No Class: Smarter Balanced Testing

We did not have class today due to Smarter Balanced testing.

Some students tested during our period 5 class. Those students who had tested earlier in the day had a study hall in Mr. Cogswell's room.

No Class: Smarter Balanced Testing

We did not have class today due to Smarter Balanced testing.

Some students tested during our period 5 class. Those students who had tested earlier in the day had a study hall in Mr. Cogswell's room.

04.28 - Smarter Balanced Lesson, Secret Formula (cont'd)

For the first half of class today, we had a lesson related to the material with which people will be working on tomorrow's Smarter Balanced test.

Following this, we returned to our work with the Be a Changemaker text with everyone sharing out some of the things they were good at and proceeding with the reading to look at identifying a community issue or problem they feel is important to solve. Everyone had time to read this portion of the text (pages 22 - 25), complete the journaling, and check in with others on the ideas they had produced.

Tomorrow we have the Smarter Balanced test so we will return to this work on Thursday with everyone completing the chapter reading and activity for homework (we will select projects on Thursday and Friday).

Handouts:
Be a Changemaker chapter
Assignments submitted for assessment last week

Submitted Today:
- - -

Homework:

Read pages 25 - 29 (end) in Be a Changemaker and complete the associated activity.

04.27 - Be a Change Agent: The Secret Formula

We started today's class with a check in and recap of break using activity cards. Next, we began to take a look at how to determine ways that individuals can realistically make positive changes in their community. For this work, we took a look at a chapter from the book Be a Changemaker. In class people had time to read the various sections of this chapter focused on a formula for creating change (passion, things you are good at, what change is needed in your community).

Examples of this work are available here: Be a Changemaker - Journal Notes

In class, we looked at people's passions with time for everyone to do the reading and suggested journaling. For homework, everyone should read and do the suggested journaling for the "What are you good at?" section. We will discuss this tomorrow in class and complete the third section.

At the end of class, I handed out updated grade report sheets.

Handouts:
Be a Changemaker chapter
Grade report sheets

Submitted Today:
- - -

Homework:

Complete the "What are you good at?" reading and journaling for the Be a Changemaker reading.

04.17 - Roving Dialogue: Civil Disobedience to Civic Action (Part II)

In today's class, we resumed the roving dialogue that we began in class yesterday and addressed two additional prompts (see slides 1 - 14 in the presentation linked below).

Roving Dialogue: Civil Disobedience to Civic Action

Due to the rain, we had our dialogue as a modified indoors circuit where we were able to discuss the following two prompts:

Q3 - Changing Things

Imagine you are made the autocratic ruler of Lisbon so that you can turn it into the ideal town. You have five years of unquestioned power to make your changes. What do you do? Where do you start?

Q4 - You as Change Agent

What are your skills and passions? How can you use those skills and passions to create positive changes in the world?

We then returned to the classroom and reviewed the various ideas that had been addressed in peoples' discussion of the second prompt.

Handouts:

- - -

Submitted Today:

- - -

Homework:

Respond to the prompt question on slide sixteen and be prepared to discuss your response when we return on Monday.

04.16 - Roving Dialogue: Civil Disobedience to Civic Action (Part I)

We started class today with the writing prompt below. Everyone had a chance to respond to this prompt and then we discussed it together as a class.

Next, I introduced everyone to the "roving dialogue" discussion format (see slides 1 - 14 in the presentation linked below). 

Roving Dialogue: Civil Disobedience to Civic Action

We then went outside and had enough time to discuss the following two prompts:

1 - Discuss the ideas and perspectives represented in the following two quote:

“But to establish the principles of the Declaration of Independence, we are going to need to go outside the law, to stop obeying the laws that demand killing or that allocate wealth the way it has been done, or that put people in jail for petty technical offenses and keep other people out of jail for enormous crimes.”

-- From Zinn’s “The Problem is Civil Obedience” (emphasis added)

“Unjust laws exist; shall we be content to obey them, or shall we endeavor to amend them, and obey them until we have succeeded, or shall we transgress them at once? Men generally, under such a government as this, think that they ought to wait until they have persuaded the majority to alter them.”

-- From Thoreau’s On the Duty of Civil Disobedience (emphasis added)

2 - Laws here and now: Identify and discuss laws that you believe benefit our community/society and ones that you would change.

We then returned to the classroom and reviewed the various ideas that had been addressed in peoples' discussion of the second prompt.

Handouts:

- - -

Submitted Today:

- - -

Homework:

Revisions (final opportunity for revision/submission)

Due Friday 4/17:

      Socratic Seminar Prep Sheet on Civil Obedience

      Annotations on Thoreau's "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"

     (read through page 13 with 10 annotations discussing 

      points of agreement, disagreement or questions you have)

04.15 - Grade Reports and Revisions

Our class did not assemble until half way through the period due to SAT testing today.

In class, I returned grade report sheets and work that was submitted last week. Everyone had the period to work on completing or revising assignments as necessary and I was available to meet and work with people on an individual basis.

Handouts:

Quarter 4 Grade Report Sheets

Returned work that was submitted last week

Submitted Today:

- - -

Homework:

Revisions (final opportunity for revision/submission)

Due Friday 4/17:

      Socratic Seminar Prep Sheet on Civil Obedience

      Annotations on Thoreau's "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"

     (read through page 13 with 10 annotations discussing 

      points of agreement, disagreement or questions you have)

No Class: Smarter Balanced Testing

We did not have class today due to Smarter Balanced testing.

Some students tested during our period 5 class. Those students who had tested earlier in the day had a study hall in Mr. Cogswell's room.

No Class: Smarter Balanced Testing

We did not have class today due to Smarter Balanced testing.

Some students tested during our period 5 class. Those students who had tested earlier in the day had a study hall in Mr. Cogswell's room.

04.10 - Smarter Balanced Test Practice

There were not enough people who had completed the Socratic seminar prep sheet for our seminar on civil (dis)obedience so we did not have this discussion today.

Everyone had the class to take the Smarter Balanced practice test online (available here) to get a sense for what this test will be like. This is the state test we will begin taking next week and continue with after vacation.

The schedule and information for this test is available here: Smarter Balanced Testing Information

Handouts:

- - -

Submitted Today:

Annotations on Thoreau's "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"

Socratic Seminar Prep Sheet: Civil (Dis)Obedience

Revisions (final opportunity for revision/submission)

Seventh "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Into the Wild In-Class Essay 

Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died

Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update

Logic Models: A Taste of Change
Logic Model - Process Reflection

Homework:

If they were not submitted today:

Annotations on Thoreau's "On the Duty of Civil Disobedience"

Socratic Seminar Prep Sheet: Civil (Dis)Obedience

04.09 - Socratic Seminar on Civil Disobedience (Prep)

I was not in class, so today's work was facilitated by a substitute. In class, people were reading Howard Zinn's essay "The Problem is Civil Obedience" and completing a Socratic seminar prep sheet for this work.

Handouts:
The Problem is Civil Obedience by Howard Zinn

Socratic Seminar Prep Sheet on Civil Obedience

Submitted:
Revised/completed assignments

Homework:

Complete the prep sheet for our Socratic seminar on civil obedience.

Revisions: Due this Friday, 4/10

Seventh "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Into the Wild In-Class Essay 

Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died

Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update

Logic Models: A Taste of Change
Logic Model - Process Reflection

04.08 - On Civil Disobedience (Part II)

Today in class we continued with our work on Henry David Thoreau's piece On the Duty of Civil Disobedience. In reading the text, we continued to read paragraphs and then pause to make annotations which we then discussed. In this work, we read through page 9 to the middle of page 11. For homework, people should continue to read the text.

Reading Activity
(Click Image to Enlarge)

Handouts:
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau

Submitted:
Revised/completed assignments

Homework:

Read through to page 13 (ending with the paragraph that concludes, "...like birth and death which convulse the body."), underlining and annotating the text (~1 annotation per page for the full 10 annotations - changed from the 20 annotations earlier). 

Revisions: Due this Friday, 4/10

Seventh "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Into the Wild In-Class Essay 

Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died

Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update

Logic Models: A Taste of Change
Logic Model - Process Reflection

04.07 - On Civil Disobedience (Part I)

Today in class we were focused on Henry David Thoreau's piece On the Duty of Civil Disobedience. We began with a pre-reading activity and then moved into reading and discussing the piece together as a class (see below for our reading activity).

For homework, people should complete the first half of this reading.

Pre-Reading Activity
(Click to Enlarge)

After everyone had a chance to respond to this pre-reading question, we discussed the various perspectives that students had on this quote. I then used these ideas to set up our reading of On the Duty of Civil Disobedience.

Reading Activity
(Click Image to Enlarge)

Handouts:
On the Duty of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau

Submitted:
Revised/completed assignments

Homework:

Read through to page 09 with today's reading, underlining and annotating the text (~1 annotation per page for the full 20 annotations). Stop on page 09 on the second paragraph that ends with, "Only his vote can hasten the abolition of slavery who asserts his own freedom by his vote."

Revisions: Due this Friday, 4/10

Seventh "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Into the Wild In-Class Essay 

Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died

Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update

Logic Models: A Taste of Change
Logic Model - Process Reflection

04.06 - Grade Reports & Revisions

At the beginning of class today, I returned work that was submitted last week along with students' grade report sheets. We reviewed general performance trends for these assignments and how to revise them (see below for revision dead line and extra copies of assignments).

Everyone then had the rest of the period to work on revising and completing assignments. I met individually with students to answer questions about grades and assignments.

Handouts:
Quarter 4 grade reports
Work submitted last week

Submitted:
Revised/completed assignments

Homework:

Revisions: Due this Friday, 4/10

Seventh "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Into the Wild In-Class Essay 

Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died

Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update


Logic Models: A Taste of Change
Logic Model - Process Reflection

04.03 - Reading Log and Logic Model Discussions

We started today's class with some reflection on people's progress with their logic model and goal (see reflection sheet below).

Our main focus in class today was a student-run class discussion over the final three reading logs for Into the Wild which we followed with a discussion of the logic models that people used over the course of the past week to try and introduce some positive changes into their lives (see slides below).

Model Listening Notes (Click to Enlarge)

Discussion Rubric (Click to Enlarge)

Click Image to Enlarge

Click Image to Enlarge

At the end of class, we reviewed what was due for today (see submitted assignments below) and people had a chance to turn this work in.

Handouts:

Logic Model - Process Reflection

Submitted Today:

Logic Model - Process Reflection
Into the Wild In-Class Essay (from yesterday)

Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)

Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died
Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update

Revisions: Fifth and Sixth  Into the Wild Reading Logs (choice of logs 7, 8, or 9)

Revisions: Reading questions for logic models

Homework:

If there are assignments from this week that you did not get turned in (like the Into the Wild in-class essay, processing questions for "How Chris McCandless Died", or reading questions for "How Chris McCandless Died: An Update"), do so for homework.

04.02 - "Into the Wild" In Class Essay

Today, everyone had the class to work on an in-class essay for Into the Wild. At the beginning of class, we reviewed the essay prompt, rubrics, and outlines. Everyone then had the period to plan and write their essay. People who did not finish the essay in class may do so for homework.

Handouts:
Into the Wild In-Class Essay

Submitted Today:
Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12)
Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update
Into the Wild In-Class Essay

Homework:
Into the Wild In-Class Essay (if not completed in class)

Revisions:
Fifth and Sixth  Into the Wild Reading Logs (choice of logs 7, 8, or 9) - Due Friday, 3/4
Reading questions for logic models - Due Friday 3/4

04.01 - How Chris McCandless Died: An Update

Today in class, people were finishing their work with Krakauer's article "How Chris McCandless Died" and the processing questions associated with this article (see below). Since groups were in different places on this work, I handed out an update to this article along with some reading questions (see below) as people finished the first article and the processing questions. 

In the last part of class, everyone completed another reflection on their progress with their logic model (we will wrap up this portion on Friday).

Handouts:
Article: How Chris McCandless Died
Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died

Article: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update
Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update


Submitted Today:
Article: How Chris McCandless Died
Processing Questions: How Chris McCandless Died


Homework:

Complete the following (due tomorrow):
Article: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update
Reading Questions: How Chris McCandless Died: An Update

Eigth "Into the Wild" reading log (choice of log 10, 11, or 12) - Due Thursday, 04/02
Into the Wild Reading Logs

Revisions:
Fifth and Sixth  Into the Wild Reading Logs (choice of logs 7, 8, or 9) - Due Friday, 3/4
Reading questions for logic models - Due Friday 3/4