Class Outline: Wednesday

1. Silent Reading: Catch up on Resilience Readers, Chains 1-5, silent reading or study vocabulary. Please don't read Chains 6 yet.
2. Vocabulary Quiz
3. Time to work on paragraph for Chapter 5 and complete all the questions for up to 5. Chapter 1-5 questions are due at the end of class. 
4. Copy out vocab for Chapter 6.
5. Based on the vocab, predict what you think will happen in Chapter 6. 
6. Class reads Chapter 6 (for homework if not done)

Resilient Figures

Hi all,

We are going to start looking at specific resilient people and how they show the attributes we studied.

• How does Rick Hansen show resilience in this video? Is it easy to see the same sort of resilience in our own lives? 
• Starting resilience: 
• Read "The Only Wheelchair in Town" 
• As you read, write down any words you don't know on a post-it note.
• Review any unknown words.
• Re-read the story, this time underline all the words or phrases that suggest adversity or challenges (ex. "wimped out"), and all the words that suggest resilience (ex. "I owed her an apology"). 
• With your list of attributes in front of you, create a T-chart where you copy from the story adversity words on one side and resilience words on the other. Try reading between the lines to look for how attributes are expressed.
• Share your t-chart with your group. What others ones did they find? Hand this in.

Historical figure

Your next assignment will be to look at explorers stories of resilience to answer the sub-question “How did
explorers have resilience?” 
1. You should go on the website http://beyondthemap.ca/english/explorers.html
2. Please read over a couple of the explorers and think about what ones you want to do. You will pick the same one as your partner. 
Groupings: 
-Gabe C
-Sylvie, Tyson
-Kira, Nikki
-Marissa, Jade
-Megan, Gabe J
-Zach, Hudson
-Conor, Parker
-Kiera, Amber
-Landon, Ming

3. With your partner, research a resilient explorer. You need to identify at least three resilient attributes he or she embodied. Later we will interview community members who show resilience and connect them to our own stories and stories from the past. These historical figures will be the pool we can choose from to connect with community members and personal stories. After you submit your research, you will create a  page on a class Google site with this all compiled. Right now, you should write in your Explorers doc in you humanities assignment folder. 

Contact Sheet for Grade 3 Art

Please look at the contact sheet for the grade 3 art.

Contact Sheet Link

Tuesday 

Complete a storyboard for your book. The starred areas need to be complete. You do not have to copy out the full text for each square. You have two choices:

1. You print off your story. Using 2+ different colours, alternate underlining what goes on each page.
2. Make a copy of your story in your assignment folder. Divide up using enter to show what is on each page. Print this out and hand it in with your storyboard.

Your pictures in your storyboard should show a rough idea of what will be in each picture. Please write the number of the image you want to use in the text box area.

This should be done for homework if not finished in class.

Here is a good website telling you how to select an image in GIMP

http://www.gimp.org/tutorials/Changing_Background_Color_2/

Updates On What We Are Doing

I figured I would write an update post so that if you or your parents want a refresher of what we are doing in class you can check here.

We have been using Trello.com to monitor where we are in the short story editing process. Students should be done a rough copy, given themselves a mark on the rubric, and working on fixing at least one area from the rubric to move it up on the scale. This should be done by Thursday. 

Next Steps

Feedback and Thinking About Rants

Reminder of our questions for this project:

How can we build a media campaign to express our voices to a public audience?

•  What is the difference between speaking for yourself and having others speak for you?
• How are different viewpoints presented in the media?
•  How does the media influence concepts of self and others?
• What are the elements of different forms of media?

Class Outline

1. Silent Reading

• If you did your 1 min wonder last week, please go back and fill in your goal setting journal. I will give you your mark on the rubric.

2. "Basics" rubric: Some edits I see.

3. Hand back feedback from blog posts. Please go through and edit your posts. If you think you mark should be adjusted, please come speak with me and bring your rubric.

4. Read over the blog posts of all other students. Please comment on at least 3 giving two things you like. You may not be able to post comments on all blogs.

5. Pick your rant topic!

In your rant, you will need to pick a topic that allows you to:

• defend a position on a controversial issue after considering a variety of perspectives
• analyse roots of present-day regional, cultural, and social issues within Canada

We will develop the requirements for the rant over then next couple of weeks. At this stage, you should be doing some basic research on areas of interest to you.

• You will be picking a modern regional cultural or social issues within Canada (may also be worldwide). 
• You will need to find information from both sides of the issue and some background about the deeper historic roots of the issue. For example, if you want to do women in the media, you will also go back to look at the history of women's rights. 
• You should be looking to see if there is good information about the topic online (more than Wikipedia or ask.com). 
• When you find a good source, paste its URL in a doc in your NLC folder. 

Over the next couple of days you will be asked to pick a topic that you think you can research and argue well based on your preliminary searches. 

Miss Representation

You will look at devices in the film "Miss Representation" to help you learn about how to apply persuasive devices to your own work. You will watch the film "Miss Representation" paying attention to the device your group is focusing on.

After-Viewing

Blog Post

After viewing, you will create a blog post explaining what the device you studied is and how it is represented in the film. This will be used to teach devices to other students.

Steps

1. Discuss with your partner the different examples of the device seen in the film.
2. Come up with a few good examples of how the device is seen in the film.
3. Share your examples with another group for feedback.
4. Develop a written work "basics" checklist and rubric.
5. Write a blog post. It should include:

• the definition of the device
• the title of the film
• the argument (thesis) of the film summarized in a sentence
• examples of how the devices is seen in the film
• an explanation as to how this device is used to help develop or argue the filmmaker's perspective

6. Send Beth the link to your post (from 'View Post'). These will be collected and posted in one section.

Blog Post: Devices

		Excellent		Very Good	Satisfactory	Min.  Acceptable
Socials: select and summarize information from sources		Fully and thoroughly identifies all necessary information from the source		Identifies all necessary information from the source	Identifies most information from the source, some may be misunderstood or omitted	Identifies some of the information from the source
Reading and Viewing: recognize and explain how persuasive devices shape viewers’ construction of meaning to support filmmaker’s argument		Identifies an example of the device and fully explores how the filmmaker uses it to advance his/her argument		Identifies an example of the device and connects its use to the filmmaker’s argument	Identifies an example of the device.	Identifies an example of the devices. May not be fully correct or misinterpreted.
Oral: use strategies to understand, recall, and analyse texts to identify main points		Accurately identifies the filmmaker’s argument in concise terms		Accurately identifies the filmmaker’s argument	Somewhat identifies the filmmaker’s argument	Identifies the main points in the film without phrasing it as an argument. May be incorrect or misinterpreted.

Blog Post 2: Respond to Ideas

1. Create a formal paragraph (topic sentence, support, closing sentence) describing your reaction to the film. Include a image or link to another site.
2. Extension: Support your idea and learn more by visiting some of these sites:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24522060
http://www.cbc.ca/player/AudioMobile/As%2BIt%2BHappens/ID/2412250245/ (7:30 mark)

Blog Post: Response

	Excellent	Very Good	Satisfactory	Min. Acceptable
Writing: explains and supports personal responses to texts by  making connections with prior knowledge and experiences
Oral: identifies and analyzes purpose and messages in the film

Rant Lesson 2 Wednesday

Since we have been busy with many unexpected items, I am combining earlier classes into this one so we have a outline of today's class.

Class Outline

1. Silent Reading
2. Presentations by Gabe C, Kiera, and Landon.
3. Journal 

• Use the same journal you used for the last activity (what others said about you).

• Make sure your journal is in your NLC folder. Beth will comment on it. If you do not have comments please ensure Beth can see it.

• Write at least 5-10 full sentences answering:

• What was difficult or challenging about the Express Yourself activity?

• What were you impressed by or surprised about in someone else's work?

• Do you think you really expressed yourself to your best ability here? Why or why not?

4. Twitter activity

You will use Twitter to tweet out reflections from the class or share something you think others would find interesting, using the NLC twitter account as your platform.

• Hashtags

• Pictures

• Links

When you take your turn posting to twitter, write your name on the calendar.
What are some examples of things we can reflect on via twitter?

5. Rants continued

• Get in your groups again. This time, use dictionaries, textbooks, online, to come up with definitions for each of your devices  you hypothesised about yesterday. In your shared doc (share with Beth) write down the definitions for each.

• Go back to the rant and find an example of each of the devices. 

• Find another group that has one of the same devices as you. Compare definitions and examples. Come up with a shared definition and list both definitions on a shared doc. Move around the room and do this for all devices.

• You were sent a shared doc with further instructions on devices.

Rant: Devices and Techniques

Class Outline

1. Silent Reading
2. In groups of 2 or 3, watch a few examples of Rick Mercer's Rants from Youtube.
3. As you watch and after each film, brainstorm with your group all the things he says and does to argue his point and convince his viewers. 
4. With your group, you will be given a rant and a list of devices. Watch the rant and come up with a hypothesis as to what the definition of each device might be, and what one example of that device is in the rant.

Videos

Pandas

• Appeal to authority
• Allusion
• Declarative Sentences
• Hyperbole
• Irony
• Sarcasm
• Sentence Fragment
• Tone

Scientists Muzzled Again

• Allusion
• Anecdote
• Imperative Sentences
• Interrogative Sentences
• Irony
• Sarcasm
• Sentence Fragment
•  Simile

Relapse/Question Period

• Allusion
• Anecdote
• Exclamatory Sentences
• Interrogative Sentences
• Irony
•  Rhetorical questioning
• Sentence Fragment
• Tone

Teen Suicide

• Allusion
• Anecdote
•  Exclamatory Sentences
• Imperative Sentences
• Interrogative Sentences
• Repetition
• Simile
• Tone

Snow Day

• Anecdote
• Exclamatory Sentences
• Hyperbole
• Imperative Sentences
• Interrogative Sentences
• Rhetorical questioning
• Slang
• Tone

        

·    

Media Campaign: The Intro to the Rant (Persuasive)

Monday Class Outline

1. Silent reading

2. Presentation of Creative Expressions

• Remember to explain why this shows you as an individual and the process you used. 

3. Journal 

• Use the same journal you used for the last activity (what others said about you).
• Make sure your journal is in your NLC folder. Beth will comment on it. If you do not have comments please ensure Beth can see it.
• Write at least 5-10 full sentences answering:
• What was difficult or challenging about the Express Yourself activity?
• What were you impressed by or surprised about in someone else's work?
• Do you think you really expressed yourself to your best ability here? Why or why not?

4. Blogs

• Take a picture, video, etc. of your creative response and post it to your blog.
• Make sure you give it a descriptive title, labels, and write a few sentences explaining it to your readers. 
• Write your name on the list to signify you have done this. 

5. Twitter activity

You will use Twitter to tweet out reflections from the class or share something you think others would find interesting, using the NLC twitter account as your platform.

• Mentions
• Hashtags
• Pictures
• Links

When you take your turn posting to twitter, write your name on the calendar. 

What are some examples of things we can reflect on via twitter?

Media Campaign: Class 1 (Friday, Sept 20)

Updates:
Steve and I have shifted the schedule to accommodate the new Grade 8 timetable. NLC will now have STEM Block C and Humanities Block D daily.

Class Outline:

1. Check In: where is everyone at for their Express Yourself Challenge? Express Yourself Challenge: Plan/Draft Due on Tuesday! 
2. Silent Reading
3. Dystopian: 

• What is it? 
• How authors use the genre to express their concerns or critique the world they live in

     4. Mr. Yule's Grade 12 Writing Class visit.

• In small groups, Grade 12 students will present the dystopic stories they have written. 
• NLC students will discuss with the authors what they were trying to convey and how they tried to convey it in their writing. 
• NLC students will give Grade 12 students feedback using the supplied rubric and "I like, I like, You might want to try."   

Depending on when Mr. Yule's class arrives, silent reading may occur at the end of class.