Monday, December 17, 2012

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Write in the gush, the throb, the flood, of the moment



The secret of it all, is to write in the gush, the throb, the flood, of the moment – to put things down without deliberation – without worrying about their style – without waiting for a fit time or place. I always worked that way. I took the first scrap of paper, the first doorstep, the first desk, and wrote – wrote, wrote. By writing at the instant the very heartbeat of life is caught.

-- Walt Whitman

Saturday, June 9, 2012

How Parents Can Help Students Improve Their Writing

Encouraging Your Student
 to Write A Few Suggestions to Consider
[#1 and #2 are adapted from Bernice E. Cullinan in Read To Me: Raising Kids Who Love to Read]
1. Help your child become aware that there are many uses for writing.  Writing surrounds us in the form of advertising, packaging, instructions for new appliances or other equipment, bills, parking signs, T.V. shows, comedians’ routines, movie dialogue, and so on and so on.
2.  Encourage your child to keep a journal. Journal writing is not only good writing practice; it also creates a record of events and feelings that might not otherwise be remembered, and it can be a way to clarify and deal with thoughts and emotions.
3.  Pull out the baby book or journal if you recorded anecdotes from when this child was younger.  This could show the value of recording memories, and might provide ideas your child could write about. 
4.  Write notes to your child – hopefully some encouraging, appreciative ones as well as the “don’t forget to do this” ones.
5.  My own children and I had a positive experience when they each kept a journal that was meant for me to read and respond to.  I’d read them at least once a week and write back to them on the same page.  
4. Be willing to help your child come up with ideas for writing, revise early drafts of a piece, and edit later drafts.      Please don’t do the writing or editing for your child, though you could pick out an error or weakness or two in a piece and explain why it’s a problem and how it could be fixed. 
   Become familiar with the Six Trait Rubrics often used to assess writing.  Remember to focus on the first five traits before you worry too much about conventions. It’s very frustrating to carefully check spelling and punctuation in a paragraph that you end up throwing out as you revise your ideas.  
    Be positive.  Be happily amazed at the unique way your child thinks and writes.  Give lots more of  encouragement than of criticism.
   All writers can use more than one reader who can respond to our work in an encouraging way, and help us see where it is strong and where it could use some more effort. 
5.  If your child isn’t already comfortable with using computers,  help him or her schedule a keyboarding class at school or take advantage of other computer-use training.
6.  Set the example.  Write. 





Published multiple times in previous years.

Monday, June 4, 2012

If You Become a Professional Writer



You must learn to face rejection:
Most famous published authors could show you many, many rejection letters that they received before their first books were accepted and published.

Prompts: Christensen "One Light"


Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Yearbook Signing and J-Dawgs during lunch
All 8 periods in one day


Yearbook Signing


Modified Schedule for May 30th
8:15-9:00                          A1                    (45 Minutes) Pass out Yearbooks
9:05-9:40                          A2                    (35 Minutes)
9:45-10:20                        A3                    (35 Minutes)
10:25-11:00                      A4                    (35 Minutes)
11:00-11:45                      1st lunch           (45 Minutes)
11:50-12:45                      B5                    (55 Minutes)
11:05-12:00                      B5                    (55 Minutes)
12:00-1:25                       2nd Lunch         (45 Minutes)
12:50-1:25                       B6                     (35 Minutes)
1:30-2:05                        B7                      (35 Minutes)
2:10-2:45                        B8                      (35 Minutes)
Please post this list for lunches for Yearbook day.  Lunch is based on B1 class.
Lunch Schedule
1st Lunch                                                            2nd Lunch
Adams                                                            Anstead
Aiman                                                             Bates
Barson                                                            Behm
Bryson                                                            Biddulph
Carter                                                             Cotterell
Clayton                                                            Dean
Crawford                                                         Dibb
Dallon                                                             Dorsey
Earl                                                                Earling
Grow                                                              Eddington                                   
Hadlock                                                            Fugal
Hansen                                                            C Gadd
Lemon                                                            Heng
Major                                                              Karjala
McCleskey                                                     Lyde
Newton                                                            Macfarlane
Ormond                                                            Maucotel
Paulsen                                                            McNeil
Roth                                                                 Memmott
Schow                                                            Moon
Scott                                                                Morrey
Seminary                                                        Olson
W Smith                                                          Packer
Somers                                                            D. Smith
Steed                                                              Starker
Steffes                                                            Underwood
Thornton                                                          Ward
Way                                                                  Wicks
Welch                                                               Wright
Everybody needs to be in Class.

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Mother's Day Poem by Catherine S.

Mother's Day Poem by Catherine S.

Six Ways to Look at Motherhood

Each new baby
as a beautiful
blessing

Dirty diapers
are not fun to change

She wants a bottle.
He's running through the sprinklers with clothes on.
He just brought an earwig in the house.
Where is my sanity when I need it?

Her dark hair falls in curls on the pillow
as she finally goes to sleep.

We're having chicken pot pie for dinner.
Sigh.
Fine.  Make yourself a sandwich.

Five little people
sit on either side of me.
I croon the story softly,
"Guess how much I love you?
To the moon and back."

Catherine S. 

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

Bring treats if you wish.
Share plays and other stuff you're proud of!

Take home your notebooks. 


originally published 2012-05-07

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Self-Starter prompt:

Outdoor TV Picture Prompt

 Share

Work on finishing up any unfinished work.

and a play!  a bit of Sherlock today!

Originally published 2012-05-07

Friday, May 18, 2012

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Self-Starter:  Getting caught up --
  • Plays
  • Card for Mother  (Have poem approved before putting it on the card.)
  • Have you made a copy of your Inspired By poem to put up on the board?  Check it off with Ms. Dorsey before you put it up.
2.  Punctuation Mini-Lesson -- See below.

3.  Concrete Poetry


Facts about the History of Punctuation from Nancie Atwell's Lessons That Change Writers
 The period:  comes from the ancient Greek word peri which means "round." Writers inserted a small circle at the end of each sentence to show that they'd gone all around a subject, that the idea they expressed was now complete and well-rounded."

 The comma:  comes from the Greek word komma, which means "a little knife" or "to cut off."  Writers inserted the little curved blade of a knife -- that is, a comma -- whenever they wanted to show a clause or phrase: a group of words cut from the body of a sentence.

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Friday, May 18, 2012

Self-Starter:  Write a "Down the Rabbit Hole" story or poem or description.
Books and stories put someone "down a rabbit hole" -- stories with portals:
Alice in Wonderland, Through the Looking Glass
Gregor the Overlander
Beyonders
Narnia
Harry Potter   9 3/4, portkeys
(Wizard of Oz)
Leven Thumps
Seeing Red




Punctuation history -- We've already looked at quotation marks.  History of exclamation mark and question mark.

A little bit of The Hormone Jungle -- first poem


 Mother's Day Cards with Poems:  Ode, Tritina, or Six-Ways Poem.
Do not make your card until your poem is approved.

If you haven't yet, you still need to copy an "Inspired By" poem to go on the bulletin board. 

How about your play?  Do you have it? 

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Self-Starter:   Prompt: The Follower
Prompt:  Write about a time when you were the follower and did something stupid or disregarded mother’s advice or an admonition or command  -- or wish you would have disobeyed.


Listen to a story, then write more.

2.  Sharing time

3.  Mother's Day Cards with Poems:  Ode, Tritina, or Six-Ways Poem.
Do not make your card until your poem is approved.

If you haven't yet, you still need to copy an "Inspired By" poem to go on the bulletin board. 





Monday, May 14, 2012

Monday, May 14, 2012


Self-Starter:  The Slide   Concrete Poetry



 
2.  Outside -- Hooray!

If more time: 

3.  More Concrete Poetry


4.  Cards for Mom --  finish or write another poem
Finish up your poem for your mother-- either a tritina, a six-ways poem, or an ode, (or a really great concrete poem) and then write it ever so neatly on a card you create. 

Here are the links from last time:
tritina     November 30, 2010
ways of looking at   Thirteen Ways Poem
ode    February 29, 2008       Neruda Odes

Here is the handout packet from last time: Poem Forms for Mothers' Day.docx 

or  Poem Forms for Mothers' Day.doc

 


 

 





Originally published on 2012-05-07

Prompt: The Follower

Guys Write for Guys Read – "The Follower"  http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4649807


See also the book by Gary Paulsen  Harris and Me  or his book Masters of Disaster.

Consider also the part of The Outsiders when Ponyboy and a friend see how long they can hold cigarettes on their hands.


Prompt:  Write about a time when you were the follower and did something stupid
or disregarded mother’s advice or an admonition or command
or wish you would have disobeyed.



A beginning for Ms. Dorsey's story -- 
            "Everybody did it – at least everybody from the farming community of Clover, Idaho who was old enough to have a drivers license (maybe some who weren't old enough, too) and too young to fear death and dismemberment.    We called it “Deadman’s Curve.”  The name should have been discouraging, but for teens it was enticing.   It was a sharp curve, following the curve in a large canal – large enough to swallow up a car or pickup. 
            The challenge was to see how fast you could go around the curve.  Disobeying laws wasn’t in character for me,  but at 16 I had been driving with a license for two years, felt so experienced, and had a need for speed."  


Concrete Poetry


"Concrete poetry or shape poetry is poetry in which the typographical arrangement of words is as important in conveying the intended effect as the conventional elements of the poem, such as meaning of words, rhythm, rhyme and so on.
It is sometimes referred to as visual poetry, a term that has evolved to have distinct meaning of its own, but which shares the distinction of being poetry in which the visual elements are as important as the text."  from
"Concrete poetry - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia." Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc, 9 May 2012. Web. 14 May 2012. .  











 Outside the lines: poetry at play by Brad Burg  See http://www.bradburg.com/













Concrete Poetry





Thursday, May 10, 2012

Mother's Day


Honku



http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=1336382

Neruda Odes



Ode to Clothes
                             

Every morning you wait,
clothes, over a chair,
to fill yourself with
my vanity, my love,
my hope, my body.
Barely
risen from sleep,
I relinquish the water,
enter your sleeves,
my legs look for
the hollows of your legs,
and so embraced
by your indefatigable faithfulness
I rise, to tread the grass,
enter poetry,
consider through the windows,
the things,
the men, the women,
the deeds and the fights
go on forming me,
go on making me face things
working my hands,
opening my eyes,
using my mouth,
and so,
clothes,
I too go forming you,
extending your elbows,
snapping your threads,
and so your life expands
in the image of my life.
In the wind
you billow and snap
as if you were my soul,
at bad times
you cling
to my bones,
vacant, for the night,
darkness, sleep
populate with their phantoms
your wings and mine.
I wonder
if one day
a bullet
from the enemy
will leave you stained with my blood
and then
you will die with me
or one day
not quite
so dramatic
but simple,
you will fall ill,
clothes,
with me,
grow old
with me, with my body
and joined
we will enter
the earth.
Because of this
each day
I greet you
with reverence and then
you embrace me and I forget you,
because we are one
and we will go on
facing the wind, in the night,
the streets or the fight,
a single body,
one day, one day, some day, still.
 
 
- Pablo Neruda


Ode To The Lemon by Pablo Neruda

From blossoms
released
by the moonlight,
from an
aroma of exasperated
love,
steeped in fragrance,
yellowness
drifted from the lemon tree,
and from its plantarium
lemons descended to the earth.

Tender yield!
The coasts,
the markets glowed
with light, with
unrefined gold;
we opened
two halves
of a miracle,
congealed acid
trickled
from the hemispheres
of a star,
the most intense liqueur
of nature,
unique, vivid,
concentrated,
born of the cool, fresh
lemon,
of its fragrant house,
its acid, secret symmetry.

Knives
sliced a small
cathedral
in the lemon,
the concealed apse, opened,
revealed acid stained glass,
drops
oozed topaz,
altars,
cool architecture.

So, when you hold
the hemisphere
of a cut lemon
above your plate,
you spill
a universe of gold,
a
yellow goblet
of miracles,
. . . . . .
a ray of light that was made fruit,
the minute fire of a planet.
 

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Mother's Day Cards  with a special poem --

tritina     November 30, 2010


ways of looking at   Thirteen Ways Poem


ode    February 29, 2008

Neruda Odes

 

Here is the handout packet for today: 

Poem Forms for Mothers' Day.docx

or 

Poem Forms for Mothers' Day.doc

 

 

 

 

 

 





Originally published May 7, 2012.

Sunday, May 6, 2012

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Deliver books to Legacy Elementary!   We'll be about 15-20 minutes late for your B2 class again.  Check ahead with your teachers if you can.

More Love That Dog and writing "Inspired By" poems.  

Friday, May 4, 2012

Friday, May 4, 2012

Self-Starter:  a)  In your notebook, list every punctuation mark you can think of, and what it does.  http://www.nationalpunctuationday.com/
http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/punctuation.aspx


b) Write an "I Am From" Poem 

December 6, 2010  I Am From

[or Outside?   54 degrees?]


Love That Dog
Monday, February 28, 2011  Love That Boy and More

February 25, 2008


Punctuation?  http://msmcclure.com/?page_id=6448

Student poems:

The following are from Branden P.  2012 

Love that horse
like tornadoes love to swirl.
I said I love that horse
like tornadoes love to swirl.
Love to call her in the summer
love to call her
"Hey there, Girl!"

Whose dog this is, I wish I'd know
Reminds me of the velvet rose.
Found me summer at the school,
So to my family, I'll show.

do much depends 
upon
the voodoo doll
on the shelf
beside the sewing kit

so much depends upon
the duck by the pond
who is 
very fond
of visitors 
_____________________________


Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Self-Starter:  "Write an If I Were in Charge of the World" Poem 

October 10, 2007 

Share

Love That Dog

Monday, February 28, 2011  Love That Boy and More

February 25, 2008

December 6, 2010  I Am From 

Punctuation?

_______________________

I  found a very cool site -- an online rhyming dictionary -- free!
http://www.rhymer.com/

 

 

 

 

Monday, April 30, 2012

Monday, April 30, 2012

Self-Starter:   Respond to a photo -- Man and woman in front of what?  From National Geographic Pictures

2. Respond/Write  to music



Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Thursday, April 25, 2012

Self-Starter:  Pick a photo or. . . .  leaves?

finish play?  Sherlock 

Outside Over There

Various activities for writing outside.




Tuesday, April 23, 2012

Self-Starter:  Write about heat, summer, or anything to do with temperature.

Computer Lab 201  -- finish memoirs -- posted on MyAccess

Finish reading plays --
Do we still need to finish one?

Thursday, April 19, 2012

Prompt: Plays


Prompt:  Write about plays --  plays you've seen, plays you've been in, plays you've read, plays you'd like to see or read. 




Tuesday, April 17, 2012

Friday, April 20, 2012

1.  Prompt: Plays


"The Play's the Thing"

2.  Add these notes to your notebook. 
Advice for Reading and Writing Plays


Advice for  Reading Plays:
1) Read all the stage directions carefully.
2) Notice what the dialogue reveals about the characters.
3) Look for the conflict, problem, or tension.
4)  Notice the plot as the play unfolds.
5)  Take your time as you read. 
Explanation:  (You don’t need to copy all of this, but try to understand it.) Dialogue is meant to be heard so if you are reading it to yourself, you need to provide the feelings that go with the dialogue.  Plays are meant to be heard, so you need to visualize what is happening on stage.
6)   Expect some confusion in the beginning. 

 

Advice for Writing Plays:
1.    Outline the plot of your play before you start writing.
2.    Use play-writing format including a list of characters at the beginning and giving the name of the character before each chunk of dialogue.
3.    Write clear stage directions.

3.  Read parts of two plays

4. Computer lab 201 to work on your narratives (Try to finish up.) and/or start working on your own original play or a skit or two on a Word document.  (Remember that your memoir is on MyAccess.)

Monday, April 16, 2012

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Self-Starter:
Pick a prompt (suggested by Gale Carson Levine, author of Ella Enchanted):

  • I have one green eye and one brown eye.  The green eye sees truth, but the brown eye sees much, much more.
  •  The ghost was eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich.
  •  "Be nice," my father said.  "After all, he's your brother."
  • I am the most famous twelve-year-old (or thirteen-year-old) in the United States.
  • If somebody didn't do something soon, they were going to have a catastrophe on their hands.
  • Jason (or another name) had never felt so foolish before, and he hoped he'd never feel so foolish again.
Rules for Writing from Gale Carson Levine:
1. The best way to write better is to write more.
2. The best way to write better is to write more.
3. The best way to write better is to write more.
4.  The best way to write more is to write whenever you have have five minutes and whenever you find a chair and a pen and paper or your computer.
5.  Read!  Most likely you don't need this rule.  If you enjoy writing, you probably enjoy reading.  The payoff for this pleasure is that reading books shows you how to write them.
6.  Reread!  There's nothing wrong with reading a book you love over and over.  When you do, the words get inside you, become part of you, in a way that words in a book you've read only once can't.
7.  Save everything you write, even if you don't like it, even if you hate it.  Save it for a minimum of fifteen years.  I'm serious.  At that time, if you want to, you can throw it out, but even then don't discard your writing lightly.    (fromWriting Magic, page 5)

We also read part of her chapter from Writing Magic about "Show and Tell."

See  An Author's Blog.



Computer Lab 211 to work on memoirs.

Monday, April 16, 2012

Self-Starter:  Picture Prompt -- White Water!!!!   or Object Prompt -- Easter Basket

More Pics for Prompts 2

 Computer lab:  type memoirs

[Finish up children's books as needed]


 

Friday, April 13, 2012

An Author's Blog

This is Gale Carson Levine's blog: 

http://gailcarsonlevine.blogspot.com/

She has lots of ideas and prompts for young (and not so young) writers.


She is the author of Ella Enchanted

Wednesday, April 4, 2012

Thursday, April 5, 2012

You will have a substitute teacher since I will be attending with the other English teachers a Literacy Conference held in Salt Lake.


Self-Starter:  Prompt -- picture or . . . . .  

Some possible prompts:

April 3 -- Prompt 6

April 3 -- Prompt 7

April 3 -- Prompt 8

April 3 -- Prompt 9

Picture Prompt -- Magritte La Voix. . .

Outdoor TV Picture Prompt

 

 



Ms. Bills will be teaching a lesson about revision.   

We recently did this with revision in Ms. Dorsey's English classes:

Bring your ARMS and fingers   

A.R.M.S. Revision Strategy

And Fingers for Writing with Sensory Images

 

originally published 3/30/12

Monday, April 2, 2012

April 3 -- Prompt 1

Describe each of your family members, but limit the number of words in each description to the age of each person. For example, your 37-year-old mother must be described in 37 words, your 16-year-old sister must be described in 16 words, and your 10-year-old cousin must be described in 10 words, and the baby who is one or less, will be described in (you guessed it) one word.

April 3 -- Prompt 2

Stand up and move to somewhere in the room by a bookshelf.  Grab the 7th book from the bookshelf or the seventh book in one of the clear plastic boxes. Open it up to page 7. Pinpoint the 7th sentence on the page. Begin a poem that begins with that sentence and limit it in length to 7 lines.  When you are done with a book,  please put it back where you found it.

April 3 -- Prompt 3

What did you eat for breakfast or lunch? Write a haiku about each item you ate ...  A haiku is a short poem with three lines.  The first line has 5 syllables, the second has 7 syllables, and the third has 5 syllables. Here's a haiku to help you remember:
I am first with five
Then seven in the middle --
Five again to end.   
Sample of a haiku about food: 
Granola is best
With  yogurt and fruit on top
A healthy breakfast.

April 3 -- Prompt 4

Open the dictionary to a random page. Find a word that you do not know how to define. Write an imaginary definition for it. Repeat until this time is up.   
Find dictionaries on the rolling book cart or on the counter at the back of the classroom. When you are done with the dictionary, please put it back on the dictionary shelf.