Writing 1 Class Notes -- February 14

Greetings!

Happy Belated Valentine's Day!  In honor of the day, the Quick Write was a "literary love letter."  They were to write a letter of affection and appreciation to an author, book, character, grammar item like punctuation or parts of speech.  We had a creative piece expressing love for "rhyming."  For our Vocabulary Challenge, the students added their own words to the list.

The next part of our discussion centered on the our book, A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court.  I re-explained the worksheets on Character Analysis, Themes, and Vocabulary.  It's important that they work on these AS they are reading.  In other words, they should fill in the boxes with words, actions, and supporting information from the book.  Students from last year's Writing 1 class felt that leaving it to the last minute had a hard time.

As we discussed the book, we read aloud some of the portions   Twain's writing can be difficult at first, but if you read carefully and not try to rush through it, the humor and descriptions are delightful.

The students handed in their final copies of their News Stories.  Continuing in a "reporter" theme, they are to write an Editorial which is a really a short persuasive essay.  I expound on this assignment in a separate blog entry.  For next week, the students are to do their pre-writing work.

Assignments for Next Week:
-- Read ACY (p. 71 - 107; Ch. 16 - 21)
-- Continue working on the worksheets
-- Find and write down 3 examples Twain's humor.
-- Pre-writing for the Editorial

Have a great week!
Mrs. Prichard