Hi Everybody,

 

Our first day of Language Arts class is tomorrow and I’m so excited to be your student’s LA teacher.

 

I’m a big believer in building classroom culture through content.  We are actually going to start our first class tomorrow by reproducing an in-class theatrical version of Beowulf.  Our studies this year will explore our humanity through the lens of the hero’s journey as we try to unravel why so many stories have similar threads. We’ll look at how to read texts closely and critically. Using Beowulf as a foundation, we’ll also write our own hero’s journey stories. What do we want to teach our readers through the power of story?  How can we manipulate our own mythology? With a focus on sentence structure, paragraph development, and idea organization, our attention will not only be on our own growth as writers, but also on peer critique.  Learning to give kind, helpful, and specific feedback is an invaluable skill and we’ll practice that a lot.  Our hero’s journey project will culminate with a “coffeehouse reading” at a local Coffeehouse on the evening of Wednesday, December 12th.  Please save the date.

 

Upcoming due dates: (subject to change)

• Reading.  Students should have a book with them at school.  We’ll spend some time “dating” books and creating reading plans at the beginning of this year.   Here’s a link to the Reading Plan task description (due by 8am on Friday, 8/24) I also have.a lot of book recommendation resources on my website.  Students should be reading 30 minutes most (all?) nights.  If students wish to listen to audio books to fulfill this reading requirement, that’s great — although I encourage students to track with text in hand whenever possible. (Also —if your student doesn’t have his/her/their own public library card, this is a great time to get one!) Students are welcome to bring Kindles or Nooks to class, but I do not allow students to read on phones.
• Rambling Autobiography due via Google Classroom by 8am on Thursday, August 30th.  Here’s a link to the task description.

Thank you so much in advance for your support.  I’m looking forward to a great year.  -JF