View Act II Scene II over the weekend. Come prepared for our debate on Monday! Can't wait to hear what you come up with.

My reading for the week has consisted of wonderful student narratives and informational reading on Columnist in preparation for an exciting unit we are creating for the B trimester.

Student narratives: The reason I'm enjoying these narratives is because I'm noticing purposeful and authentic dialogue, precise word choice for imagery and setting, and intentional structuring of the text to increase suspense. Thank you for using our short stories as models to incorporate these techniques in your own writing!

The Art of Column Writing by Suzette Martinez Standring: We can use this book as the backbone of the unit. I see lesson potential for writing leads, endings, subject matter, self-revision, and concise writing. There are also several quotes from famous columnist which I think could be used as conversation starters for each lesson. There are several examples of columns which include models for each of these lessons. I can't wait to hear about what my colleagues are reading about in regards to column writing!

Bloggers of the Week

Okay...I tried to get one from each class, but all of our bloggers came from Period One. Step it up Period Two!

Peyton has a great section that analyzes figurative language and how it changes meaning and tone in her Sept. 24th post.

Ever wonder what a book would sound like? Check out Jessica's album for Catcher in the Rye.

Read Trang's for voice. It may seem informal, but she's honest, direct, and casual, and has a unique style.

Kay's blog is great for hearing what it's like to love reading. You can feel her passion as you follow what she is reading.

Good work all!

Wabi-Sabi

I finished Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life over the weekend. Although it wasn't as comical as I thought it was going to be, it helped me to consider finding the extraordinary in the ordinary. Also, something great happened. I found a word to describe how I've been feeling lately. Wabi-Sabi. Apparently, the author had been in search of this word too, and thankfully shared the word when she found it. She said she was looking for a word that meant "complete happiness and complete sadness simultaneously" where you feel "content, peaceful, hyper-aware of loss, in awe, perfectly, gently happy/sad" (205). She eventually found the word from 12th century Japanese history. Wabi-Sabi means "fusing two moods seamlessly; a sigh of slightly bittersweet contentment, awareness of transience of earthly things, and a resigned pleasure in simple things that bear the mark of that transience."

This is precisely the word I have been looking for. It's how I feel when I look at my newborn baby girl and am so in love with her big blue eyes, her round cheeks, and her pure spirit. I'm so perfectly happy with my child, yet I realize that this moment is incredibly fleeting, and that she will too soon grow out of this newborn stage, and eventually it will just be a memory that I will be desperately trying to cling to. Because of the "transience of earthly things" it makes this perfect moment of joy also a perfect moment of sadness/awareness that this too will pass as quickly as it came.

This is also the feeling Sayuri would often get in Memoirs of a Geisha and goes back to the discussion of the purpose of a fleeting life mentioned in my earlier posts.

Blogger of the Week Friday the 13th

Honors English Only:  

 

We will begin implementing something I'm going to call the "Blogger of the Week." I'm going to feature someone's blog every Friday. The "feature blogger" will be someone who has posted something that I believe is model-worthy and will help you understand the expectations of the rubric. In most cases, the feature blogger goes above and beyond the expectations of the rubric. I'm asking that each weekend you comment on that person's blog. We have seven more weeks of blogging and you will receive two points for each meaningful, quality comment you make for blogger of the week, therefore this will be a 14 point assignment. This 14 point assignment will be separate from your rubric.

 

 

Our first featured blog will be Jessica W. I would like for you to read through her page, but pay close attention to the September 8th post "Justice is Served." Jessica perfectly meets the expectation for the characters section of the rubric. Notice that she makes assertions on how the character changes or develops, but provides textual evidence to support each assertion and adds her own analysis to connect the quote to the assertion. In addition, Jessica provides a symbol to represent her character and explains in depth how this symbol represents each character's development and how this advances the plot. She also looks at all sides of the character and mentions several traits that are revealed throughout the story about each character. Well done, Jessica!

Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life

I'm still not finished with Outliers, but Barnes and Noble called and informed me that I book I ordered, Encyclopedia of an Ordinary Life, was in. It's such a quick read, I'm already on page 92 and need to talk about it. Starting on page two, I haven't stopped laughing. The way this book begins is basically mocking the format of how books are published. Instead of being a memoir written like a narrative, it's a memoir written by meshing together a bunch of random stories and things that have happened in her life by putting them into a category and inserting this into an encylopedia like format. For instance, she'll state something like "Bowling" as her header and then give a short (paragraph or two) blurb or story about that header. (see example!)

 

Penny Kittle, author of Book Love, used this book as a model for a quick, beginning of class, prompt. I may use this in my classes to start class by having them use the header "LOCKERS" for example and have them write a short statement about what comes to mind when they think about lockers. 

 

Outliers

I've finally picked up Outliers! So far, it's been an interesting read. To summarize, it basically explores how different successful paper have become successful. It goes against popular beliefs that hard work alone can help a person overcome all obstacles and become uber-successful. Instead, it suggests that there are certain qualities, such as a person's age or birth month, that contribute to an outlier's success. While Gladwell does give some credit to hard work, such as the 10,000 hour rule, he argues that it has more to do with opportunities presented to these individuals. I'm only on chapter five, so we'll see where he goes with this. The most interesting observation that Gladwell has made so far is his assertion that there is an "intelligence threshold." He says while there is a difference between those with an IQ of 70 and and IQ of 170, that anyone with an IQ of 130 or over has an equal chance of becoming a Noble Prize Winner or something successful. He states, "once someone has reached an IQ of somewhere around 120, having additional IQ points doesn't seem to translate into any measurable real-world advantage" (Gladwell, 79). I thought this was cool, since my husband has an IQ in this threshold. Here is Anderson Cooper's interview with Malcolm Gladwell. He states that he wanted to explore the factors surrounding those who are successful, rather than examining the successful person themselves. He argues that it's not the born geniuses or those with "luck" who are successful, but where and when they grew up.

The Purpose of this Blog

This blog can be used as an outlet for sharing thoughts surrounding independent reading. This meets the standard that asks students to "use technology, including the internet, to produce, publish, and update individual or shared writing products, taking advantage of technology's capacity to link to other information and to display information flexibly and dynamically." Students can link to goodreads.com to create a place to track how much they've read, talk about what they're reading, link to information surrounding your reading, read/comment on other's reading, among other features.

the importance of kindness

Throughout Memoirs of a Geisha, the main character, Chiyo/Sayuri, grapples with the seeming pointlessness of life. After finding out her mother's death is near she comments "Was life nothing more than a storm that constantly washed away what had been there only a moment before, and left behind something barren and unrecognizable (13)?" She also states, after relaying her memoir to the reader, that "whatever our struggles and triumps, however we may suffer them, all too soon they bleed into a wash, just like watery ink on paper (428)." For someone who struggles with the pointlessness of life, she finds something very meaningful about 1/3 of the way through the book. When Chiyo is at her lowest point, and crying by the river, a man comes up to her and offers her comforting words, money, and a handkerchief. He says, "We non of us find as much kindness in this world as we should (112)." He then offers her a treat. She then goes on to say she tried to thank him, "for showing me that something besides cruelty could be found in the world, I suppose (113)." It's the first time she's encountered someone in her narrative that has shown her true kindness, and it's the reason that motivates her to turn around and become a geisha.

Another place Golden reveals the importance of kindness is through the character Mameha. Mameha goes out of her way to make Chiyo her little sister and is the main reason Chiyo becomes one of the most successful Geisha of her time. For example, Chiyo relays, "I'd grown accustomed to wearing Mameha's kimono, but in fact, it's unusual for a geisha to lend out robes from her collection this way. Two friends in gion might trade Kimono for a night or two; but it's rare for an older geisha to show such kindness to a young girl (193)." Chiyo believes that Mameha has interior motives for helping her, like getting revenge on another geisha (Hatsumomo), but in reality we find out that Mameha is just doing a favor for the Chairman (the man Chiyo met that showed her kindness). It is clear Mameha and the Chairman are both interested in helping Chiyo and are pure-hearted.

Another character that shows Chiyo kindness is Nobu. Nobu is attracted to Chiyo, but despite his interior motive to become her danna, he shows Chiyo/Sayuri kindness throughout her life, including finding a safe place for her to live during the peak of WWII that possibly saved her life. The disappointing factor is that Sayuri betrays Nobu later in the book because of her own selfish desires, which lead me to question the character of Sayuri herself. She also makes decisions, although partially out of her hands, that betray both Mameha and another close friend. It would have been nice to see Sayuri return the kindness that was shown to her. The Kirkus Review mentioned that the end was "increasingly flat." I agree the plot line was predictable and disappointing at the end.

A Garage Sale Gem

My husband and I go to garage sales on a regular basis. My main reason for garage sale-ing is to find used books for my classroom library. Recently, I came across a book at one of these sales that I hadn't read yet, but the back cover made it sound intriguing. I decided to read it before I put it on my class shelf. Memoirs of a Geisha is a fake narrative of the life and times of a geisha from early childhood to old age, with a focus mainly on her time as a geisha. At first I wasn't certain what a geisha was, so I did some research and found that a geisha is basically a professional entertainer whose responsibilities include engaging company in conversations, dancing or playing music, or involving company in drinking games. I was also unsure of the pronunciation so I went to webster and discovered there are actually two pronunciations. I also learned that there were many geisha districts, such as the setting of the book, Kyoto's Gion Geisha district. I have a friend who recently traveled to Kyoto, whose picture can be seen below: So far, what I've enjoyed about this book are some of the true lines that I've found and enjoyed: "Was life nothing more than a storm that constantly washed away what had been there only a moment before, and left behind something barren and unrecognizable?" pg. 13

Intrigued...

As I was searching for "multicultural reading material" to incorporate into our curriculum, I came across the short story by Amy Tan entitled "Two Kinds"

I was intrigued by this story because of my recent obsession with chinese parenting. I had read a few other short stories by Amy Tan (fish eyes) and realized I had never read one of her most famous worksThe Joy Luck Club.I picked up a copy at Joseph Beth's in Cincinnati.

The book is broken up into different stories about four mothers and their four daughters woven around this Joy Luck club they have. My favorite story so far is one of the mother's tales "The Red Candle." It discusses the constraints of an arranged marriage.

the battle continues

More Tiger Mom Reading... Today I came into a conversation with one of Brady’s friend’s mom (who is from India) about education. She told me that her husband is spending the year working in India and one of her twin boys is with him, while she stays in America with the other twin boy (Brady’s friend). Apparently, the twin is already reading level 2 books, spelling words, and writing. She said when he comes to America he will be way ahead of his twin brother. This got me thinking AGAIN about the way asian families are educating their children vs. american parenting styles and schools. So, my reading this week turned into a search about Asian schooling/parenting…

Hidden Tigers

Chinese Parenting

Battle Hymn of a Tiger Mother

Last weekend I read Battle Hymn of a Tiger Mother. I flew through this book because of my interest in the subject. After reading, I have a few opinions of my own: 1) Amy Chua takes things too far by rejecting her daughter’s birthday card because “it wasn’t good enough,” calling her daughter “trash,” and criticizing her daughters at every turn. However, there were some take aways from this book. She worked with her daughters at a young age drilling rote memorization of multiplication, site words, etc. and had them practicing piano/violin for 4-5 hours a day. Also, on top of her job as a full-time Yale Law professor, she oversaw these tutoring sessions/piano & violin lessons HERSELF. No matter how crazy you think she is, that is very impressive. So, I was thinking about how I am raising my son, and what I might take away from this. Currently, I’ve moved to working with Brady 1 hour everyday (weekends included) on spelling, writing, reading, and math. Obviously this is nowhere near what her requirements are, but I do believe it will be beneficial to receive this 1 on 1 time learning with his mom, while still having the afternoon to learn through free play While I began trying rote memorization and drilling letters with him, I remembered my former research in early literacy and that it must be enjoyable if it’s going to stick in the long run. Since then, I’ve tried to come up with fun activities that encourage him to learn while being more than rote memorization. For example, we practiced site words by writing them on a large sheet of paper. Then I gave Brady a car and asked him to “park it” on a certain word like “the.” He would race his car around the table, and with some prompting, or not, would eventually find the word and place his car on top. He loved this. I also went out and bought stamps with every letter of the alphabet and different colored ink pads. I made these books where I would spell the word, have a place where he could stamp the word, and then a place where he would write it. He LOVED finding all the different letters and stamping them to form words like “CAT’ “DOG” and “BAT” in his book. After they were stamped he would practice writing them while sounding the word out. I’m continuing to find more ways to teach my four year old. Most of my time has been spent researching math and science ideas for preschoolers because I’m clueless. Some helpful articles I have read this week :

preschool math

preschool math 2

preschool science

Also, I’ve watched some videos surrounding the controversy and conversations started by Amy Chua’s book. The book was met with much criticism: \ interview