Writing 3 Class Notes -- Week 5 (Sept. 25)

Greetings!

 We had a productive day in class today.  We began our class with a quiz on the “Research Process Timeline.”  I wasn’t as concerned that the students had committed all of the names of the steps to memory, but that they had taken time to think about them.  We filled in the blanks on a timeline that I drew on the board and then discussed which steps of the process were easiest and which were the hardest.  For most of the class, the writing on the first rough draft seems to the task the will be the hardest.  My encouragement to them was to not put it off.  Procrastinating gives temporary relief, but in the long run, it generally leads to unnecessary stress and possibly a poor quality product.

Because I wanted to cover more about the outlines and some grammar, I chose to not go over an ACT/SAT writing prompt.  I did give to the students a two sample rubrics about how the SAT writing tests are scored.  Additionally, I gave them handouts about the essay required by the Common Application.  Some of the students are at that place where they’re looking at colleges and filling out applications.  I will be glad to help them with any essays, now or in the future, that they need to write. 

A large portion of our time was spent on some Grammar.  Teaching grammar is a curious business.  When grammar has a direct connection to a student’s writing, the lesson sticks.  When it’s simply an academic pursuit, it is often in one ear and out the other.  Hopefully, today’s lesson will stick at least a little.  We discussed phrases:  prepositional, participial, gerund, and infinitive.  The last three are verbal phrases and would be considered a topic in advanced grammar.

In the research paper writing process, the students were to have the informal outlines done for today, and the detailed outline is due next week.  At this point, a lot of the research needs to be done.  Many times, some research will continue as the paper is being written, but the bulk of it should be completed in order to compose that detailed outline.

I've included a couple of extra blog posts this week with links to other sources that I thought might be helpful for the class.  While we cover the pertinent material in the class, sometimes I find other videos or websites that say it better than I did.

Assignments for Next Week:

-- Detailed Outline

-- Phrases Worksheet: 

     -- Preposition Phrases (second page of the attachment)

     -- Participial Phrases

     -- Gerund Phrases

     -- Infinitive Phrases

Blogs this week:

Class Notes

Links for Writing Outlines

Week 5 -- Helpful Videos

Have a great weekend.  It looks like the weather will be marvelous!

Mrs. Prichard

Week 5 -- Helpful Videos for Note-taking

Class,
Below is a list of helpful videos related to note-taking and research. 

Writing Videos
Taking Notes
Making Note Cards
How to Avoid Plagiarism
How to Write a Great Paper
Note-Taking Strategies
MLA Style
Writing a paper
Thoughts on Writing

Writing 3 Class Notes -- Week 4 (Sept. 18)

Greetings!

We had another good day in Writing 3.  These are diligent, conscientious students; I'm greatly enjoying our class discussions.

We began with working through a couple of ACT/SAT essay prompts.  I divided the class in half and had them brainstorm how they might respond to the questions.  Half of the class worked through this prompt:

18. Some high schools in the United States have considered creating separate classrooms for male

and female students in subjects such as mathematics and science. Some educators think separate

classes will be beneficial because students will be less distracted from learning. Other educators

think having separate classes for females and males will not be beneficial because it will seem

to support stereotypes about differences in ability between males and females. In your opinion,

should high schools create separate classes for male and female students?

Source: The Real ACT Prep Guide, 2005

While the other half discussed this prompt:

25.  Some people say you should be content with what you have and accept who you are. But it is

possible that too much self-acceptance can turn into self-satisfied lack of ambition. People should

always strive to improve themselves and to have more in their lives — friends, things, opportunities.

After all, where would we be if great people, both in history and in our own time, did not try to

have more and to improve themselves?

Assignment: Is it best for people to accept who they are and what they have, or should people

always strive to better themselves?

Source: www.collegeboard.com, 2009

They then presented to the class their thoughts on their respective questions.  They are doing a great job thinking critically and taking apart the various aspects of the assignments.

Regarding the research paper, we began by discussing the basic process that students go through when writing longer research papers.  My hope is that, while they will be producing a well-written paper for this call, they will be learning the steps, strategies and skills that will help them with future writing.  I put together a hand-written timeline to illustrate the process.  Many of the steps may need to be revisited during the researching and writing stages.  We discussed that sometimes your research doesn't reveal the information that you thought it would.  A student shouldn't be afraid to "go back to the drawing board" if original ideas don't match data OR if new material sheds a different light on a topic.  It's all a part of the process.

In addition to reviewing the steps and the process, we talked about various ways to take notes and to keep track of information.  Some use sheets of notebook paper, some use notecards, and some use electronic note-taking tools, like OneNote.  Whichever way the individual student feels choose, he/she should be consistent and ALWAYS  keep track of where the information was found.  We also discussed types of outlines as they pertain to the process:  preliminary outlines, informal outlines, and detailed outlines.

A note about the task of finding good information:  

Some students are concerned about finding the right kind of good, accurate, authoritative and timely information.  One helpful trick is to look where those who wrote articles on your topic found their information.  Google Scholar is a good resource, too.  For some topics that have strong opinions on either side of an issue, don't be afraid to read articles that disagree with your point of view.  It helps to know what the opposition thinks.

For this week, students were to have an initial list of resources and  some general subtopics.  For next week, they are to write an informal outline with the subtopics in the order they feel they should be presented in the paper.

This week's blog:

Class Notes

Helps for Writing Outlines

Evaluating Print Resources

Week 4 -- Taking Notes & Outlines

Have a great week!

Mrs. Prichard

Writing 3 Class Notes -- Week 3 (Sept. 11)

Greetings!

Today was a good day in class.  Since it is 9/11, I had the students write a short Quick Write titled "Patriot Day."  In 2009, September 11 was named Patriot Day as a means of memorial and as an encouragement to Americans to offer volunteer service to others.  I asked the students to write about some way they give service or would like to give service to others.  I appreciated the comments that they shared.

Following the Quick Write, we took some time to talk through thoughts and ideas about one of the ACT/SAT prompts: 

"Discipline" is a negative word for many people because it is associated with rigorous training, strict rules, and strong self-control. But we fail to realize that freedom comes only through discipline. Discipline compels us to sacrifice immediate rewards and pleasures, but it also gives our lives structure and prevents us from making costly mistakes. It keeps us from being subject to our impulses and weaknesses and thus frees us to achieve our true goals.

Assignment: Do people need discipline to achieve freedom? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or observations.

As we worked through this test prompt, I pointed out some specific strategies for taking this part of these tests.  Some key points that were brought up:

-- Sometimes absolutes are expressed in the quotes, and students should feel free to disagree with these statements. 

-- Sometimes it's important to define terms as you understand them or from the perspective that you will be discussing the assignment.

-- Make clear the perspective from which you will be writing.

-- While looking at pros and cons of the situation, be open to taking a middle ground.

Following our discussion, we discussed the process of our papers.  All of the students need to be at a place where they are confident about their topics.  After reviewing our topics and the importance of the thesis, we talked about research and sources.  For the most part, the findings of any research will be either data (factual information) or ideas (opinions, theorems, perspectives).  We can find this information in books, reference material, non-print media, interviews, experiences, and websites.  We can look at primary sources and secondary sources.  Another important step is to keep track of all the resources you use in your research.  I encouraged the students to use their library cards to access the internet search engines. 

Here are some helpful links for Finding and Evaluating Sources

Cornell University Digital Literacy Resource

Purdue Online Writing Lab

Gerorgetown University Resources

Assignment for Next Week:

-- Read Steps 11 - 13 for the "30 Steps" booklet

-- Bring a list of Initial Resources  (at least 3)

-- Make a list of General Subtopics

This week's blog

Have a great weekend!

Mrs. Prichard

Writing 3 & Dropbox

Greetings!

I have added all of the e-mails for Writing 3 to the Dropbox account, and you should already have an invitation in your e-mail Inbox that gives you a link to the files.  You can access these files without downloading Dropbox to your computer and without setting up an account.  (I've used Dropbox for cloud storage for quite a  while, and I've been really happy with it.)

When students were missing worksheets or handouts during that first year that I taught at CHAT, they had to wait a week to get new ones, often causing assignments to be 2 weeks late.  While using regular e-mails, Dropbox, and the blog may be more than some families need, it seems that in the course of the year, and handful of students or parents accesses each of these resources on a regular basis.  Feel free to use what works for you and ignore the rest.

Blessings,

Mrs. Prichard 

Writing 3 Class Notes -- Week 2 (Sept. 4)

Greetings!

(Firstly, my apologies for the lateness of this update.  Our family had neither phone nor internet connections until Sunday afternoon.  We survived quite well without them, but some work items were delayed.)

We had a good, productive time in class this week.  I'm pleased at the class interaction as we discuss ideas and writing first thing in the morning.

In my other classes, I begin with a Quick Write -- a 5 - 10 spontaneous writing exercise to get us in the groove of writing.  For these older students, our beginning of class activity includes SAT and ACT writing prompts.  Our prompt this week was:

   

Winning does not require people to be against someone else; people can reach their goals through

cooperation just as well as they can through competition. Winning is not always the result of selfish

individualism. People achieve happiness by cooperating with others to increase the happiness of

all, rather than by winning at others’ expense. Ours is not a world in which the price of one person’s

happiness is someone else’s unhappiness.

Adapted from Gilbert Brim, Ambition

Assignment: When some people win, must others lose, or are there situations in which everyone

wins? Plan and write an essay in which you develop your point of view on this issue. Support

your position with reasoning and examples taken from your reading, studies, experience, or

observations.  Source: www.collegeboard.com, 2009

We had a wonderful discussion about competition.

The students have my "30 Steps to a Research Paper," which we will use weekly to guide our discussions and the research process.  Last week we covered Steps 1 - 6; this week we covered # 7 - 10.  In these steps we talked about developing a thesis, forming leading questions, and writing a research proposal.  Their assignment for next week is to write a research proposal.  For this paper, they should discuss these areas:

   -- The Topic

   -- Leading questions

   -- Sources for research

   -- Timeline for completion

   -- Acknowledging challenges

Assignments for Next Week:

-- Review the 30 Steps handout up to Step 10.

-- Write the Research Proposal.

See y'all on Thursday!

Mrs. Prichard