English+Language+Arts

__Thursday, October 25, 2012__ Today the students continued to work on their newspaper articles, many typing out their final copy! __Wednesday, October 24, 2012__ Today the students continued to work on their newspaper articles, by writing their rough drafts!!

__Tuesday, October 23, 2012__ Today the students continued to work on their newspaper articles. We discussed the organization/format of newspaper articles, reporting tips, and finally the different topics that the students can choose from to write about. The students were given research time to answer the 5W's about their topic.

__Thursday, October 18, 2012__ Today we started our last ELA project together - writing a newspaper article. The students started by looking through different newspapers and finding different text features, formats, and similarities between all of them. After we discussed the 5W's and why reporters use these five questions when they are reporting news stories. The students were given nursery rhymes to write out the 5W's for each rhyme for practice.

__Wednesday, October 17, 2012__ Today we finished IQBAL!!! The students who were here for the entire novel took the test on the novel and finished the final vocabulary and review questions.

__Monday, October 15, 2012__ Today we continued to read chapter 11 of Iqbal.

__Thursday, October 11, 2012__ Today the students were given time to finish their vocabulary and review questions.

__Wednesday, October 10, 2012__ Today we read Chapters 9 and 10 of Iqbal together,making connections, predictions and summarizing each chapter. After the students started their vocabulary and five review questions for Chapters 6-10.

__Tuesday, October 9, 2012__ Today we read Chapter 8 of Iqbal, making connections, predictions and summarizing each chapter.

__Tuesday, October 2, 2012__ Today we read chapters 6 & 7 of Iqbal, making connections, predictions and summarizing each chapter. After the students were given time to complete the three vocabulary worsd and five review questions from the first five chapters.

__Monday, October 1, 2012__ Today we read chapter 5 of Iqbal and the students were given time to complete three vocabulary words and five review questions from the first five chapters.

__Friday, September 28, 2012__ Today we read chapters 2-4 of Iqbal, making connections, predictions and summarizing each chapter.

__Thursday, September 27, 2012__ Today we read and summarized the first chapter of Iqbal! The students had to make a prediction of what the chapter was going to be about then also make a connection to the chapter.

__Tuesday, September 25, 2012__ Today the students and I reviewed their "Resisting Hitler" questions. After we started the introduction to our new read aloud: "Iqbal". The introduction included making connections to the setting of the novel, Pakistan, and predicting what they know about child labour.

__Monday, September 24, 2012__ Today the students had time to finish their RAD assessments and "Resisting Hitler" questions. Once they were finished they had time to AR read.

__Friday, September 21, 2012__ Today the students were given extra time to finish their RAD assessments. After they were complete they were asked to finish their "Resisting Hitler" questions.

__Thursday, September 20, 2012__ Today the students started their RAD assessments in the morning. In the afternoon we reviewed the "Universal Soldier" and "First They Came" pieces. After the students were asked to read an article entitled "Resisting Hitler". During reading the article the students were given sticky notes to write any connections they could make to the article on.

__Tuesday, September 18, 2012__ Today the students completed their bi-annual Schnoell Spelling Test with the substitute.

__Friday, September 14, 2012__ Today we finished reading and reviewing the Tupac "And 2morrow" poem. After we took a look at Buffy Sainte-Marie's song "Universal Soldier". The students both read the lyrics and listened to the song to answer questions. We then compared the song to a short poem entitled "First They Came".

__Tuesday, September 11, 2012__ Today the students were given time to finish their "Change the World" poems. We went over a few things to remember when writing poems, like being specific, using creative comparisons, and being concise. After we started looking at a poem by Tupac Shakur, with the students making predictions on what the poem and author would be about.

__Monday, September 10, 2012__ Today the students discussed what TOOLS they possess that can help them change the world. We talked about different values such as respect and caring and other aspects such as education and freedom. The were then asked to take all these words and start a short 5-lined poem on changing the world.

__Friday, September 7, 2012__ Today we reviewed the names of difference makers and talked about how they, as one person, changed the world! We then discussed if the world can be changed or not. The students listened to four songs, each with different perspectives on changing the world, and the students had to decide whether each had a positive or negative message. After, the students brainstormed different things that need to be changed in the world.

__Thursday, September 6, 2012__ Today the students continued to work on and finished their three SMART goals. After we completed a categorizing activity where the students had to organize names of difference makers into specific groups.

__Tuesday, September 4, 2012__ Goal Setting! Today we talked about the importance of aiming before you shoot or planning before you set a goal. The students came up with a list of 10 different goals and then chose three of those goals to make SMART - Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Timed. The students were asked to have one goal by on AR points, one about their character, and one of their choice.