February 23, 2015 - February 27, 2015 Contemporary Composition

Monday, February 23rd:
The classes are taught by Mr. Alex Fox
1st Period:
Gatsby Themes Intro
What is the American Dream?
Definitions
Lecture
Whole Class Discussion

Period 2:
The Bluest Eye Intro: Self-image, Gender and Race
Music Video: Summarizing sentences of themes found in music videos
Compare/Contrast paragraphs on themes, images and messages found in music videos
John Legend. Callie Caillais, Stevie Wonder, Bruno Mars, Nas, India Arie, Christina Aguilera

Tuesday, February 24th:
The classes are taught by Mr. Alex Fox
1st Period:
Preparation for THE GREAT GATSBY
Questionnaire Handout: "Values in American Culture"
Students work in pairs to answer the questionnaire
Power Point:
The American Dreams and the American Character (Values)
Gap Fill Reading and Discussion

2nd Period:
The Bluest Eye Introduction: Self-Image: Gender and Race
Explicit Instruction: Grammar, Formal Academic Discourse Markers
Music Video: Summarizing Sentences and Compare/Contrast Paragraph on Themes, Images and Message from two of the videos they chose
Videos: John Legend, Callie Caillais, Stevie Wonder, Bruno Mars, Mas, India Arie, Christina  Aguilera

Wednesday, February 25th:
Turn in books and check out new books
The classes are taught by Mr. Alex Fox 

1st Period:
The American Dream
Kurt Vonnegut's speech on America's poor's Self-loathing
Discussion
American Values and Culture Handout
Writing assignment
Gap fill on American Values

2nd  period:
Warm-ups:
"Self-Identification: Race and Gender"
Students defined race and gender
Discussion
Critical Analysis
Introduction to THE BLUEST EYE
Critical Summary and Analysis of Video: Self-Image, Race, Gender, and Beauty
Stevie Wonder - "Isn't She Lovely"
John Legend - "You and I"
India Arie - "Video" and "I Am Not My Hair"
Colbie Caillait - "Try"


Thursday, February 26th:
1st Period:
Power point: Wealth Inequality
Video: what wealth distribution really looks like in America
Discussion
Power point:
The Roaring Twenties
Discussion
F. Scott Fitzgerald
Read the first five pages of The Great Gatsby

2nd Period:
Discussion of Beauty: what does a beautiful man and woman look like?
PowerPoint: examples of female beauty in the media: Disney heroines
Video: Whoopie Goldberg's One Woman a Show
Watch video and summarize the main message of each:
Author's name  plus academic verb plus 7 - 10 word summary of the main point:
Academic Verbs:
Assert, claim, report, attest, argue, purport, deny, imply, suggest, demonstrate, etc.
Read a passage from THE BLUEST EYE
Discussion:
What do we learn about the book, the characters, the possible themes, etc. from this passage.
Questions: is this a child?
Making connections:
1. How are the themes addressed in Whoopie Goldberg's show  addressed in the passage from THE BLUEST EYE
2. How has your race, gender, ethnicity shaped your understanding of beauty?

Friday, February 27th:
1st Period:
Excerpt from Ken Burns' "The Jazz Age"
Vocabulary game from "The Great Gatsby
Students are divided into three teams. Twenty difficult words from the first chapter are written on the board. Students are given a handout with the words, their definitions, and the excerpts from the THE GREAT GATSBY from which the words were taken; however, the vocabulary words are deleted from the excerpts.  Mr. Fox reads an excerpt aloud, but makes a funny sound rather than saying the vocabulary word in the excerpt. The students are to put a mark next to the word they think should go in the blank.  The exercise is designed to help students learn vocabulary through the use of context.

Students are to read the first ten pages of THE GREAT GATSBY.

2nd Period:
A paragraph from THE BLUEST EYE is shown on the screen. Students read the excerpt and a class discussion is held.
Video: "A Girl Like Me"
Write down responses and any questions you may have about the video.
Small group discussion follows about the video.
Guiding Questions:
1. How do the ideas presented in the music videos, the Whoopie Goldberg monologue, and the documentary, "A Girl Like Me"connect to the ideas expressed in the excerpt from THE BLUEST EYE and the character of Pecola Breedlove?
2. How did your gender, race, or ethnicity shape your self-image?

Power Point: Pictures from THE DICK and JANE series. Discussion regarding gender and race stereotypes.
Analyze the prologue from THE BLUEST EYE. Why does Toni Morrisson lay out the print on the page in that manner? What thematic point do you think she is making?

February 17, 20015 - February 20, 2015 Contemporary Composition

Monday, February 16th:
No school today. President's Day

Tuesday, February 17th:
1st and 2nd Periods:
Mr. Fox will be teaching the class today.
The class will be in the library and working on the graphic organizers  in preparation for the essay portion for the Interim Assessment for Smarter Balance

Wednesday, February 18th:
1st and 2nd periods:
Mr. Fox will be teaching the class today.
The class will be in the library and working on the essay for the Interim Assessment for Smarter Balance

Thursday, February 19th:
1st and 2nd Periods:
Students will be in the library today to work on the final report. The  final report will be due at the end of the period on Friday.

Friday, February 20th:
1st and 2nd Periods:
Students will be working in 503 to finish their reports which must be finished by the end of class on Friday.

February 9, 2015 - February 13, 2015 Weekly Agenda for Contemporary Composition

Monday, February 9^th:

1^st Period:

Turn in posters for The Bluest Eye

Answer the 8 questions over the last three pages of The Bluest Eye 

Final Questions for The Bluest Eye:

1.    How does Morrison use bird imagery to describe Pecola? Cite specific sentences Morrison uses to describe Pecola.

2.    What was the reaction of the people of Lorain to Pecola after her breakdown? Be specific. Cite specific sentences as evidence to support your answers.

3.    A scapegoat is someone that other people blame for the mistakes  a community makes. It comes from the Old Testament where the Israelites would send a goat, symbolically burdened with the people’s collective sins from the previous year, from the village into the desert – symbolically removing the villages’ sins. How is Pecola the scapegoat for Lorain, Ohio? Write in grammatically correct answers. Thoroughly answer the question and use evidence from the book to support your answers.

4.    How did the people of Lorain use the defects, the flaws, the deficiencies of Pecola to make them feel better about themselves?

5.    According to Morrison, what kind of people did the community of Lorain become as a result of their abuse of Pecola?

6.    Marigolds represent grief and cruelty. Why does Morrison use the seeds of marigolds in this story?

7.    What does Morrison mean when she writes, “Love is no better than the lover.”

8.    Read the next the last paragraph on page 206, starting with, “Oh, some of us loved her.” What does Morrison mean when she writes, “The loved one is shorn, neutralized, frozen in the glare of the lover’s inward eye.”

2^nd Period:

Break into groups to work on “HOT SEAT” for The Great Gatsby

HOT SEAT!

Tuesday, February 10^th:

Went over the culminating questions 1, 2, 3, and 5 for the last chapter in The Bluest Eye  together in class.

1.     Answer is on page 204, “Elbows on shoulders….but which filled the valleys of the mind.” Christian - A

2.     The people of Lorain avoided Pecola, and looked away. Claudia and Frieda wanted to talk to Pecola but couldn’t because they believed they failed her.  The people of the community believed that the rape and the pregnancy were Pecola’s fault. “She be all to blame. She ought to be pulled out of school.”  The people judged Pecola harshly to make themselves feel better about themselves. Astrid and Justin

3.     Junior blamed Pecola (used her as a scapegoat) for the death of the cat – Jasmine. The community put all the blame on her. “Pecola is somewhere in that little brown house, on the edges of the town.” Pecola did have the prostitutes who liked her – Maria. Claudia and Frieda thought that since the prostitutes liked Pecola,  they thought the prostitutes would be nice to the sisters, but the sisters revealed that they did not really like the prostitutes which caused them to turn on the sisters. Jalen – Pecola did things, ran errands for the prostitutes so they did not hate her.  Not hating someone is a far cry from loving. Cynthia – the people of Lorain did not look Pecola in the eye anymore. Her one and only mistake was to be born into the wrong family – Cynthia.

4.     Cynthia – “We were not strong, we were aggressive. We were not free, we were merely licensed.”

Participation credit for today: Jasmine, Kamron, Christian, Jalen, Christian, Maria, Cynthia, Astrid, Araksi,

Went over the first three essay questions for The Bluest Eye.

2^nd Period:

Hot Seat for The Great Gatsby 

Wednesday, February 11th: 

1st and 2nd Periods:
Interim Assessment
The class will be taught by Mr. Alex Fox

Thursday, February 12th: 

1st Period:
The class will be taught by Mr. Fox
Vocabulary Charades
Power Point Presentation:
Photos of oil slick
Discussion about assumptions
Analyzing Cartoon Data as Text
Assessment Task
Choosing Your Sources
Definitions: Primary, Secondary
Source Credibility
Types of Websites
Video on sources
Note-taking template
Summarizing sentence

2nd Period:
Interim Assessment

The class will be taught by Mr. Alex Fox
"Power Point: It's Your Turn"
Read and annotate the short opinion piece on vaccination
Data - Analyzing energy sources 

Friday, February 13th: 

1st and 2nd Periods: 

Interim Assessment

The class will be taught by Mr. Alex Fox 

Culminating Essay Questions Over THE BLUEST EYE

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The following questions will act as a final test. You will answer these in class and they will be due at the end of the period.

Write in complete, grammatically correct answers. Thoroughly answer the questions and use evidence from the book to support your answers.

Final Questions for The Bluest Eye:

1.    How does Morrison use bird imagery to describe Pecola? Cite specific sentences Morrison uses to describe Pecola.

2.    What was the reaction of the people of Lorain to Pecola after her breakdown? Be specific. Cite specific sentences as evidence to support your answers.

3.    A scapegoat is someone that other people blame for the mistakes a community makes.  It comes from the Old Testament where the Israelites would send a goat, symbolically burdened with the people’s collective sins from the previous year, from the village into the desert – symbolically removing the village’s sins. How is Pecola the scapegoat for Lorain, Ohio?

4.    How did the people of Lorain use the defects, the flaws, the deficiencies of Pecola to make them feel better about themselves?

5.    According to Morrison, what kind of people did the community of Lorain become as a result of their abuse and neglect of Pecola?

6.    Marigolds represent grief and cruelty. Why does Morrison use the seeds of marigolds in this story?

7.    What does Morrison mean when she writes, “Love is no better than the lover.”

8.    Read the next the last paragraph on page 206, starting with, “Oh, some of us loved her.” What does Morrison mean when she writes, “The loved one is shorn, neutralized, frozen in the glare of the lover’s inward eye.”