HONORS
TH
9
Daily Agenda PPT
LIT
What am I learning today?
1-5-16
◦ Welcome back!
◦ Semester 2 Syllabus
◦ A humorous Introduction to Grammar:
◦ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8Gv0H-vPoDc
◦ Grammar Observations: Excerpt from TKAM (intro to grammar unit)
“Calpurnia was something else… She was all angles and bones; she
was nearsighted; she squinted; her hand was as wide as a bed slat
and twice as hard… Our battles were epic and one-sided – Calpurnia
always won. She had been with us ever since Jem was born, and I had
felt her tyrannical presence as long as I could remember.”
◦ – from To Kill a Mockingbird, p. 6
◦ Write everything you notice GRAMATICALLY about this excerpt.
What am I learning today?
1-6-16
◦ Ah…today we’re taking the first of three grammar pretests, but it’s okay! Grammar is
fun, right…?! (go ahead and find a few sheets of NB paper)
◦ Since Conventions of Language is a component on the EOC (which is 20% of our
course grade) AND since all Freshmen didn’t do so well on that section last year, we’ve
decided to refresh
◦ Sections to complete: (finish for HW)
◦ A: The Parts of Speech
◦ B: Subjects and Verbs
◦ Skip C
◦ D: The Phrase
◦ E: The Clause
◦ F: The Classification of Sentences
What am I learning today?
1-7-16
◦ Hand back pretests from yesterday; let’s see how we did, shall we?
◦ Score sections
◦ Poll commonly missed items and review in class / takes notes on what you
struggled with
What am I learning today?
1-8-16
◦ Time for Grammar Pretest # 2
◦ But first…a grammar lesson from Sherlock Holmes
◦ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hP3ni60whKU
◦ Sections to Complete:
◦ A: Agreement
◦ B: Pronouns
◦ Skip C and D
◦ E: Modifiers
◦ F: Standard Usage
◦ If time, go over section answers
Application HW This Weekend (Due Monday, 1-11)
◦ Look at the passage from Sing a Song of Tuna Fish: Hard-toSwallow Stories from the Fifth Grade and write an “imitation piece”
that begins with the sentence, “Let me tell you something
about…” It should be a lengthy paragraph (about half a page)
and can be about anything you want to “tell us” about. Try to
include a variety of sentences as well as strong verbs and sensory
details (all the things that make good narrative writing).
◦ After you finish, make some observations about your syntax:
Underline all the phrases (remember the 5 types: appositive,
gerund, participial, infinitive, prepositional). Put [brackets] around
all [dependent clauses]. Circle all of your pronouns.
◦ Tally how many sentences there are total. Now tally how many of
those are simple, compound, complex, and compound-complex.
Chart
Example
Total #:
Simple:
Compound:
Complex:
C-C:
What am I learning today?
1-11-16
◦ Turn in Narrative Paragraph HW
◦ Sit in assigned grammar groups (see board)
◦ Pick up copies of your pretest #2 and 1 answer key per table
◦ Go through your pretests together as a group, explaining and working through difficult
questions together. Ask me for help if necessary.
◦ Reconvene as a class and discuss the rules for commonly missed questions
◦ Watch video on Subject-Verb Agreement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yEVhUEq6P1w
◦ Watch video on Who versus Whom: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mpLxLYELKPY
What am I learning today?
1-12-16
◦ We’re so close!! Grammar Pretest # 3 today (this one’s fun: punctuation!)
◦ But first…grammar lessons with food:
◦ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ry-NYbMEbgc
◦ Sections to complete:
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A: Capitalization
B: Commas
C: Semicolons and Colons
D: Italics and Quotation Marks
E: Apostrophes
F: The Hyphen, The Dash, Parenthesis, and Bracket
Okay, so you’re doing all of them 
All 3 Grammar Pretests should be
scored by tomorrow. Make sure to see
me if you missed a day and need a key.
On Friday you will be turning in all 3
scored Pretests in addition to a
reflection you are writing in class
tomorrow for a 50 point minor grade.
◦ When you finish, pick up a copy of Pronoun Notes and begin annolighting / reading.
What am I learning today?
1-13-16
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Go over section answers from Grammar Pretest 3
Poll commonly missed questions
Clarify confusing concepts – Watch USA Test Prep videos on colons and semicolons
Reflection:
◦ Go back through your pretest and look at the sections where you missed 1/3 of the questions or more.
In a paragraph, discuss what you could use more help with and specifically what it is within those
grammatical concepts that is giving you trouble.
◦ Assign USA Test Prep Grammar and Conventions Practice: Due Sunday, 1-17
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Sign up for a USA Test Prep account (see blog for directions)
Choose the 9th Lit GA Milestones assessment tab
Scroll down and choose #2 under the “Language” category
Choose “Videos”
There are 7 videos that I want you to watch – they’re all short. After you watch them, answer the
questions on the right side and submit to me (you have to choose my name, then your class under the
drop down menus)
What am I learning today?
1-14-16
“All you have to do is write one true sentence. Write the truest sentence that you know.”
– Earnest Hemingway
Sometimes short sentence are incredibly powerful in writing, most often when they
provide a break in between longer sentences or are used to emphasize something:
◦ “Call me Ishmael.” – first line of Moby Dick by Herman Melville
◦ “Love is a serious mental disease.” – Plato
◦ “I would always rather be happy than dignified.” - from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
◦ “Frailty – they name is woman!” – from Hamlet by Shakespeare
Sentence Combining
But… often short sentences, if used in succession, make writing sound choppy and simplistic. Today I want us
to work on sentence combining in an effort to get rid of those short, choppy sentences and replace them with
beautiful, rich, compound and complex ones. Take 5 minutes and combine the following sentences using
commas, conjunctions, semicolons, or whatever else feels appropriate:
Max walks into his office. It is too hot. Julie looks up from her desk. She is suspicious. The
whole place takes on a feel of an interrogation. Even the lights seem brighter. He takes off his
coat.
Now take this one and UNCOMBINE it into multiple sentences:
A single empty chair waited for Rowanne, and a thought whispered from the back of Hector’s
mind, but it was drowned out by the sounds of scraping, shifting chairs. – Lynne Rae Perkins, Criss
Cross (2005)
Complete the exercises below working with your group; however everyone needs to write his or her own copy:
http://english.sxu.edu/musgrove/combine.html
What am I learning today?
1-15-16
◦ Parallel structure game:
◦ Pick up a “card” from the stool and hang on to it.
◦ Your card contains a phrase that fits with other parallel phrases in a sentence.
◦ Your job is to find your other phrases in order to complete your perfectly parallel sentence. Use
common sense and context to help you out.
◦ When your group has found each other, form a line and hold up your cards in order.
**Hint: pronouns will really help you – make sure pronouns agree in all parts of your sentence.
Watch videos on Parallel Structure if time (USA Test Prep)
Parallel Structure Sentences
◦ When I was five years old, I wore ribbons in my hair, slept with a teddy bear, and started
kindergarten.
◦ The teacher said that he was a poor student because he waited until the last minute to
study for the exam, completed his lab problems in a careless manner, and
lacked motivation.
◦ The salesman expected that he would present his product at the meeting, that there would
be time for him to show his slide presentation, and that prospective buyers would ask him
questions.
◦ Tim was considered to be a good employee because he was never late, he was very
motivated and he was not lacking in initiative.
◦ Our job as responsible citizens is to uphold the law, set a good example for others, and treat
people with respect.
◦ This woman is incredible: she ran for city council, raised 5 responsible children, started a
campaign against drunk driving, and wrote a book about urban poverty.
What am I learning today?
1-19-16
How to tighten up verbs!
Active voice: puts the actor or the subject of a sentence near the front of the sentence,
so it can do or be.
Passive voice: not the same thing as past tense. In passive voice the subject of the
sentence is acted upon by something else.
“Sometimes PV is the right choice, but very often switching to active voice will make
great improvements” (Anderson 96).
Here is a sentence in the passive voice: “Writing is weakened by the passive voice.”
Now, write that same idea in active voice.
Active Voice: You Try
It was like nothing on earth we had ever seen before. Fred, Sam, and I were standing in front
of strange trees and giant ferns. A rocky cliff was rising behind us. A volcano was smoking
ahead of us. – modified from Jon Scieszka, Your Mother Was a Neanderthal (2003)
◦ Rewrite this in active voice.
He dashed into the house while the smell of hose water and burning plastic drifted up over the
patio. – Tony Abbot, Firegirl (2007)
◦ Rewrite this one in passive voice.
Let’s Apply It: take a look at this essay by a former 2nd grader. Mark where you see her using
passive voice with a PV and where you see active voice with an AV. Then we’ll look at it
together to see if we think she should revise anything, or if her voice fits with her content.
http://college.cengage.com/english/rawlins/writers_way/6e/students/samples/road.html
What am I learning today?
1-20-16
◦ Yay! We’re finished with grammar! For a while, anyway…
◦ To kick off our unit on poetry, I’d like for you to freewrite on these questions: What is
poetry? Or more specifically, what is a poem? No right or wrong answers, just write for
about 5 minutes (at least a paragraph).
◦ Scene from Dead Poets Society
◦ Quotation Response – Robin Williams / Class Discussion
Text from Dead Poets Society
◦ We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because
we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And
medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain
life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from
Whitman, “O me! O life…of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the
faithless…of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life? Answer:
That you are here – that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you
may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?