Important announcements
Our new English classes are filled with incredible energy. Students participate eagerly, contributing ideas, connections, and enthusiasm to create a classroom atmosphere that is based on an interest in new ideas and ways to use language.
Although we are still waiting for our new workbooks to arrive, the poetry we have been reading has been a successful introduction to a class that is centered on language and creativity as they relate to the new Common Core. Shy students are beginning to participate more, and even students who initially said they “can’t write poetry” are beginning to rhyme.
This week, we are going to transition from poetry to descriptive writing that uses the techniques of alliteration, assonance, sound rhyme, sight rhyme, and onomatopoeia. We will also begin working on grammar and reading comprehension; vocabulary will be added in another week or two (the books are backordered).
Grades 2-3: This class has five students now, and they are an energetic bunch, filled with ideas and lively observations. This week, each child is writing a poem about an animal; our model was “Duck’s Ditty,” a poem that appears in Kenneth Grahame’s classic, The Wind in the Willows. It is full of “old-fashioned words” and sparked a lively conversation about fresh water plants and the different names of male and female animals (duck and drake; stallion, mare, colt, and filly). The children have been asked to focus on sounds and actions that are specific to the animals they have chosen.
Grades 4-5: Calling all students! There’s room in this class!! Two weeks ago, we looked at Edgar Allen Poe’s famous romantic poem and agreed that it is really quite “icky.” Last week, we looked at dialect in Scottish poet Robert Burns’ “To a Mouse” and discussed how the different sounds and Gaelic words help create a fun, slightly ironic poem. The models for the homework, which is to write a rhyming poem about fall, are two poems by Robert Frost, “A Prayer in Spring” and “Flower-Gathering.” Squirrels, autumn foliage, and the unexpected purple and white flowers that grow wild along central Jersey’s roads are all terrific topics! Next week, we are going to look at how character types and even stereotypes are used to create memorable characters in fiction and non-fiction prose.
Grades 6-7: Last week we read Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven,” and students were challenged to use his rhyme schemes and creative imagery as a model for their own work. One student described fall colors as seen through the window of a speeding Lamborghini, another described “The Halloween Movie Disaster” in rhymed couplets, and a third experimented with short bi-meter rhymes to tell a story almost as scary as Poe’s (except for the line about “rotten ham,” which everyone agree was just gross!). Last week, we read several poems by Lucille Clifton, one of which can best be described as an “anti-fairy tale.” Students are going to write their own anti-fairy tales—acceptable topics include any original ideas and explorations into some of the stereotypes that plague middle school life.
Although we are still waiting for our new workbooks to arrive, the poetry we have been reading has been a successful introduction to a class that is centered on language and creativity as they relate to the new Common Core. Shy students are beginning to participate more, and even students who initially said they “can’t write poetry” are beginning to rhyme.
This week, we are going to transition from poetry to descriptive writing that uses the techniques of alliteration, assonance, sound rhyme, sight rhyme, and onomatopoeia. We will also begin working on grammar and reading comprehension; vocabulary will be added in another week or two (the books are backordered).
Grades 2-3: This class has five students now, and they are an energetic bunch, filled with ideas and lively observations. This week, each child is writing a poem about an animal; our model was “Duck’s Ditty,” a poem that appears in Kenneth Grahame’s classic, The Wind in the Willows. It is full of “old-fashioned words” and sparked a lively conversation about fresh water plants and the different names of male and female animals (duck and drake; stallion, mare, colt, and filly). The children have been asked to focus on sounds and actions that are specific to the animals they have chosen.
Grades 4-5: Calling all students! There’s room in this class!! Two weeks ago, we looked at Edgar Allen Poe’s famous romantic poem and agreed that it is really quite “icky.” Last week, we looked at dialect in Scottish poet Robert Burns’ “To a Mouse” and discussed how the different sounds and Gaelic words help create a fun, slightly ironic poem. The models for the homework, which is to write a rhyming poem about fall, are two poems by Robert Frost, “A Prayer in Spring” and “Flower-Gathering.” Squirrels, autumn foliage, and the unexpected purple and white flowers that grow wild along central Jersey’s roads are all terrific topics! Next week, we are going to look at how character types and even stereotypes are used to create memorable characters in fiction and non-fiction prose.
Grades 6-7: Last week we read Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven,” and students were challenged to use his rhyme schemes and creative imagery as a model for their own work. One student described fall colors as seen through the window of a speeding Lamborghini, another described “The Halloween Movie Disaster” in rhymed couplets, and a third experimented with short bi-meter rhymes to tell a story almost as scary as Poe’s (except for the line about “rotten ham,” which everyone agree was just gross!). Last week, we read several poems by Lucille Clifton, one of which can best be described as an “anti-fairy tale.” Students are going to write their own anti-fairy tales—acceptable topics include any original ideas and explorations into some of the stereotypes that plague middle school life.