Tuesday, December 8th, 2009

Homework due tomorrow, Wednesday, December 9^th : Students should read from chapter 14 to chapter 19 of the Island of the Blue Dolphins, and then complete their Literature Circle tasks for that week.


Homework due, Thursday, December 10^th : Students should prepare for their spelling quiz. They should bring in five sentences, each containing a one of their spelling words.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.


Today during writing workshop we completed a lesson on using quotation marks to signal dialogue. The students then got a chance to use what they had learned by punctuating a paragraph that contained dialogue between two characters.

Great Literature Discussion Today!

Homework due tomorrow, Thursday, December 3rd: Students should bring in their completed spelling assignments.

Homework due Wednesday, December 9^th: Students should read from chapter 14 to chapter 19 of the Island of the Blue Dolphins, and then complete their Literature Circle tasks for that week.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

During todays literature class, the students discussed Island of the Blue Dolphins, from chapter 7 to chapter 13. Some of the questions discussed were, how mature was Karana’s six-year-old brother, Ramo; does the environment in the novel just serve as the setting, or is it also a character; what drove the Aleuts to become violent against other Indians? After a whole class discussion the students then broke into their four person Lit circles and continued their own discussions, with learning specialist MaryBeth Ventura and myself circulating though the classroom.

In cultural studies, the students started a review quiz on the four main Californian Indian tribes that we have been discussing. This review will be continued during our next class.

Questions For Memoirists

Homework due tomorrow, Wednesday, December 2nd: Students should bring in the work they did on their literature circle assignments, and be ready to discuss the 7^th to 13^th chapters of Island of the Blue Dolphins. Each student should be able to answer the following question. Who were the Aleuts?

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Continuing our work on personal memoirs the class read the handout, "Questions For Memoirists." We discussed the importance of writers choosing subjects that matter to them. If a writer is bored by their subject very likely their readers will also be bored. The 6^th grade writers then spent the rest of the writing workshop working on their own drafts of personal memoirs.

In cultural studies, the students continued to work on research for their Californian Indian Presentations. The 1^st drafts of their reports will be due next Monday.

Back from Thanksgiving Break

Homework due tomorrow, Tuesday, December 1st: Since I was out during last spelling period with strep throat please bring in last completed spelling homework.

Homework due Wednesday, December 2nd: Students should bring in the work they did on their literature circle assignments, and be ready to discuss the 7^th to 13^th chapters of Island of the Blue Dolphins. Each student should be able to answer the following question. Who were the Aleuts?

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

During writing workshop, students continued working on their personal memoirs. Most of the students are finished with their first drafts. As they work on subsequent drafts, their focus is on making their writing compelling being sure to answer any questions readers may have. Before showing me their work, the students are getting peer reviews from their classmates. Any work shown to me must be in 12 point Times New Roman type, double-spaced. It is striking to note how comfortable the 6^th graders are with the idea of writing multiple drafts before a piece of work is complete.

In drama class today the 6^th grade actors worked on tableaux. The main points we worked on were physical presentation, expressiveness of the actors, clarity of story, and relationship between actors.

In cultural studies, the students continued to work on research for their Californian Indian Presentations. We discussed some of the difficulties of conducting research, such as finding information, sorting out what is important from what is not, and putting information in our own words. The students are also confronting the advantages and challenges of collaboration. The 1^st drafts of their reports will be due next Monday.

Language Arts Homework

Homework due tomorrow, Friday, November 20th: Student’s who did not turn in today’s language arts homework must bring it in tomorrow morning.

Homework due Wednesday, December 2nd: Students should bring in the work they did on their literature circle assignments, and be ready to discuss the 7th to 13th chapters of Island of the Blue Dolphins. Each student should be able to answer the following question. Who were the Aleuts?

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Today in language arts we looked at the Island of the Blue Dolphins. We discussed the events leading up to the conflict between the Aleuts and Karana’s people. The 6th graders noted how the custom of the Indians to work with their environment in order to fill their fundamental needs became threatened by the desire to make a profit.

Upcoming Homework

Homework due Tuesday, November 16: Students should bring in their sheet with the five words they have chosen for their Weekly Word Studies.

Homework due Wednesday, November 17: Students should bring in the work they did on their literature circle assignments, and be ready to discuss the 2^nd to 6^th chapters of Island of the Blue Dolphins.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Literature Homework Due Wednesday, November 11th.

Homework due Tomorrow: Students should bring in the work they did on their literature circle assignments, and be ready to discuss the 1st chapter of Island of the Blue Dolphins.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

In language arts the students showed me the words they had chosen for their weekly word studies. We also went over the procedure for doing their spelling homework. This procedure can be found in their writing handbooks, and in this spelling procedure link.

During writing workshop, the students were absorbed in working on the first drafts of their personal memoirs.

Homework Due Tomorrow

Homework due Tomorrow;
Remember to bring in the five words you have chosen for your Weekly Word Studies.
Spend thirty minutes working on the first draft of your personal memoir.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

In writing workshop today we moved on from poetry and looked at a new genre, personal memoir. After learning what memoir was the class brainstormed ideas about what an effective memoir looks like. We then looked at the first draft of a memoir of mine, and discussed what made it an ineffective piece of writing.

The First Time I Scored On My High School Basketball Team.

The year was 1975. I was fifteen years old. I was living in Kingston, the capital of Jamaica, at the time. I had made my high school basketball team. The name of my high school was Kingston College. I had been trying out for the team for the past two years and I finally made it. I was short so I played guard. I was a good defender and an okay passer, but I was not a good shooter. After four games I still had not scored a point, even though I was the captain of the team and a member of the starting five.

Our fifth game was against Saint Jago High School. They had not won a game. They were in last place. After the first half, we had fifteen points and they had twelve points. In the second half I was called for a technical foul for arguing about a call. With a minute to go we were still leading, but the score was thirty-one points to thirty points. Then I got a pass in the corner, and I shot. The ball rattled around and went in. That was the first time I scored.

The students noted that there was a lack of emotion or feeling in the writing. They pointed out the lack of variety in the length of the sentences, and the overemphasis of the first person pronoun. Janet summed up by saying that the memoir lacked any “Wow” factor. After our discussion, the students were asked to take a subject from their heart map and begin to draft a personal memoir of their own.

In cultural studies the 6^th graders continued work on the California Indian project. Each student’s first draft is due next week Monday, November 16.

Language Arts Homework due Tuesday, Nov 10; Wednesday, Nov 11.

Homework due Tuesday, November 10. Students should bring in the five words they have chosen for their Weekly Word Studies.


 Homework due Wednesday, November 11. Students should come to class on Wednesday having read the first chapter of the Island of the Blue Dolphins, and having completed the assignment for their particular Literature Circle job.


Slight Change In Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Reading the assigned novel does count towards the nightly reading. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, as long as you make sure you get your assigned reading done. Please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

In language arts the students were all given copies of Stuart O’Dell’s book, Island of the Blue Dolphin, the novel that will begin our study of Literature this year. The sixth graders have all been divided into five literature circle groups, and each group has a Discussion Director, a Summarizer, an Illustrator, and a Vocabulary Enricher. Each of these jobs comes with a particular assignment that is designed to help the students read with a sharp sense of purpose and serve as entry points into the novel. The student will bring in their completed assignments each week in order share them with their group members and aid in their discussions and understanding of the novel.

Based on their research on the Bay Area Miwoks in particular, and California Indians in general, and the questions that their research engendered, the students have chosen areas that they would like to research and present to the class. Most of their questions have focused on how the Indians took care of their fundamental needs, and how the Californian environment affected the various cultures that were created. The main tribes that the students chose to study were the Miwoks and the Yuroks. Areas of interest vary from how the first peoples of California fed and clothed themselves, to how their systems of trade worked. Some of the students are working in triads and dyads, while others are working by themselves. They have been asked to produce a written report, and decide on a method of presenting their work to the class.

Walking in the Steps of the Miwok Indians

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

The students all did a great job presenting their work during Student, Parent, and Teacher conferences.

Yesterday the students explored the Miwok village at Point Reyes station. They were charged with the task of looking at the village with archeologists’ eyes. What information, clues, or suppositions could they take away from their excursion? Today in cultural studies the students set about testing their suppositions through research. They used books in the classroom, and notes taken by their classmates to develop a stronger sense of the Indians of California. As they answered questions they were, as always, encouraged to find more questions.

In language arts we are about to introduce the 6^th graders to the form of spelling they will be doing this year. As a precursor to their spelling assignments, I presented a unit today appropriately called, “A Brief History of the English Language.” We took a quick look at the various other languages that have mixed and influenced English, such as Latin, French and the Germanic languages. We then discussed how this complicated past and lack of unifying structure would make finding spelling rules difficult. The next step in this unit will be for the students to be shown how to develop their own personal spelling list that will be used to collect the words for their weekly spelling test.

Portfolios, Conference Preparation, and Visualization.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

The 6th graders are all spending time getting their portfolios together for their conferences on Thursday and Friday. They are choosing works they are proud of as well as works that were challenging for them. They are then, with prompts from Sima and I, reflecting on their sense of what these works say about their learning. Self-reflection is always a challenging process, even for the most introspective adult, so for these students this work serves as the beginning of what will hopefully be a lifelong habit.

Today in language arts, learning specialist, MaryBeth Ventura was a guest teacher. She gave the students a presentation on visualization.  MaryBeth gave the students an exercise that encouraged them to use specific language to describe a picture that they could see, but she could not. She prompted them to help her create a clear sense of the picture even though it was on the board behind her. The students realized that they could not be vague in their descriptions. They had to really pay attention to what they were seeing, and the language they were using to describe it.  This was the first of a series of presentations that MaryBeth will offer the 6th grade class on strategies to help express their learning.

Discipline, Focus, and Asking the Hard Questions.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Monday and Tuesday are writing workshop days. Today the students worked quietly and diligently on their various projects. They were encouraged to be clear about their choice of words, imagery and form, and they were questioned about why they made the choices they did.  These questions were very challenging for some of the writers who confessed to having a vague sense of what affect they wanted their writing to have. They are discovering that asking and answering challenging questions can help create clear and focused writing.

In drama, we continue to engage in theater games that challenge the individual actors to work as an ensemble. We considered the importance of discipline in the actors work. We worked holding a freeze in tableau work, as well as using criticism as a component of improving our work.

In cultural studies the class went over our review on the First Californians. The students shared their answers, and then shared strategies for doing review tests in the future. Some of the advice given was to “read the questions carefully before answering,” and “read the entire chapter rather than guessing the answer.”

How Do Writers Work? What Does A Historian Do?

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

In writing workshop today we started the class reading Elizabeth Spires’ poem, “The Sims.” We focused on the writer’s choices concerning persona, and form. What were the possible reasons the poet chose to write the poem in the voice of a child? Why did the poet choose to have so much white space in her stanzas?

The students were reminded that poets make deliberate choices when writing. They were also reminded that as writers themselves they needed to be aware, and intentional in their own writing. They then went on to work on their own material.

In cultural studies, we continued our study of the first Californians. We discussed the idea of history being a matter of asking the right questions, and those good questions generally produce even more questions.

We noted that the vegetation and animal life of the Bay Area was much more lush and plentiful than it is today. What did that mean for the California Indians? Students began to share some of the questions that they had begun to wonder about.

Cultural Studies Homework due Monday, October 26

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Homework due Monday, October 26: Throughout the week, as we learn about the First Californians you are going to learn things that should raise questions in you mind. Think about and record any questions that you have. Write down and bring in at least 5 questions to cultural studies class on Monday, October 26.

In writing workshop today, students worked on their current projects. Some students turned in final drafts of poems, others were working towards final drafts, and some were drafting new poems.

In drama, the young actors worked on listening, observing, concentrating and working as an ensemble. We played a wide variety of games that were fun and challenging. One of the games was, counting from 1 to 50 as a group, getting progressively louder, so that each person had to focus on the volume of the person who counted right before them. Another game challenged the students to create a space with their imagination, such as a kitchen, or an office, and then make it as real as possible by acting in that space. As members of the audience recognized and “saw” the space, they were then free to join it with an activity of their own. The activity allowed them to work on being comfortable before an audience, building meaning together, and sustaining concentration.

In cultural studies we began to study the first Californians. We discussed how the first Americans crossed what is now the Bering Strait. Sixth grader, Marina Shethar, who was born in Russia, mentioned that the strait was named for the Danish captain, Vitus Bering. Marina had done a report on Bering the year before. We brainstormed some reasons for the first Americans making that trek to the new continent. As we continue the unit, the students will be encouraged to think about any questions they have, and to eventually note that in history the more questions one answers the more questions one ends up having.

Homework due Wednesday, October 21

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Homework due Wednesday, October 21: Please bring in your visual metaphor reflections for Language Arts class on Wednesday.

In language arts today the students worked on using visual journaling for reflecting on literature. The book we examined today was, Two Bear Cubs: A Miwok Legend from California’s Yosemite Valley, by Robert Sans Souci. Groups of two and three students were given laminated photocopies of a page, which they read and then picked out a work, phrase and sentence that they thought was crucial to, or summative of the page. Each student then shared their ideas with their other group members, explaining why they had chosen the particular word, phrase and sentence.

Each student will then draw an impression of what they read using colored pencils, colored markers, and crayons to create visual metaphors. This will help them to think beyond the obvious. The next step of the assignment will eventually be to write a short explanation of the ideas in their sketch.

826 Valencia

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Today we spent most of the school day enjoying a great field trip at 826 Valencia in San Francisco.
The 6^th graders were quite excited and engaged as they worked with the workshop leader, Vickie Vertiz. Ms. Vertiz introduced the students to the main elements that go into writing a screenplay. She then announced that the class was going to co-create the beginning and middle of their very own screenplay. She focused on setting, character, and dialogue. 

Taking ideas from many excited contributors we were eventually able to create a movie set in a parallel universe, with a rock named JOE as a main character, a dodo bird named JULIET as a love interest, a pebble named BOBBI as a faithful sidekick, and a lawnmower named DYLAN as the dastardly villain. 

For the final part of the workshop, each student worked alone to create his or her own ending. By the end of the class we had twenty bound copies of their mini-screenplay!

Tuesday, October 13th

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Today in writing workshop we talked about tomorrow’s field trip to 826 Valencia in San Francisco. For those of you who don’t know 826 Valencia is an organization that was, “Founded in 2002 by author Dave Eggers and educator Nínive Calegari, 826 Valencia is dedicated to supporting students ages 6 to 18 with their writing skills, and to helping teachers get their students excited about the writing.”

Tomorrow’s class, which is to be a screenwriting workshop, will focus on character, but also touch on dialogue and setting. Today the 6th graders looked at the importance of character and its effect on the writer’s voice.

After our discussion, the students spent the rest of the class working on their own writing. Many of them had conferences with me, and most of them turned in typed drafts at the end of the class.



In cultural studies, the students finished presenting their group projects on the California Regions. After each presentation, the students asked the presenters questions and gave a critique focused on content, presentation, and teamwork. Apart from sharing what they had learned with their classmates, they all continued to develop a sense of what makes for good work.

Thursday, October 8th

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Today in language arts we continued working with the R.A.F.T.S. model for writing responses to literature. The students worked in pairs to discuss the homework they did with the R.A.F.T.S. Thinking Sheet. We then discussed the homework as a whole class, and the students shared the ways in which they thought the Thinking Sheet helped them, or got in their way. We noticed how stopping to think and plan can sometimes be frustrating at first, but helpful in the long run.

Continuing to work in pairs, the students then started to write a draft based on a given writing prompt. They focused on how knowing the role that one is taking on as a writer, knowing one's audience, and understanding the format one is writing in, can affect the voice and word selection of the writer.

Language Arts Homework due: Thursday, October 8th.

I apologize for being behind on my blogging. Family stresses caught up with me a bit, but I am back on track.

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read on your Reading Journal entry form. Please turn in your entry forms on Friday, so that I can review how your reading is going. I will return them to you on Monday. I would encourage you to keep up with your reading over the weekend.

Homework due tomorrow, Thursday, October 8th: Look over the following prompt. You do not have to start writing yet.

You are Great Spirit (Role.) and you want to command (Strong verb) coyote (Audience) to eat the crickets. Write a list of commandments (Format) to show coyote that eating the crickets is the right thing to do (Topic).

Please reread, How Coyote Put Fish in Clear Lake. Thoughtfully fill out the R.A.F.T.S Thinking Sheet, and bring it to class for discussion tomorrow.


Today in language arts the 6th graders explored ways to write about literature. The class was introduced to the R.A.F.T.S. model that helps students break writing into five components, Role, Audience, Format, Topic, and Strong verb. The students were then asked to use the R.A.F.T.S. model to look at the story, How Coyote Put Fish in Clear Lake. This work will be continued tomorrow in class.

In Cultural Studies we had our first California Regions presentation. The group that first presented listened to positive and helpful feedback, and will use that feedback to present their material a final time. This process will be the same for all four groups. In this way, the students are able to hear assessments from their peers as well as from their teacher, and are given a chance to use these assessments as a learning opportunity.

Grammar Review

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read.

Today in language arts the 6th graders had a grammar review. The students discussed their attitudes towards studying grammar, and towards grammar’s relationship to writing. Some of the students stated that thinking about the rules of grammar was challenging, and sometimes even annoying. We all recognized that sometimes it felt as if grammar got in the way of the creative flow of writing.

Using the SMART Board, we created a piece of unpunctuated writing, and then set about punctuating it in order to get it to say what we wanted it to. In this way, we explored the role of punctuation in organizing and ordering the words we write. We then too a look at recognizing conjunctions, and the role they play as a part of speech. The students were asked to write their own sentences using conjunctions in various ways.

First Readers' Theater Performance

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read.

Wildcat gave their first Readers’ Theater performance to the 2nd and 3rd graders of Sweet Briar Creek today. The scripts we read from were adapted from Maurice Sendak’s Where the Wild Things Are, and The True Story of the Three Little Pigs by John Scieszka. The 6th graders gave a spirited performance, reading clearly and with emotion. On subsequent Wednesdays the 6th graders will have an opportunity to buddy up with the 2nd and 3rd graders and work on their own Readers’ Theater presentations.

In Cultural Studies the students continued work on their California Regions Project. The four groups of five students, representing, the deserts, the coast, the mountains and the Central Valley, worked on their reports, skits or posters. As a class, we discussed the importance of having a presentation that was rich with content. At the end of the class we gathered in circle and used our teamwork rubric to discuss how their group interactions were going.

Tuesday, September 29

Ongoing Homework: Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read.

Today in Language Arts, the students rehearsed reading for Readers’ Theater. They focused on voice projection and clarity.

In groups of four they worked on creating scripts out of one-page stories that they were given. They discussed among themselves the important characters, the parts of the story they wanted to keep, and the parts they wanted to discard. They created a script that they are going to perform for their classmates.

The students ended the day by working as a class to create a rubric for teamwork. They discussed what effective teamwork looks like, and what ineffective teamwork looks like. They created four main criteria, Cooperation, Participation, Support and Engagement. They then discussed the components that go into each criteria.

Thirty Minutes Reading

Students should remember to read for thirty minutes each evening. Remember there are no restrictions on what you choose to read, but please remember to record the date, the title of what you read, and how many pages you read.

Today in Writing Workshop, the students edited their poems-in-progress. Many of them are working on adding detail and clear imagery to their poems. They are focusing on writing images that are vivid in order to help the reader experience the poem.

In Cultural Studies, the students are working on their California Regions group project. Today we watched the first episode of Ken Burns’ documentary, The West, which focuses on the First People of North America. The students were asked to note the ways in which the environment influenced the culture of the various tribes.

In drama, the students practiced some reader’s theater, which they plan to share with the 2nd and 3rd graders of Sweet Briar Creek on Wednesday.

Technology Form Reminder

Please remember to get your parents to sign and then bring in your technology form tomorrow. Students who have not handed in a signed technology form will not be allowed to use laptops at school. Using laptops will be an important part of our humanities curriculum.

Language Arts Homework, Due Tuesday, September 15th

Please read the Rules and Expectations for Writer's Workshop on pages 3-4 of your Writer's Workshop Handbook.

If you have not yet done so pick out a topic from your writing territories to be the subject of a poem. Come to writer's workshop tomorrow ready to work on drafting the poem.

Language Arts Home Work Due Monday, September 14

Please do a close rereading of the poem, "You Can't Write a Poem about McDonald's" by Ronald Wallace. If you see a phrase or an image that strikes you as being interesting make a note of it. If you are comfortable doing so write a sentence or two about why the image strikes you as being interesting.

Cultural Studies Homework: Due Wednesday, 9, 2009

Please do 10 of the 12 questions in your Interest Survey. Remember to write your answers in complete sentences.