Description
A full year English Language Arts course diving into literature about family that includes foundational writing exercises and assignments as we progress. Students will meet in class once per week and will have offline reading, vocabulary and writing work to do between classes. Class sessions will be predominantly used for writing instruction and Shared Inquiry discussion of text read as homework. “What is Shared Inquiry?” explanation from GreatBooks.org.
Family Matters
English Language Arts with Light Writing
In-person class Mondays, 9-10:30 am** with an additional approximately 1 hour of work to be done between classes. (Parents may opt to enroll in our Flex Work Session/s to contribute toward completing–or complete–work done outside of group class time)
Registration is for the 2024-25 school year (26 weeks)
**NOTE: We have increased the time for this course compared to previous years to provide more writing instruction.
Our literature pieces will be our guide for analyzing writing to guide us in pieces of our own writing. At middle school level, we are working on the building blocks of good writing and learning how to analyze and discuss our readings.
We start each semester with a review of Active Reading strategies and use of our reading journal.
Minimum concepts include:
- Word choice, repetition and sentence variety
- Summarizing
- Story maps
- Point of view
- Paragraph construction
- Character development
- Setting
- Plot
- Tone
Writing content will be repeated and developed over the course of the year.
- Pencil case with:
- 2-3 typical (non-colored) pencils
- Pencil sharpener with a COVERED blade (one that captures it’s own shavings and keeps blade from being exposed)
- One 1″ to 1-1/2″ binder with 100 looseleaf sheets of paper and at least 3 dividers
- Double pocket folder for handouts.
Additionally, students will need technical ability to access Zoom, EdPuzzle, FlipGrid, Nearpod.com, Discovery Education Streaming, Study.com and Canvas (our learning management system).
At home, students will need access to the internet (home or library) to look up information, related published materials and/or videos and do work through our class learning management system. Some videos will be subscription-based and issued by illuminat-ED (all students will have accounts for Discovery Streaming and Study.com for additional video support). Some videos will be freely available.
Live class time will assume students have done their pre-reading, writing assignments, online content and any offline work. We will be collaboratively discussing and analyzing our offline work and building upon that.
Sample discussion questions (based on assigned reading and usually a prior discussion about the reading) are:
- Why does (character A) talk to (character B) and tell him, “Thanks for the help”?
- Why does the speaker call the handshake “lethal”?
- Why does (character A) believe that (character B)’s always been jealous of her?
Sample writing assignments would be:
- Under what circumstances is one friend justified in breaking a promise to another friend? (essay)
- Write your own definition of friendship. (graphic organizer provided)
- Compare and contrast animal and human friends. (essay with graphic organizer provided)
- Write a series of letters between two friends. Give the friends a reason to write (perhaps one has moved away or perhaps they are trying to repair the friendship after an argument)
If you feel your child would be challenged, but not completely overwhelmed, with questions and assignments like this rather than stumped, then your child would be a good fit for this course. If you are unsure, please contact us to discuss further.
