Friday, December 4, 2020

Writing 3 Class Notes -- Week 13 (December 3)

 Greetings!


It's hard to believe that we're in December already and that there are only 2 weeks left.  I feel like I'm just getting to know them as students, and we're going to be done.  

For this week's Quick Write, I offered the following prompts:
  • Option 1: On December 2, 1867, Charles Dickens gave his first reading in America. People waited in mile long lines in New York to hear him read. Is there an author, speaker, or other person whom you would wait in a long line to hear? Why?
  • Option 2: On December 1, 1824, the results of the election went to the House of Representatives because no presidential candidate had received a majority of the total electoral votes in the election, and according to the 12th amendment, Congress turned to the House to decide. What do you think of the election results and the efforts to find evidence of fraud?
  • Option 3: On December 4, 1783, George Washington bid farewell to his officers, leaving military life before being elected in 1797 the first president of the United States. Do you have a favorite found father, military leader, or world leader? Who and why?
Following our Quick Write discussion, I went over the various rubrics that we're using with our final products.  For the Presentations, I will evaluate the students with a rubric, students will use the same rubric for a self evaluation, and classmates will use a shortened version for a peer evaluation.  Rubrics allow for a more holistic evaluation; a student can be strong in one point but weaker in another, and a rubric acknowledges those differences.  An important part of learning (and thinking) is to both reflect on work done and to think about the work of others.  I also use a rubric for the Final Draft of the Research Paper; students will fill out the same rubric as a Self-evaluation.

Here are the links to the Self-Evaluation Rubrics
Presentation Self-Evaluation Rubric
Research Paper Self Evaluation Rubric

After looking at those rubrics, we had our first Student Presentations.  Joseph told us about the dangers of rotational falls and frangible technology in the context of cross-country eventing.  Lilly, whose paper is about World War I, chose to focus on one aspect, the details of the chemical warfare of WWI.  Finally, Dellia had done research about the issue of trafficking in the United States and shared some sad, yet important statistics about this concern.  As I told the class, they've worked hard on their papers, and not only is it good for the rest of the class to learn some of what they've learned.  

With two weeks left, students should not only be finalizing their presentations, but they should be finishing up their papers.  Every student is in a different place and in varying stages of rough draft revisions and final draft preparations.  As soon as a student has a draft ready for me to go over, he/she should submit it to Google Classroom AND send me an email.  I'll do my best to get it back ASAP.  If there's a concern about a draft or any questions, please let me know.  The Final Draft of the Research Paper is due on December 17, which is the last day of class.

Here are the links to the Google Classroom assignments for each of the drafts:
Rough Draft #1
Rough Draft #2
Rough Draft #3 (opt)
Final Draft

Looking forward to more presentations:
December 10
Sophia
Annika
Abby Kate
Martha

December 17
Will
Laura
Isaac
Jacob
Brad
Katie  

We're down to the homestretch!
Mrs. Prichard


Tamera M. Prichard
Writing Instructor at CHAT

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