High Stakes Day

English 1 -- At the beginning of class today, students took a reading check quiz for Act IV of Romeo and Juliet, which was the homework they were given last time. While students took the quiz, I also took completion points for Act IV questions in the study packet. After the quiz, we dove right into Act V, thus traveling closer to the end of the play and closer to the demise of our two favorite teenage spouses. And though Act IV showed us many turns in the plot, we still have plenty more twists where that came from before all is said and done. We will be finishing up both the play and the movie next week (on Tuesday for 2nd block and Wednesday for 7th and 8th), and taking a test over the whole thing after that (Thursday and Friday of next week).

English 1 Homework
Finish writing your rough draft for your personal narrative. Remember to make it as much like a story as possible -- lots of description, imagery, active verbs, etc. Your goal is to add entertainment value and drama!


English 2 -- Today was test day over our holocaust unit. After finishing the test, students did a systematic revision of their research papers, including:
-getting rid of "be" verbs (am, is, are, was, were, be, being, been)
-finding synonyms for often-repeated words
-making sure they used a variety of sentence beginnings
-making sure they used a good mix of short and long sentences
-eliminating "dead" words like good, very, nice, rather, quite, sort of, kind of
Students also had the option of having an individual paper conference with me to get advice for improvement before turning in the final copy next Tuesday.

English 2 Homework
Finish research papers -- they are due at the beginning of next class period (9-23). Make sure to include internal citation and a correctly formatted works cited page.
Also, be prepared to get up and teach the class a bit about your topic next class -- these "presentations" will be brief, only a minute or two, and can include anything you wish -- statistics, a summary, pictures, etc.