Comp/Lit 9: 9/20/10

The Short Stories Unit Begins

• Today's class started with a quiz that covered MLA Format, the citation of titles & quotes and the course expectations.
• While the students took the quiz, I checked the homework-WOR reflection and revision, VFA #3-4 and a spiral bound notebook.
• After the quiz, we began our short story journey.  
• I passed out the new course calendar for this week.
• The students listened to the story "Chrysanthemum" while following along on the "Name" Packet.  
• After "Chrysanthemum", I asked the students to react to the story.  What did they think?  What stood out?  What was the overall message?
• We then read a short piece called "My Name" by Ryan Schey.  I asked them the same types of questions for each paragraph of the story.  I asked them, does he like his name?  I also asked them to support their claim with a sentence from the story.
• I then had them set up their interactive notebook.  I walked them through setting up the Table of Contents, then we started on our first entry.  We got the page for the first entry set up, then we read a third story about names.  
• I read "My Name" by Sandra Cisneros.  After I read it one time through, I continued the instruction on the Interactive Notebook.  I had the students number the paragraphs in the story.  For each paragraph they did they exact same thing.  The page in the notebook is divided in two.  On the left side, they write an important phrase from the first paragraph and label it with a number 1.  In the right column, they write a one sentence summary of the paragraph (labeled with an "a") then they write either a question or a connection for the first paragraph (and label it with a "b").
• They did this for all five paragraphs of the story.
• I then introduced the Name Essay Assignment.  The students will write a one-page name essay covering all aspects of their name(s).
• I ended the period by telling the story of my name.
• Homework: Write your Name Essay.  5th & 7th periods: Finish the Interactive notebook for "My Name" by Sandra Cisneros.