September 29-October 3, 2014

This week, I showed students how to play Kahoot. I create a game and project it on the front screen. They log in on their computers or phones and click the correct color and shape associated with the correct answer. Kahoot shows who answered first and got the most points and the class rank in answering correct answers. They didn't just like it; they went a little insane over it. I told them I wanted to give it a try with a 10 question "quiz" on keyword searches as an introduction and that I would also give them opportunities later to create Kahoots for the class to play.

They began working on their first formal essay this week: What are the things that matter most in your life right now? I talked about how to preplan and outline essays and why they need to get into that habit. They told me about what they had learned about writing in seventh grade. I told them one of our big objectives this year is to build the stamina to write an essay in one sitting since they will need to do it on the writing SOL in March. We will be working on the essay more this week. They also completed a fifth vocabulary word, succulent, so they are now ready for a vocab quiz on Monday (I generally have them on Fridays, but we had the field trip to JMU, and students chose Monday as the alternate day). There are three sections on the quiz: fill in the blank, write a sentence for the word with strong context clues that show meaning, and match the word to the correct picture. For the second section they can study the exercises we did in class and memorize the sentence for the text because it must not only be correct usage, but also punctuated correctly with all words spelled correctly.

Core 1 and 3 continued reading The Outsiders in class, while Core 2 worked on writing the first five pages of the sequel, which is due this Friday, October 10.

The most exciting activity has been the 1965 research projects, which are drawing to a close. Many students have completed the research, the movie, and the MLA citation page for sources. I won't accept them unless they are A or B quality, so I'm spending a lot of time looking at their work by way of Google, then e-mailing with what needs to be fixed. The video and research will be their first 80% summative grade, so they are important. The pictures I'm showing this week are of students helping and teaching other students how to do different required tasks associated with the project. Teaching reinforces their knowledge, and being taught by a peer is sometimes more effective than getting the information from the teacher. It gives me goosebumps when I see students reach that point in learning. I've sent all students information to plan their next topic: they must use reading and writing to learn a topic or skill and decide a final product, such as a video, skit, e-portfolio, etc.

ECO did an activity from Sir Kenneth Robinson's Finding Your Element to see how their time is currently spent to consider how the want to spend time in future jobs. They also completed a short job predictor and read about jobs.

Encore is almost finished with Honus and Me. Their discussions of the book have become very targeted. It's not unusual for someone to raise a hand and say, I'd like to make a prediction. . ."