Why I Write...

It is hard to believe our semester together is at an end, and here we are wrapping it all up.  Our final exercise is an opportunity to focus on the topic of  why a person writes.  You must think back over all that you have accomplished, all you have written, and all you have learned.  Your challenge is to think about why YOU write.  What do you learn about yourself, your relationship to the world, and the way you see the world?

Read excerpts over the following essay by the author Terry Tempest Williams.   The topic itself was inspired by the original essay written by George Orwell, and though you may find it rather dense, you may at least want to skim down to the final paragraph.  The National Writing Project adopted a national writing day based on the topic of "Why I Write."  This last link provides you with a number of essays which you may read through to gather ideas for how you might respond to the same topic. This last link is an interesting essay by a college adjunct professor who writes about the topic and asks her students to write as well.  After you have read over these essays, you may begin to sketch out your own ideas as to what writing reveals to you or why you write.

Think about the pieces we have written this year, what you may have written on your own, and how writing fits into your life and into your future.  You may simply begin your piece with a series of statements, "I write because_________________."   See where it leads you.

In this final self-reflection please take care to proofread how you write.  Use spell check.  Read what you say aloud to yourself to see if it makes sense and is what you intended to say.  Don't  be afraid to let the topic lead you to a new discovery.  This is about you as a writer, a thinker, and about what your own writing reveals to you.

I look forward to reading what your write.  For those of you leaving us, I will miss peeking into your thoughts and insights.  Keep thinking.  Keep writing!

One last letter to our Chinese friends

Write a letter to your Chinese pen pal today and post a copy of it to your blog as a New Post.  This can be a "goodbye" or a "let's keep in touch."

Address the following:

• what's going on here at the end of the school year--fun activities, Prom, finals, graduation, etc.--and what you've been up to, how you're feeling
• explain that the semester/our class is almost over and that you'll be graduating or moving on to other classes
• share where you're headed (summer plans, college plans, travel plans, etc.)
• either say you will try to keep in touch or explain that you won't be writing anymore
• wish him or her well (have a great summer, keep writing, etc.)

***To the two of you who do not have a Chinese pen pal due to the timing of the exercise, you may write to your MSU China exchange student instead.  Post it here and forward it to me and I'll see they get it!

Starry Night, painting and poetry

The starry night paintings have dried, and Wednesday we will mount them to construction paper along with the tankas composed in response to Van Gogh, his life, the painting, loneliness, insanity...anything in response to the study.

As we wrap things up this week, be sure you have posted two to three (or more) of your favorite photos (with captions) on your blog. Yes, we  created poster displays of our photo hunt to share in class, but it would be nice to have a digital record of your favorites as well.  After all, the whole idea of "what an artist sees" is highlighted in the photo hunt as well as our Van Gogh project.

Sadly, we have little time left with our seniors, so the class size will dwindle in half, and we will miss the personalities that filled this room.  We will take time Wednesday to gallery walk some of our work, the photo hunt and Starry Night.  Friday we will be doing a similar "gallery walk" on our blogs!

For those of you who haven't kept up with your blog posts, read back through this main page, and you'll find directions to all assignments.  Linked here is a check list (you got one of these in class) of your assigned blog posts and a space to evaluate your progress.  Good luck!

Xiexie to Our New Friends!

What a joy it was to partner up with our MSU Chinese exchange students and talk about language and life.  When I get pictures from our school photographers, I'll try to upload some of those.  I'm sure they'll be better than what I captured here on my phone. 

I especially loved hearing all of you share the new Chinese adjectives and seeing the pinyin you learned as you expressed your relationship with school right now... 

The face match warm up activity. 

           

I picked up the index cards you filled out, and on Tuesday we'll take a look at those.  Let's see if you remember how to pronounce your adjective.  I can't wait to talk about our visit, review the activities, and blog about it. I'll also try to find a great place to display your photos and your index cards!    

MSU Chinese students visit  PHS April 8th, 2016

I hope to be able to schedule at least one more "get together" before seniors graduate and school is out. Zhenzhen said they'd like to come back, and I know many of you made new Facebook friends.  I am very grateful to ZhenZhen, Jasmine, and MSU for planning and orchestrating the event.  (Next time I'll be sure to give clear directions regarding a drop off point!  I nearly lost everyone!)                                                                                            

Zhenzhen and I say goodbye

Meantime xiexie to all of you.  Friday's visit enabled us to talk about our lives and learn about educational systems, family life, hobbies, friends, interests, and opportunities available to all citizens.  

I'm anxious to read what you have to say about the discussions you had, the surprises you found, and in general what you learned.  I saw many of you taking pictures, and I hope you  will post them to your blog. 

I couldn't be prouder to be at Parkview and to be your teacher.  You represented us well, and you are wonderful American ambassadors. You are why I love teaching!            

Nǐ Hǎo to Friday's MSU Visitors

On Friday a dozen or so MSU students from China will shuttle to PHS to visit our class, which will be held in the library after lunch.  Don't forget we will have first lunch Friday in order to give us time to get organized in the library.

PLEASE be in school Friday and have your photo hunt blog post completed and posted!  We will have a set of chrome books so that we can share our posts with our visitors, but first we will introduce ourselves in small groups and get to know something about each other.  Think about questions you would like to ask the MSU students by class time on Wednesday so we can talk about possible questions.

I don't know if the MSUstudents have ever visited an American high school, but it's likely they have not.  You are ambassadors, and I am proud they will be meeting you!  Let's make them feel welcome. They will remember your sincerity, your manners, and the personal interest you show them.   AND...they will form an opinion about American high school students based on their visit here.
To hear how to say hello, click on the link here and listen to the audio.

On Friday, I'd love for you to talk in your small groups about your most meaningful picture and how it makes you feel.  We'll ask our visitors to suggest a Chinese character that could represent that picture, something we could add to our collage.

This should be fun.  I am really looking forward to the experience.  The MSU China Programs office was so pleased to learn about your email exchange program that they are providing the shuttle to make this happen and will likely stay and join us.  Let's have fun and make the most of our time with them!

Photo Exchange

In a New Post on your blog, please add the photos you took Monday during our Photo Hunt or that you found on your own. As we discussed in class, you may omit a category you don't like, or substitute categories of your own, but in the end you should have at least 10 pictures. Each picture should have a caption of at least 25 words, and include a clever #hashtag with each caption.  You can decide whether to label or otherwise indicate which photo on the list each was supposed to be.

At the end of your post, include a quote that suggests something about paying attention or writers noticing everything or the power of photographs.

In case you are looking for online pictures of the Ozarks for your photo hunt, here is a link to Ozarks landscapes, which can give you some options in addition to photos you take yourself.

Culture Swap: What Would You Do?

Write a letter of 300-400 words to your Chinese pen pals commenting on some aspect of the Wife Swap clips we watch in class, and you can add comments about the What Would You Do episodes as well if you have not already done so.  Share connections you can make to your own life, how you think these clips accurately portray us, what they might leave out, your own experiences in situations like these, etc.  Think about what you'd like the Chinese to know about us as Americans and/or you as an individual.  What are we proud of when it comes to our way of life?  What would we like to do better or see in our future?  

Ask some good questions about what the Chinese students thought of the clips, what those shows might look like if they were filmed in China, something else you'd like to know...

Share your letter in a New Post on your blog, please, and send your letter to your pen pals.  You can send the same letter to both of your pen pals if you have more than one.

Kevin sent me a copy of his lesson he used with the Wife Swap episode.  Here's some of what he said about how he introduced the show and some of the issues/concepts they're working on...

Hey! I've attached my lesson for Wife Swap for what it's worth. Maybe your students would be interested to look at what (I make) the students do in class. We covered fifteen phrasal verbs for this show because phrasal verbs are insanely difficult for non-native speakers, and we use them all the time. Take is used, for example, in dozens of phrasal verbs in the show, and even the single phrasal verb "take off" has several meanings. So these are really important for them. 

I used the second slide to elicit the name of the show and introduce a game. They then look at the last fifteen slides and have to look at the two pictures and come up with the phrasal verbs that correspond to the pictures and write the verb phrase on the blanks on the worksheet. After the phrasal verbs are all elicited, we work on meaning and pronunciation. This is tricky, too, because for a phrase like "count on," most Americans drop the /t/ in count, so it winds up sounding like cow-non; using the /t/ sounds unnatural and throws off sentence rhythm. 

When we watched the show, we focused on phrasal verbs in the first ten minutes of the show and then sentence stress in questions in the last ten minutes. I also paused quite a bit to talk about gender roles/politics. One of the husbands is a self-proclaimed redneck and he says things to his "new" wife like "I'm thirsty." My students don't understand the implicit meaning (go get me a beer).

Finally we watch the show and they answer the discussion questions. The circle with four lines at the bottom is for a freer speaking activity. I asked them to put their name in the circle, and write four facts about themselves or interests using only one or two words like "Chinese" or "pizza" or "dog." Then they mingle and ask each other questions, ideally mimicking the stress patterns we just covered.

This is long-winded.. Sorry! Your students are awesome, and my students are loving this. Thank you and be in touch soon!