WEEK 10

Good Morning and welcome to final-exam week!

Here's your work:


1. Set aside a quiet 45 minutes and work through Practice Test C. This is a test, so try to maintain a testing environment: silence, no breaks, no help from anyone or anything else. I suggest printing the test out, writing your answers on the test, and then moving your answers to the google doc (label it clearly, please).


2. Your final essay...

Education and the Workplace

Many colleges and universities have cut their humanities departments, and high schools have started to shift their attention much more definitively toward STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) and away from ELA (English, Language Arts). Representatives from both school boards and government organizations suggest that the move toward STEM is necessary in helping students to participate in a meaningful way in the American workplace. Given the urgency of this debate for the future of education and society as a whole, it is worth examining the potential consequences of this shift in how students are educated in the United States.

Read and carefully consider these perspectives. Each suggests a particular way of thinking about the shift in American education.

1. ELA programs should be emphasized over STEM programs. Education is not merely a means to employment: ELA education helps students to live more meaningful lives. In addition, an exclusively STEM-based program cannot help but limit students’ creativity and lead them to overemphasize the importance of money and other tangible gains.

2. ELA programs should be eradicated entirely, except to establish the basic literacy necessary to engage in the hard sciences, mathematics, and business. Reading and writing are activities that are best saved for the leisure of students who enjoy them.

3. ELA and STEM programs should always be in equal balance with one another. Both are necessary to providing a student with a well-rounded education. Moreover, equal emphasis will allow the fullest possible exposure to many subjects before students choose their majors and careers.

Essay Task

Write a unified, coherent essay in which you evaluate multiple perspectives on the issue of how schools should balance STEM and ELA subjects. In your essay, be sure to:

• analyze and evaluate the perspectives given
• state and develop your own perspective on the issue
• explain the relationship between your perspective and those given

Your perspective may be in full agreement with any of the others, in partial agreement, or wholly different. Whatever the case, support your ideas with logical reasoning and detailed, persuasive examples.

• Limit yourself to 40 minutes of actual writing and prep.
• Remember the grading criteria we've been practicing (context and framing, counter-argument[s], good support and evidence).

The test and final essay will both be double weighted toward your final grade. Give me a week or so to finalize grades. 


Have a great last week!

WEEK 9

WELCOME BACK!

YOUR WORK: 

DUE Friday at 5pm.


1. ACT Practice Test E .... Corrections and Review.

2. Go to this act site. You'll see five reading passages with questions. Take passages 1,2,3, and 5. (We did passage 4 already). Read through the explanations (No, you don't have to listen to my voice for these) and submit your scores to me in the table in the misc section of the google doc.

3. Go HERE for this week's ACT essay prompt.

4. Revise the School Scheduling ACT prompt (if you're so inclined; it's optional).

CATCH-UP WEEK!

 If you've used a time extension and need to get caught up, then get caught up. If not, enjoy a break from English class.

WEEK 8

 YOUR WORK:

1. ACT Q set (Passage IV, beginning with "Comic books...")  Corrections.

2. Reading skills practice....

a. Skill Builder 1

b. Skill Builder 2

Check here for the corrections for 2a 2b 


3. GO HERE. Read each of the five passages and answer those questions. Set your timer for 42 minutes (that's the same pace as the ACT test, but you'll be answering 48 questions instead of 40 in 35 minutes). You'll be reading these passages:

1. "Men of Brewster Place"
2. "Personality Disorders"
3. "A Poem of One's Own"
4. "How to Build a Baby's Brain"
5. A pair of passages: "In Orbit" and "On July 20th 1969" 

4. In week 5, you watched this video on context and framing. Make sure you're including these strategies in this week's essay.

5. This week we'll leave the SAT and start with the ACT style prompts.  Go HERE for the prompt.  

DUE FRIDAY @ 5:00.

WEEK 7

Good morning!

YOUR WORK:

Everything is due Friday.

1. LBGB...

A. Read chapter 4. 

B. Explain in your own words the five "AVOIDS" in the Style & Usage section.

C. Write a sentence using each term in the pair correctly:

    possible / plausible

    shall / will

    who / whom

D. Write three sentences, each using the word literally in a corret way.     

2. The videos have you getting out your green textbook. Ignore that. I posted a pdf of all the exercises here. Show me your work and post your scores. Also, check your scores from last week's exercises. A few of you didn't tell me how you did, so you may need to score those again. Show me the ones you got wrong.  

Watch this video on modifier problems ...

and this video on case forms. The video cuts in a little after the beginning, but that's ok. You'll hear what you need to hear. I'm more concerned with you knowing how the objective case works (that's where problems tend to show up) than the subjective case.


3. ACT Q set (Passage III, beginning with "The formal tradition..."). Corrections.  *Make sure you do this Q set after the two videos from #1. 


4. Revise the Paul Bogard SAT prompt. Most of you need to read the prompt again. It lays out how to organize it pretty clearly: evidence, reasoning, and appeal to emotion (or other style/persuasive technique like word choice). Remember, your job in that essay to show HOW he builds his argument, so use the terms that describe persuasive writing.


5. Go HERE for SAT prompt #2. Remember to use the language of the prompt itself to guide your writing (the basic language about evidence, reasoning, and other elements, doesn't change from one prompt to another, so get in the habit of organizing your essay that way.) NO REVISIONS THIS TIME! So proof it carefully.


Have a great week!

WEEK 6

WELCOME!

1. Chapter 22 in the GREEN textbook deals with common usage problems. Some of these issues involve the use of words that sound similar but are different words--affect and effect, for example. (You'll recognize that pair from the LBGB work last week. These exercises are similar but cover a lot more usage problems; yes, we'll be skipping LBGB this week.) Others are simply conventions that developed over time to become accepted usage in standard English (no logical rule to point to--you just need to know how to use the word). We'll work through a handful of these exercises. As you'll see, the exercises apply to particular alphabetical sections of the glossary. Be sure to refer to these before (or while) you do the work. 

The corrections and review cover all of the exercises.  

a.  ex 1, p.699
b.  ex 3, p.702
c.  Rev A, p.702
d.  ex 4, p.705
e.  ex 5, p.709


2. SAT persuasive essay analysis:
Before we write ACT style essays, we're going to take a couple of weeks and look at the SAT essay. This one acts as a good bridge between the persuasive essays you've been writing and the analytical essays you will be writing for the ACT. The SAT essay is different in that it has you analyze a persuasive piece of writing. The ACT will have you analyze and synthesize three different positions on a debatable issue.

Go to HERE for this week's writing assignment.




EVERYTHING'S DUE FRIDAY NIGHT.

Have a great week!

WEEK 5

Good morning! I hope you had a restful catch-up week. 


YOUR WORK:

1. Complete practice test D (Read the stuff below before you start!). No ACT q set this time--we'll do the whole test instead. I would suggest printing the test out rather than doing it from the computer. It's better practice for the real thing.

Some things to be mindful of:

a. There's no time limit for this test, but because the ACT limits you to 45 minutes for this section, you want to be aware of how you're doing in terms of pace. I suggest setting a time and noting where you're at in the test at the 45 minute mark. Don't stop there, just note it. As you do the practice ACT q sets for the remaining weeks, work toward getting them finished in 8 or 9 minutes max. You may be there already. If so, great. The idea is that when you sit down to take the official test, the clock will not be something to make you anxious. You should be familiar enough with your pace to not even have to think about timing.

b. Find a quiet place where you won't be disturbed. Your official testing environment will be extremely quiet (as in no head phones!). You need to get used to that.

c. Keep careful score when you watch the review video. I'll explain then how to calculate a raw ACT score (the 1-36 number that ACT uses to report your score).

d. Don't use anything other than your brain to help answer the questions.

e. Take the test in ONE SITTING, and keep all electronic devices--phones, ipods, watches, whatever--in another room. These are the conditions you'll find at your official test site. Your practice needs to be as close to the real thing as possible. A wall clock is fine.

Corrections, review, and scoring video. 

2. LBGB...

• Read the "Style and Usage" section of chapter 3. 
• Look at these usage pairs and write a correct sentence using each (You may use my examples as models, but write your own):

            a. affect / effect
            b. assure / ensure / insure
            c. compose / comprise
            d. farther / further
            e. i.e. / e.g.
            f. me / myself

3. Watch this video on context and framing and revise your Facial Recognition essay by adding context and framing. Yes, you already have a final score on that essay. I'll treat it like a separate exercise and include it in the week 5 work score. (Some of you may have already done this per my comments last week. If you did it well, then you're done.) 

4. ACT Essay #3...
Choose either the Helmet Law or Facial Recognition prompts and write the essay from the OPPOSITE POSITION from what you wrote earlier. That's right--you may be writing from a position you don't actually believe in. That's ok. We're practicing the persuasive mode of discourse; fake it persuasively.

Here's a reminder of grading criteria:

• context and framing (watch the video above!)
• clear position statement in first P
• full arguments in each P
• counter-argument mentioned and knocked down (this can be one or more of your 3 body P's)
• overall, solid persuasive writing

As usual everything is DUE FRIDAY @ 5:00pm. 

CATCH-UP WEEK!

 No new work this week. 

Use the time to catch up. 

However, if you'd rather get an early start, here's what I'll be posting next week:

1. Complete practice test D (Read the stuff below before you start!). No ACT q set this time--we'll do the whole test instead. I would suggest printing the test out rather than doing it from the computer. It's better practice for the real thing.

Some things to be mindful of:

a. There's no time limit for this test, but because the ACT limits you to 45 minutes for this section, you want to be aware of how you're doing in terms of pace. I suggest setting a time and noting where you're at in the test at the 45 minute mark. Don't stop there, just note it. As you do the practice ACT q sets for the remaining weeks, work toward getting them finished in 8 or 9 minutes max. You may be there already. If so, great. The idea is that when you sit down to take the official test, the clock will not be something to make you anxious. You should be familiar enough with your pace to not even have to think about timing.

b. Find a quiet place where you won't be disturbed. Your official testing environment will be extremely quiet (as in no head phones!). You need to get used to that.

c. Keep careful score when you watch the review video. I'll explain then how to calculate a raw ACT score (the 1-36 number that ACT uses to report your score).

d. Don't use anything other than your brain to help answer the questions.

e. Take the test in ONE SITTING, and keep all electronic devices--phones, ipods, watches, whatever--in another room. These are the conditions you'll find at your official test site. Your practice needs to be as close to the real thing as possible. A wall clock is fine.

Corrections, review, and scoring video. 

2. Watch this video on context and framing and revise your Facial Recognition essay by adding context and framing. Yes, you already have a final score on that essay. I'll treat it like a separate exercise and include it in the week 5 work score. (Some of you may have already done this per my comments last week. If you did it well, then you're done.) 

3. ACT Essay #3...
Choose either the Helmet Law or Facial Recognition prompts and write the essay from the OPPOSITE POSITION from what you wrote earlier. That's right--you may be writing from a position you don't actually believe in. That's ok. We're practicing the persuasive mode of discourse; fake it persuasively.

Here's a reminder of grading criteria:

• context and framing (watch the video above!)
• clear position statement in first P
• full arguments in each P
• counter-argument mentioned and knocked down (this can be one or more of your 3 body P's)
• overall, solid persuasive writing

WEEK 4

YOUR WORK:

DUE FRIDAY at 5pm. Report your scores and include the summaries.


1. ACT Q set (Passage II beginning "Jane Austen's reputation...")  Corrections and review.

2. Watch this video on subjects.

3. Ex 7, p508 and ex 9, p510. For each sentence in both exercises, do these 3 steps: 
a. identify it as action or description;  
b. identify the subject (watch for compounds; you may have more than one subject);  
c. identify the verb (an action if the sentence is about action, a linking verb if it's about description).  
Corrections and review. 

4. Read the blog post called "Actives Speak Louder." I wrote this for copy writers, but it's still a good introduction to passive and active voice. Write a short summary of the post (50-100 words).

5. Now read the post called "Please, Ink Responsibly." This one points out situations where the passive voice is helpful. Write a short summary of the post (50-100 words, and be sure to include examples). 

6. Read p.633-635 and do exercises 6 and 7. Corrections and review. 

7. Revise the Facial Recognition essay.

8. No new essay this week and no LBGB, just a lot of Mr. Beals talking at you. 

Have a great week!

WEEK 3

WELCOME TO MONDAY!


YOUR WORK. Due Friday by 5pm.

Everyone did a great job last week of reporting scores and showing work. Thank you! If you're confused about an item, write me a question there in your work. 

1. Work through the ACT q set Passage I, (Just the first 15 items; we'll do the rest of the packet over the next couple of weeks). Here are the corrections and review.  

2. Pronouns & Antecedents (Ex 12 and 13, p.610-612 if you have the green textbook). Corrections and review. 

3. LBGB...

Read chapter 2 and do the following: 

a) Read the outlined BOX on page 27. What are Mr. Beals' thoughts on pronouns? I bring this up here because I use a pronoun this way on page 26. Find the reference (there are actually a few) and write the sentence out.

b) Read "Active and Passive Voice" on pages 34-37. What are the two advantages to active voice? What are the three appropriate times to use the passive voice?

c)  Write correct sentences using each of these (you may model my examples):

i. less

ii. fewer

iii. amount

iv. rise

v. raise

vi. sit

vii. set

viii. lie

ix. lay 

4. Revise the Helmet Law essay if you need to.

5. Revise the Separate Gender Classroom essay. 

6. ACT essay prompt #3 first draft. Write a well-argued essay on the following prompt:

In the coming months and years, the US federal government plans to implement facial recognition technology in all public spaces (not only airports and train stations, but parks and street corners). Some groups have sounded the alarm on such measures, claiming that they not only violate the 4th amendment’s protection from unreasonable search and protection of privacy, but will be ineffective in catching potential threats. They also argue that the government has no business tracking the movement of its citizens. Others claim the new technology will better ensure the safety of the nation's citizens. Should such technology be the standard rule for all of our nation’s public spaces? In your essay, take a position on the issue. You may write about either of the two points of view, or you may propose a different point of view. Use specific reasons and examples to support your position.

Remember the basics we've covered this far: Three-part structure (intro, body P's, conclusion); a counter-argument KNOCKED DOWN!; plenty of detail and supporting evidence. Also remember this: your strongest argument is the BIG argument based on principle (the principles of privacy or of public safety). Give that one (whichever direction you go) the attention it deserves (It's also the best counter-argument to knock down, so look for the opposition's best, most principled argument, state it fairly, and then kick it to pieces). 




Have a great week!

WEEK 2

WEEK 2

GOOD MORNING!

IMPORTANT: 

1. I wasn't clear in that first post about recording your answers for exercises. I do need to see your work, so this week I've included those instructions with the assignments. "Record" means write out your answers in the doc as you're working. "Post" means give me your score (label it and put it somewhere I can see it easily).

2. The essay grade always reflects where I think you are in the process. So a first draft typically will be scored in the 50-70 range. That means you're 50-70% on your way to the final draft. In other words, don't freak out; it's a process.

Your work for this week... 

1. Revise the helmet law essay from last week. Yes, you may use (and maybe you should use) the usual word processing helps like grammar review and spell check. 


2. ACT q set #2 - take 10-15 minutes to complete it then go here for review. For each wrong answer write out an explanation on why you got it wrong. Record your answers in the doc and post your score.


3. Watch this semicolon and colon video.  Complete Review C on .783 and Posttest A on .784. For both exercises EXPLAIN WHY you're using the punctuation. Record your answers in the doc and post your score. (See #4 below for answers)


4. Watch this video for review/corrections of exercises from #3 and #4.

5.  LBGB work. Our work in LBGB for this course will involve 1) reviewing the big ideas (I won't make you re-read entire chapters); and 2) practicing the definitions and Style & Usage items that we skipped in HSW1. 

This week we'll look at chapter 1. Here's your work:

A. Conjunctions: define the three types and write an original sentence for each. 

B. Define conjunctive adverb. Write three sentences (note the punctuation pattern in my examples!) using three different CAs. Here are a few to choose from: 

in addition, accordingly, furthermore, moreover, on the other hand, similarly, also, hence, namely, still, anyway, however, nevertheless, then, in fact, besides, incidentally, next, thereafter, certainly, indeed, nonetheless, therefore, consequently, instead, now, thus, finally, likewise, otherwise, undoubtedly, further, meanwhile

Make sure the word you're using is WORKING as a conjunctive adverb. Many of the words in this list can be used as other parts of speech.

C. Explain the difference between these pairs and use each correctly in a sentence: 

    all together / altogether

    ___ and I  / ___ and me. 

6. Watch this video on the perusasive essay. This is how the old ACT essays were set up, so I'll refer to it that way. Our purpose is just to see the structure of a persuasive essay. 

There's about a minute missing that talks about the first body paragraph. Sorry - just pause it at that point and read the screen carefully. Also, at the end of the video I mention a gender-separated classrooms essay. IGNORE IT. This was a video I made a couple of years ago, and we started out with a different topic. We'll be doing the gender essay this week. Just pay attention to how a persuasive essay is set up. 

Also, though I don't mention this in the video (Yes, I need to just make a new video), you need to acknowledge a counter-argument, an argument from the opposing side, and then refute it (i.e, take the opposition's best argument and knock it down). I used to teach that you could include this idea anywhere in the essay, but I've since decided that making the counter-argument and knock down its own body paragraph is more effective. Here's how such a paragraph might look for the pop prompt you just watched:

Some may argue that pop consumption is a public health issue, similar to the safety of drinking water, and therefore the government has a duty to enact laws like this [That's the counter-argument. What follows is the knock down]. But that simplifies the argument too much. Yes, over consumption of pop or any highly sweet drink or food is having an adverse effect on many people. But just because it is widespread doesn't make it a public issue because not everyone is effected by the behavior. Whereas we all suffer the effects of bad drinking water or poor air quality, only those who choose to do so suffer from over-consumption of pop. This issue may be widespread, but it is simply not a public-health issue, and therefore the government has no business making laws regarding it. 

Here I've explained the opposition's point, and then I showed how it doesn't work. That's how you have to deal with a counter-argument. And remember, the only point of doing that is to help YOUR argument. You're better off not dealing with a counter-argument at all than to present one and leave it intact.


7. Write a persuasive essay on the following prompt:

It’s been proposed in your school district that students in grades 8 through 12 be separated into classrooms by sex. Proponents believe that this will allow students to focus better on their schoolwork. Opponents feel that such measures would fail to prepare students for the real world. In your essay, take a position on the issue. You may write about either of the two points of view, or you may propose a different point of view. Use specific reasons and examples to support your position.)

[In the last years gender itself has become a debatable issue (for some), for our purposes, you may ignore the whole gender confusion madness and simply deal with the idea of separating boys and girls.]  



(IT'S ALL DUE BY 5:00 pm FRIDAY.) 

HAVE A GREAT WEEK!

WEEK 1

WELCOME to our first class!

Read this first (even if you think you know it already; there's new info here):

GOOGLE DOCS REVIEW...

There are three parts to your doc: the spreadsheet at the top, a section to keep essay drafts, and a section for other work. Let's look at each one:

SPREADSHEET. This where I'll put your grade for essays and weekly work. Keep an eye on this. I update it every week. And read my comments! 

ESSAYS. This section is for essays only. Paragraphs are not essays. Keep the essay assignments together (if you have three drafts on the Helmet Law essay, they should all be next to each other with the latest one on top). LABEL the essay with title and draft #, like this: "Helmet Law draft 2". Keep the most recent assignment at the top of the section.

MISC. WORK. Anything that's not a full essay goes here. Labels are even more important for this section, so include, the week and a title, like this: "WEEK 3, Skill Builder 2". Keep the most recent assignments at the top of the section.  

LATE WORK...

If you need more time, you can ask for an extension by Wednesday midnight. After that I'll grade it at half credit. I'll let you do that TWICE. We'll have two "catch-up" weeks, so that should help you stay on top of things. 

YOUR WORK FOR THIS WEEK:

Post all scores in your google doc in the MISC WORK section. Something like this:  Skill Builder 1 - 15/20

1. Review this course description link.

2. Practice set #1 (Vatican City's Wonders) - Go here for directions and review. 

3. Watch this comma video (it will be familiar if you took HSW1; ignore the date). Do this exercise. 

4. Skill Builder #1 (Skip the exercise on p62; Do the exercise on p64) - Go here for directions and review. I've gone to pdf's for most of these exercises. It can be a little tricky going back and forth between the Skill Builder pdf and my video. Just a heads-up; I'm sure you'll figure it out.

5. ACT persuasive essay. 
When you take the ACT, you'll have 40 minutes to read a piece of persuasive writing and write your own essay analyzing it. In order to write a good analysis, you'll need to be familiar with the persuasive form, so that's where we'll start and spend the first half of this course -- in the persuasive (or argumentative) form of discourse.

Here's the assignment: Write a persuasive essay based on this old ACT prompt: 

A few years ago in Michigan, the law was changed making it legal to operate a motorcycle without a helmet. Some argue that this is merely a correction to laws that went beyond the scope of state government. Opponents to the change argue that some laws—including seat-belt laws—are beneficial to the general welfare and therefore should remain in place. Do you agree that safety measures such as helmets and seat-belts should be mandatory? You may address either side of the debate, or you may present a different point of view on the issue. 

• 500 word minimum (keep the intro and conclusion paragraphs brief: 3 sentences is plenty; just as with any essay, the work — argumentation for this one — should be primarily in the body paragraphs). It's good to begin thinking about this now: try to argue from big principles rather than from particulars. In other words, what principle would lead someone to argue that he should make his own decisions about health rather than the government making those decisions? What principle would lead someone to argue that the government should make these kinds of decisions for us? 

It's all due by 5pm FRIDAY. 


HAVE A GREAT WEEK!