Another white day means another trip to the 9th circle. Brutal every single time, no matter what. I find it amazing how a 30-minute time period can drag when it's part of a class, yet when it's a lunch break, its like blinking. Maybe I just shouldn't blink...
Today was a full load of English 12 in that I saw very single one of them today. First block was a Groundhog Day of yesterday, and they did a pretty good job with the main idea and supporting sentences. Ok, honestly, at this point, I don't freaking remember how that one class went. I moved on to teach new material to my other classes (which previous said class will get tomorrow), and that class happened at the beginning of my 11 hour day. All my lessons seemed to go well today, but I will have to check their assessment to see how well it really went, or if they grasped it. Between thinking about my other lessons today, soccer stuff, and thinking about teaching tomorrow, first block might as well of been last week. It's just one of those days.
In my other English classes, the ones where I taught my other lesson and same lesson 3 times today, I do feel those went very well. We talked about paraphrasing and how properly use it to avoid plagiarism. The students, in groups, came up with as many paraphrasing ways to say something was dead (little bit of a Patch Adams scene), and they really enjoyed this. I don't think they thought paraphrasing was such a simple concept. While the concept may be simple, the application can be a little more difficult. I modeled how to paraphrase from an article I found online, then I had them paraphrase a different article in groups. The groups, for the most part, did an exceptional job with putting a tough passage in their own words and not plagiarising. The real litmus test will come when I grade the homework that is due tomorrow. If nothing else, they had some great examples of how to paraphrase, now if they can only do it. Guess I'll find out tomorrow.
In the 180 lab, we worked more on brainstorming and organizing for their writing. Its such a drastic change to go from teaching how to paraphrase to how to brainstorm, but these kids need it. They truly struggle with how to brainstorm even about themselves. We discussed how to organize a short essay on themselves, and they needed their hands held through the entire process. I guess its good that I am teaching the entire "writing process" in varying ways in my classes and covering literally the full gamut of it. I know this is probably a pipe dream, but I really hope I can teach these seniors and some other writing classes (like the creative writing class I'm trying to put together) for a very long time.
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