using context clues to understand difficult vocabulary.  We used the mentor text "Consorting with Frogs" by Farley Mowat.  The students then had to find difficult words from the text, make an inference (guess) of the word meaning, explain the reasoning for their guess, and then look up the dictionary definition.  The definitions are due Wednesday. Don't forget your snapshot moments are due in final copy tomorrow.