This week the students in
#ENGRoom121 began preparing for their first official writing assignment. The memoir unit aligns with The New Ohio Learning Standards for English/Language Arts in the writing strand. While writing, they will be asked to pay particular attention to: recount and develop a real experience (from his/her life), "using descriptive details, and a well-structured sequence of events." The students will help the reader by establishing a point of view, introduce a narrator, and logically share the sequence of events. Also, the final piece of writing will need to include "narrative techniques, like dialogue, pacing, description," and reflection, to develop experiences, events, and/or characters while maintaining a command of the English language and capitalization, punctuation, and spelling. It's a tall order, but with a slow and steady writing pace, guidance and support via mini-lessons, and regular check-ins the students will create a memoir to be proud of and worthy of sharing.
Our walk down "memoir lane" began with a discussion in our mini-learning communities contrasting narratives and memoirs. The student's final thoughts were compiled in a single note sheet (see
Narratives vs. Memoirs Notes). We continued our trek by reviewing the "
Elements of a Story" from our 8th grade Summer Vocabulary List. The review helped focus the student's attention on the qualities that are needed to make a story a story. On Thursday, we read a sample memoir entitled, "
The Martyrdom of Andy" (give it a read), took notes on it (
see notes for "The Elements of a Story," and filled out its
plot diagram. We ended the week by completing a brainstorming activity while listening to our memoir theme song, "
Souvenirs," by Switchfoot. The song sings about our mental pictures (memories) being our souvenirs. Listen to the song and complete the
brainstorming activity that the students did :-). What are your "souvenirs?" Begin a dialog with your student by sharing some answers with him/her and maybe having he/she share some answers with you :-). It would make for some pleasant weekend conversation.
A blast from the past ... last week we wrote our "exceptional" paragraph response to the prompt, "What would you do in the last hour of your life? Where would you be? Who would remember?” Well, the responses have been narrowed down to the top three in each class. The remaining three are with the "
#ENGRoom121's Got Talent" judges, and the top paragraph will be announced soon and featured in an upcoming blog post.
Take a look at some of the shared responses. They are telling, compelling, sweet, and heartbreaking.
Here's a look at the upcoming week:
1. Take a look at simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex sentences and practice writing them
2. Settle on a "souvenir" (memory) to write your memoir about
3. Discuss leads
4. Begin the memoir writing process
5. Friday Bi-Weekly Conference with all students (topic of discussion ... memoirs and the writing process)
Vocabulary to know for the upcoming week:
1.
simple sentence - a sentence consisting of only one clause, with a single subject and predicate
2.
compound sentence - a sentence with at least two independent clauses joined by a comma and conjunction, or semicolon
3.
complex sentence - a sentence that combines one independent clause with at least one dependent clause
4.
compound-complex sentence - a sentence that contains at least two independent clauses and at least one dependent clause
5.
lead - a way to grab a reader's interest or attention
Enjoy your weekend. GO TITANS!
