August 21/24, 2009

August 21/24, 2009

Today's Self Starter: Pretest on editing sentences.
1. Students took the test
2. and corrected their own -- honestly because this is being used to see where students are in their understanding of certain aspects of proofreading.
3. Today's vocabulary word: Setting. When we talk about setting, it means more than just the place something happened or where a story took place. We must also talk about the time something takes place. Is it in the present day, Medieval or Civil War times, in the future?
Is something happening during the day or at night? Is it winter or summer?

4. Everyday Editing: During Everyday Editing, we are looking at sentences that can teach us something. Normally students will do some writing in response to the sentences. (Don't forget to bring a composition book if you haven't yet.) Today we just discussed them.
During today's Everyday Editing, we made inferences and predictions, and noticed how the author used words and punctuation:

1) Miss Karpou was young, she was pretty, and she had been nice to
me. I didn’t want her to be sad.

2) Orville smiled a big, nasty, gap-toothed smile, and said, “I’m gonna
turn you into dog meat.”

3) I could see only one place where no one would look for me.
The dumpster.
The Mancatcher would be coming through the door soon. No time to think – only to do. I ran across the loading dock, grabbed the lip of the dumpster, and swung my leg over the edge.
When I looked down inside I almost changed my mind. Four feet below me waited a smelly mass of banana peels, bread crusts, half-eaten hamburgers, and things too gross to mention. I considered turning back. Then I heard the door start to swing open.

5. The teacher read an excerpt from My Teacher Fried My Brains. We discussed the setting and discussed what qualifies a book to be considered science fiction (genre).

6. We also read a poem -- "Southbound on the Freeway" -- see nearby post, which is also "science fiction," and discussed the setting of the poem.

7. Students interviewed each other as they rotated around the room.

8. Students received a spelling homework assignment.

Homework
First Spelling Assignment

Prepare to be tested on correctly spelling (with correct capitalization and punctuation)
the names of your teachers, counselor, and administrators.

Be ready to take the test on these names on September 2 (B-Day) or September 3 (B-Day).


The names of your teachers for this term:
(Include the title each prefers: Mr., Ms., etc.)
1. ________________________________
2. ________________________________
3. ________________________________
4. ________________________________
5. ________________________________
6. ________________________________
7. ________________________________
8. ________________________________

Your seventh grade counselor:
9. Mr. Thompson
The names of our administrators
10. Principal: Mr. Farnsworth
11. Vice-Principal: Mr. Young
12. Vice-Principal: Mr. Dalley

Extra Credit -- Poet

This extra credit is available only through August 24.

Extra Credit: For 5 points extra credit, tell me where the poet May Swenson was born, and where she is buried. She wrote the poem "Southbound on the Freeway," which we are reading in class on August 21 and August 24.

You can find the answers in this blog -- just a couple of posts away from this one. Points are available only to those who have come to this blog.

Southbound on the Freeway - Poem

Southbound on the Freeway
by May Swenson

A tourist came in from Orbitville, 

parked in the air, and said:

The creatures of this star
are made of metal and glass.

Through the transparent parts
you can see their guts.

Their feet are round and roll
on diagrams or long

measuring tapes, dark
with white lines.

They have four eyes.
The two in the back are red.

Sometimes you can see a five-eyed
one, with a red eye turning

on the top of his head.
He must be special—

the others respect him,
and go slow

when he passes, winding
among them from behind.

They all hiss as they glide,
like inches, down the marked

tapes. Those soft shapes,
shadowy inside

the hard bodies—are they
their guts or their brains?

Poet May Swenson

The following information is from Poets.org. Italicized text is paraphrased.

May Swenson was born Anna Thilda May Swenson on May 28, 1913 in Logan, Utah. Her parents were Swedish immigrants, and her father was a professor of mechanical engineering at Utah State University. English was her second language, her family having spoken mostly Swedish in their home. Influenced early on by Edgar Allan Poe, she kept journals as a young girl, in which she wrote in multiple genres.

She attended Utah State University, Logan, and received a bachelor's degree in 1934. She spent another year in Utah working as a reporter, but in 1935 relocated to New York, where she remained for most of her adult life.

She became a world-famous, award-winning poet during her lifetime.

Four months before her death, Swenson wrote: "The best poetry has its roots in the subconscious to a great degree. Youth, naivety, reliance on instinct more than learning and method, a sense of freedom and play, even trust in randomness, is necessary to the making of a poem."

She died in 1989 and is buried in Logan.

--Source: http://www.poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/168

Spelling Challenge Words

For an A in spelling for term 1, master our commonly confused words, correctly spell the names of your teachers, administrators, and counselor (with titles), and select and learn 15 additional words from this list that you have not already mastered at the beginning of the term. For the A-Grade challenge, do not use any words that are already on our commonly confused words list.


a lot

Core Curriculum

A quick way to look over the 7th Grade Core is to go to this page
http://www.schools.utah.gov/curr/lang_art/sec/core.htm
and look down the left hand column for either of these:
Core-at-a-Glance or
Brochure

These are downloadable files.

Book Recommendation

My sixteen year old daughter and I just finished reading The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. We both highly recommend it. Scroll down to see some reviews here.