Round 1

We started, and mostly finished, the first round of poem presentations today. They were great!

A Final Bit of Prep

Today, after a bit of business, students had a bit of final in class rehearsal for their poetry recitations which begin tomorrow. In preparation for the recitation, here are some links about recitation and scoring:

• Evaluation Criteria & Tips
• The Scoring Rubric
• The Evaluation Sheet
• The Accuracy Scoresheet

Tone

Today students had a bit more time to work on their poems, especially in terms of tone and emotion. Tomorrow we will have one final practice day before recitations/readings begin Wednesday.

In preparation for Wednesday, here are some links about recitation and scoring:

• Evaluation Criteria & Tips
• The Scoring Rubric
• The Evaluation Sheet
• The Accuracy Scoresheet

Wrapping Up

Students finished their cover sheets and submitted final draft research essays to TurnItIn.com. They spent the remainder of the period working on their Poetry Out Loud poems.

By the time we return from break, students should have both poems

1) Annotated

1.   Circle any words that you don’t know.  Look those words up in the dictionary and write the definition somewhere in the right-hand margin of your page, near the poem.

2.   Underline any phrases that you don’t understand. 

3.   Write 3 questions that you have about the poem in the right-hand margin.

4.   Write a 2 sentence summary of what you think the poem is about underneath the poem.

2) SOAPSToned (see handout at Google Classroom), and

3) Paraphrased.

The should also be rehearsing their reading/recitation. See the Poetry Out Loud website for tips.

Poem Annotation & Final Drafts

By tomorrow, students should be well into annotating and analyzing their poems and be finished with the essay revision checklist.

Work Time

We started with a short video and some memorization tips (including the website memorizer.me) for students who are planning to memorize their poems. Students then split their time between essay revision and finding, print, and analyzing poems.

By tomorrow, students should have completed the essay revision checklist (at Google Classroom) and have printed copies of their POL poems.

Revision Time

By now, students should have posted their draft essay to TurnItIn and have chosen their poems for the poetry project. Below is what we worked on in class today. These things could certainly be worked on for homework as well!

Essay Drafts and POL

We began the day looking at a short poem called "We Real Cool" by Gwendolyn Brooks. Afterwards, students had some time to post their essays to TurnItIt.com (if they were ready), begin looking for poems for the poetry project (start at Google Classroom), and finish up their SOAPSTone of "We Real Cool."

Draft essays should be posted to TurnItIn by tonight and students should be working on choosing two poems fro the poetry project.

The Conclusion

Students had the whole period to work on conclusion paragraphs and their works cited pages today. Slides are at Google Classroom. And some useful frames are below.

Counter-Claims

Today students had essentially the entire period to write, working on body paragraphs and counter-arguments. The slides are at Google Classroom. By class tomorrow, they should be ready to work on their conclusion.

The Essay Body

After looking at some examples (slides 23 through 26), students had the whole period to work on body paragraphs for their Speak essay. They should have two or three body paragraphs, with quotations and evidence from their notes, complete by tomorrow.

Hooks and Intros

Today we spent the period finishing the graphic organizer for the Speak argument essay and then looked at some sample introductions. Students should write three different hooks for their intro paragraph in their writer's notebook tonight. See slides 14 through 21 at Google Classroom for clarification.

Writing Claims

Today students started by reviewing their claims from yesterday and posting them to Google Classroom. After looking at some of these as a class, students moved on to a graphic organizer to plan the essay.

The Claim

After filling out the Q1 discussion rubric, students got started focusing their ideas for our next essay. Here are today's slides. Students should look at slides one through eight and have a thesis/claim for tomorrow's class.