First of all, thank you to those who turned in their permission forms. However, not everyone did so. Please remember to bring it in on Tuesday!!!!
Anyway...
We've made it! The first three-day weekend of the 2009-2010 school year! (And when, exactly, am I going to stop typing a "1" automatically when I begin to write down a year???? I mean it's been almost a full decade for crying out loud!!!)
Anyway...
(I already said that.) (Yes, Mrs. T is a bit slap-happy. 4th cup of coffee today.) So a brief recap of the week is in order. For once (and for perhaps the only time all year), all three classes were in near-perfect harmony. We explored techniques for holding stronger P2P conferences, actually held some that worked well, discussed some workshop nuts and bolts, and ended with a Silly 70's song and a discussion of where we'll be next week. Not shabby. But all good things must end, and so we move on...
Next week...
Well, first of all everyone needs to have a class three-ring binder for writing workshop. And everyone needs to check the "Conferences" tab above at some point later this weekend to find out when you are scheduled for a teacher conference. (Note: I will post a new message here when I have uploaded the conference schedule.)
CW-ers: We will being on Tuesday with P2P's of a new draft of anything--either an x.0 draft of an older piece or something entirely new. Meanwhile, here is another assignment that I'd like you to do over the weekend...another class prompt that I forgot to give you:
At some point this weekend, take a twenty minute walk in a place with which you are thoroughly familiar. During this walk, do everything you can to keep your focus in the here and now; that is, don't think about issues connected to the past or the future, just about what is happening at this moment. Notice everything. And then, when you are through, spend some time writing a journal entry about it. What did you see, hear, feel, etc. that was new to you, despite the familiarity you already had with the place? What struck you?
After you finish the journal entry, put it away. Come back to it a day later, read it, and then see what kind of idea for a piece it generates. We'll look at both the journal entry and the first draft of the piece on Wednesday.
E3H-ers: It's "Ars Poetica" weekend. Here is the assignment: Over the next two days, I'd like to see you discussing online what you think MacLeish is saying in this poem. Hash out the images, the metaphors, and (yes) even the punctuation. (Yep, the colon after "equal to" is important.) When he says "A poem should not mean But be" is he telling us it should actually have no meaning? Or is this another MacLeish misdirection as in the other poem of his we looked at? Or is there a third option? Discuss this at length online.
Monday: Compose an essay (maybe 500 words or so) in which you take a stand about MacLeish's poem and support that stand. Email it to me.
Note re: the overwhelming board presence of Christian and Bonamico:
Always begin new discussion with open threads, but if you determine that their very enthusiastic participation is too much to keep up with at some point, you may (at your option) begin a separate thread without them on the same topic. Simply use the same topic as a subject header but place the initials NCB--non-Christian&Bonamico--before it. I encourage all of you to accept the challenge that their intense board use offers, but I also understand that it may simply be too much for certain conversations. Do as you wish. But again: always begin a topic with an all-inclusive board.
E2H-ers: Where's Waldo? Well...we wonder where, when we watch with withered, weary wills.
Whatever.
He's on the E2H page, that's where! The link is called "Transcendentalist Writings," but on the old E2H pages (and the new ones are not finished yet) the first word is invisible. Click on "writings." Your assignment: Read the Emerson bio stuff and the excerpts from his essays. Read it all but pay particular attention to the highlighted sections. Then, online, find the threads under "Emerson/Thoreau" that are dedicated to each of these essays. I would like you each to post at least once, but preferably twice, in each of these threads. These posts will be graded after this weekend. So make them strong and clear, and use the texts for support of your points.
Note: The biggest difference between posting and formal analytical writing? You are writing informally in a post, so your organizational structure is less critical. And sometimes it is more like a dialogue. But the process of building an argument is pretty much the same.
I found this online and thought you might enjoy it, especially if you like Disney and the musical "Chicago":
J: sleeping in Music: Working For the Weekend--Loverboy Silly 70's I Think I Love You--The Partridge Family
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