3/16/2017

(Options in slides-fiction)

1. Sketch two characters in conflict with one another

2. Talk about setting

3. Dialogue sketch

What does a color smell like? The color green must smell like this day in April, sitting under the oak trees, with azaleas blooming around us. The sun hits the leaves and perfumes the air. Our senses mingle and we don't know what we are feeling, but we like it. The grass pokes through our blanket but we don't mind; we mistake the inchworms for blades come to life, squirming across the pages of our books with slow determination, just as the springtime slowly but surely gives way to summer, who takes over with a fiery passion as early as late May. Look at the sky, it reflects us. The blue is clear and bright and surrounds us in a blanket of warmth. 

4/6/2017

Write about creative activities you would like to use in order to teach immigration to your students. This can be as simple as a list of activities generated from this lesson to a full blown lesson plan about an immigration project.

I would be interested in perhaps examining the ethnic origins of my students, using that as a jumping off point for a new understanding of immigrations. I think it is important to first understand that we are all "immigrants" and should not isolate only certain ethnic groups in our understanding of the definition of immigration.
I also might like to use the news surrounding immigration as a starting point for a conversation about immigration by looking at how the world, especially politics, sees immigrants.

4/13/2017

Select one piece of writing from the MGP and complete 3 steps:
1. Tell how you got this piece.
2. Tell what this piece demonstrates about your ability to write and what it says about you as a writer.
3. If you can, write about your observations of yourself as a writer.

1. I created this piece based on Janie's grandmother in Their Eyes Were Watching God. She is intent on finding a husband for Janie, so much so that I thought creating a "want ad" for a husband would be a good way of demonstrating her grandmother's intense desire to marry her off. I didn't want to lose sight of the grandmother's good intentions, but I wanted to dramatize this "duty" of older women to find husbands for the younger ones. 

2. I'm not sure if this piece demonstrates "good writing" per-say, but it does indicate an ability ( I guess? ) to mimic the writing styles of things like want ads, obituaries and other unique pieces of literature.

3. If anything, I think I notice my writing can easily adopt a tone based on the needs of the piece. 

4/21/2017

Write about a new tradition you would like to have in your future classroom.

Be creative and create a practice that honors the students' time together.

Well, I LOVED the idea of writing poems about one another. I think another cool idea would maybe to interview each other at the beginning and end of the year. Perhaps pairing students throughout the year and allowing them to grow with each other academically and otherwise, beginning and ending the year with each other and seeing how they have changed throughout the class.


How would you describe your writing voice? Describe what your range of reading voice and why you think it matters in a piece of writing. Finally, how would you go about teaching your students to find their boxes?

My writing voice is probably a little more formal that my real voice, kind of like a phone voice. But, I do have a bad habit of just letting a stream of consciousness flow out of my head, usually not making much sense at all.