Essays

Since I know many you are disappointed with the grade you earned on your Literacy Narrative, I want to take a moment to remind you of a few things:

A) This is one assignment, and this score measures how well you demonstrated specific skills for a specific purpose on a specific assignment.

B) This isn't the end. Next week you will bring in your essay and we will work on it. In doing so, you will be able to improve your score by fixing structural flaws and grammatical errors and you will be able to improve your writing holistically by working through some hard-core revision. This isn't a full "rewrite" per-se, and you won't go from zero to Tolstoy, but I believe wholeheartedly that this will be an important learning experience for you. Remember what I said in my syllabus?

C) The comments I scrawl all over your essays are my honest, in-the-moment, reader reactions. If they are indecipherable to you (you are not the only one), next week when we're looking at your work I will be available to "interpret" for you.

Read my comments and let it all sink in. Be mad at me and complain about how "mean" I am, if you must, but then sit down and re-read your essay. Try to be objective. Is it really your best work? Do you see areas where you can build and change and polish? Am I really just "out to get you" or "impossible"? No, I'm not. Has your writing improved since you wrote it a few weeks ago? It probably has. Bring those new-and-improved skills to the operating table next week. In the mean time, take a deep breath, relax, and enjoy your weekend. I hope it is "spooktacular."

You Might Be Wondering...

In case you see this and in case you were curious, here's the deal:

Mrs. Smith is taking care of you through Monday. Yes, I got a visa and I'm headed to China! So, those poster presentations will just have to be postponed. I know, you're crushed. The documentary you will be watching has some very interesting content if you consider it through the lens of rhetorical analysis and language study, so as you watch it keep in mind the goals of our class. Your vocab quiz on this weeks words will have to be Tuesday when I'm back instead of Monday.

Waiting for Superman

The new documentary,Waiting for Superman is stirring up some controversy and raising some important issues related to the current state of education in America. This article form the NY Times is only one of many articles in response to the release of this film.