ELA Weekly:
November 9 - November 13
Curriculum Manager Announcements
ELA Webinars This Week!
Instructional Toolbox Added to the Hub
ELA 8-10 Campus Observations
Course Specific
6th Grade ELA
SpringBoard: Students will begin this week exploring elements of a newscast, in preparation for EA 2. They will then move into reading a folktale and a myth. The fiction texts serve two purposes: 1. In preparation for the EA, the folktale and myth reinforce using stories to create newscasts. Students will practice reading a story, then use it to write expository essays. 2. These are great activities for embedding additional practice with literary TEKS (6.3, 6.6, & 6.8). Use BWA and IA data to determine which skills you need to embed in the lessons, and usethis opportunity for students to practice analyzing plot, character, theme, and sensory details.
Webinar Focus: This week's webinar will focus on how to use the literary lessons in Bundle 4 to prepare students to create an expository newscast, as well as tips for the Expository Close-Reading Workshop that is coming up in the next few weeks. Make sure to attend; Caleb has great tips and suggestions for getting the most out of these lessons!
Do-Nows: This week's Do-Nows move into Revising skills, with 6.14(C) Simple/Compound sentences as the focus. Remember that the Do-Nows are an introduction to a skill; students should receive repeated practice with skills in their own writing (through revision and editing opportunities) and through homework practice. All Do-Nows for Bundle 4 have been posted to the Hub, in the "Do-Nows" folder within "Quarter 2." Make sure to follow the sequence of the Do-Nows for the remainder of Quarter 2 in order to expose students to all tested TEKS. In Quarter 3, teachers will choose the focus TEKS for the Do-Nows that meet the needs of individual classrooms.
Archived Webinars: Please visit the links below to view previous webinars.
- October 28th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kvp/
- September 30th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8E2z/
- September 16th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8AMZ/ (SpringBoard 1.14/Expository Rubric and exemplars for EA 2)
7th Grade ELA
SpringBoard: Students will continue (and finish) the Expository Writing Workshop this week. Since the beginning of Quarter 2, students have analyzed expository texts that follow the six different organizational patterns, practiced writing in different organizational patterns, and they are now bringing all of their learning together to craft a complete expository essay. Next week, students will move back into SpringBoard Unit 4, which is a revising unit. If teachers want to adjust the lessons this week to focus more heavily on brainstorming, ideation, text organization, and drafting, students will have ample opportunity to revise their expository essays through the Revision Unit 4 next week. Several teachers have also expressed an interest in revisiting the expository reading lessons, using the graphic organizers to reinforce text organization and author's craft. Moving between reading model expository texts and writing expository paragraphs/short essays is definitely best practice! This unit of study forms the foundation for expository writing, so take advantage of the time dedicated to this genre over the next few weeks.
Assessments: Students will take BWA 5: Revising and Editing on Friday, November 13th. The scanning deadline is also Friday, November 13th. Data will be analyzed and the analysis sent to managers and the Schools Team, to aid in discussions around the data.
Do-Nows: Students will practice with pronoun usage (7.14D). Remember that the Do-Nows are an introduction to a skill; students should receive repeated practice with skills in their own writing (through revision and editing opportunities) and through homework practice. Make sure to follow the sequence of the Do-Nows for the remainder of Quarter 2 in order to provide direct instruction to students on all tested TEKS, and to align instruction to BWAs and IA 2. This Quarter's Do-Nows are specifically aligned to all of the skills students will need to master for success on the 2015 STAAR Released that was used to build IA 3. In Quarter 3, teachers will choose the focus TEKS for the Do-Nows that meet the needs of individual classrooms.
Webinar Focus: Teachers will discuss best practices in the upcoming Unit 4 on Revision. Teachers will also discuss strategies for conferencing with students. Make sure to join us as we share ideas and prepare to support students in their revision practice!
Archived Webinars:
- October 28th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kw6/
- September 30th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8E2D/
- September 16th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8AN7/ (Strategies for teaching mythology)
- September 2nd: https://bluejeans.com/s/8zrR/
- August 19th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8zrU/
8th Grade ELA
Bi-Weekly Assessment 5: The scanning deadline for BWA5 is Friday, November 13 by 5 pm. This exam is to be scanned using GradeCam.
- Criteria for Success: Ensure that the response has the following three elements in order to ensure success: 1) A - Answer, 2) P - Proof or textual evidence, and 3) E -Explanation or commentary.
- For a more in-depth breakdown of criteria, please refer to the Instructional Notes section of the Q2 Unit Road Map.
How is an OER preparing my students for the ELA 8 STAAR exam when my test is all multiple choice? That is a great question! The rationale is provided below:
- With a multiple choice question, you as the teacher are only able to see if the student chose the correct or incorrect answer.
- With an OER, you as the teacher are able to answer the following questions: 1) Did the student truly understand or did he/she guess on this question? 2) What made the student either select the correct or incorrect response? 3) Where in the text did the student identify evidence that lead to their answer selection? 4) What was the thought process they took in order to get to the correct answer and/or where did they make a mistake that lead them to select the incorrect answer choice?
- On the 2015 STAAR ELA release, 25 out of the 52 questions assessed directly link to author's craft within a specific text. Giving students multiple opportunities to practice the skill of decoding, process of elimination, and identifying textual evidence will help transfer the skill to any passage/poem/visual that appears on the ELA 8 STAAR exam.
SpringBoard: SpringBoard Activity 2.4 and Embedded Assessment 1 are this week's critical lessons.
- SB Activity 2.4: Students will read a non-fiction piece and use the SOAPSTone strategy to ensure understanding. The strategy focuses on the following areas: S (Speaker), O (Occasion), A (Audience), P (Purpose), S (Subject), and T (Tone).
- In order to maximize this strategy, require students provide a clear claim for each section and textual evidence that supports that claim. Requiring this step will help students practice the necessary skill of finding and answer based off of evidence from the selection. This skill is required on all STAAR, AP/IB, and ACT exams.
- Embedded Assessment 1 is a key opportunity to incorporate review of the writing process and model for students the steps effective readers/writers take when constructing a written work.
- Ensure you as the teacher outline what you will do during the Embedded Assessment to ensure all students are successful. Using small groups to help review with specific individuals is one way to ensure success.
- Note: This action falls under the SB Implementation/Usage look-out for Quarter 2. Take the time to make this lesson meaningful for students. A visual that looks like it was done with no intention or clarity will allow observers to infer that additional help in this area is needed.
Grammar Focus/Do Now: The focus for this week is sentence revision (8.17Av). Ensure students can articulate two key items in their response: 1) What is the error and 2) What should this change be made.
- Suggestion: You can add additional errors for the student to correct in order to spiral in previous grammar TEKS covered.
- For example, you can lowercase the beginning of the sentence, remove the punctuation, and add in additional errors to challenge the students to recall previous TEKS as well as use academic vocabulary.
- The Grammar Focus/Do Now slides are a foundation to support the specific TEK in the Unit Road Map; however, you can add to the slide to ensure continuous coverage of prior material.
Archived Webinars: Please visit the links below to view previous webinars.
- October 28th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kvb/
- October 14th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kva/
- September 30th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8D_S/
English I Pre-AP
Bi-Weekly Assessment 5: The scanning deadline for BWA5 is Friday, November 13 by 5 pm. This exam is to be scanned using GradeCam.
- Criteria for Success: Ensure that the response has the following three elements in order to ensure success: 1) A - Answer, 2) P - Proof or textual evidence from passage 1, 3) P - Proof or textual evidence from passage 2, and 4) E -Explanation or commentary that connects both answer together.
- For a more in-depth breakdown of criteria, please refer to the Instructional Notes section of the Q2 Unit Road Map.
SpringBoard: SpringBoard Activity 3.15 and 3.16 are this week's critical lessons.
- SB Activity 3.15 challenges students to analyze a poem using the strategy known as TP-CASTT which stands for T (Title), P (Paraphrase), C (Connotation), A (Attitude), S (Shifts), T (Title-Revisited), and T (Theme).
- Require that students provide an answer for each section of the graphic organizer with textual evidence from the selection so support their answer. Requiring textual evidence will ensure strong preparation for the ELA 8 STAAR Exam which will challenge students to do this same process, but in the form of a multiple choice question.
- SB 3.16 breaks up the class into specific groups and challenges them to apply the TP-CASTT strategy learned in SB 3.14.
- This is a key application to ensure students can independently apply previous skills to a poem. Ensure you as the teacher have planned specific CFUs to ensure students are progressing towards successful analysis of the poem.
- Note: This action falls under the SB Implementation/Usage look-out for Quarter 2. Take the time to make this lesson meaningful for students. A visual that looks like it was done with no intention or clarity will allow observers to infer that additional help in this area is needed.
Grammar Focus/Do Now: The focus for this week is sentence revision (9.17C/9.15Aii). Ensure students can articulate two key items in their response: 1) What is the error and 2) What should this change be made.
- Suggestion: You can add additional errors for the student to correct in order to spiral in previous grammar TEKS covered.
- For example, you can lowercase the beginning of the sentence, remove the punctuation, and add in additional errors to challenge the students to recall previous TEKS as well as use academic vocabulary.
- The Grammar Focus/Do Now slides are a foundation to support the specific TEK in the Unit Road Map; however, you can add to the slide to ensure continuous coverage of prior material.
Archived Webinars: Please visit the links below to view previous webinars.
- October 28th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kvb/
- October 14th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kva/
- September 30th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8D_U/
- September 16th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Av6/
- September 2nd: https://bluejeans.com/s/8D_V/
English II Pre-AP
Bi-Weekly Assessment 5: The scanning deadline for BWA5 is Friday, November 13 by 5 pm. This exam is to be scanned using GradeCam.
- Criteria for Success: Ensure that the response has the following three elements in order to ensure success: 1) A - Answer, 2) P - Proof or textual evidence from passage 1, 3) P - Proof or textual evidence from passage 2, and 4) E -Explanation or commentary that connects both answer together.
- For a more in-depth breakdown of criteria, please refer to the Instructional Notes section of the Q2 Unit Road Map.
SpringBoard: SpringBoard Activity 3.14 and 3.16 are this week's critical lessons.
- SB 3.14 challenges students to analyze the role of a character and create a written response through the RAFT strategy. RAFT is composed of the following: R (Role), A (Audience), F (Format), and T (Topic).
- This activity will challenge students to create a response from a given role and is the highest form of understanding.
- Please refer to the RAFT folder found on the Instructional Toolbox folder on The Hub.
- SB 3.16 challenges the student to identify textual evidence and provide commentary on the excerpt. This is a direct skill necessary on the English II STAAR exam with this higher order thinking being challenged on the AP/IB exams.
- Challenge students to create sound commentary and provide sentence stems that will help provide the foundation of what an effective response should sound like.
- Note: This action falls under the SB Implementation/Usage look-out for Quarter 2. Take the time to make this lesson meaningful for students. A visual that looks like it was done with no intention or clarity will allow observers to infer that additional help in this area is needed.
Grammar Focus/Do Now: The focus for this week is sentence revision (10.17C/10.15Aii). Ensure students can articulate two key items in their response: 1) What is the error and 2) What should this change be made.
- Suggestion: You can add additional errors for the student to correct in order to spiral in previous grammar TEKS covered.
- For example, you can lowercase the beginning of the sentence, remove the punctuation, and add in additional errors to challenge the students to recall previous TEKS as well as use academic vocabulary.
- The Grammar Focus/Do Now slides are a foundation to support the specific TEK in the Unit Road Map; however, you can add to the slide to ensure continuous coverage of prior material.
Archived Webinars: Please visit the links below to view previous webinars.
- October 28th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kvb/
- October 14th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kva/
- September 30th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8D_X/
- September 16th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Avc/
- September 2nd: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Avb/
AP Language
SpringBoard: Students will explore Satire and its effectiveness in commenting on a serious issue. Students tend to struggle with satire because of its underlying meanings. Exposure to more well-known satire, prior to reading, helps students to understand how satire is used to comment on serious issues. Teachers can incorporate contemporary parodies and texts to build foundational understanding of satire before students are asked to evaluate satire in earlier works.
Assessments: Teachers will have until Friday, November 13th to scan scores for the Argument FRQ BWA that students took last Friday. Teachers can use the 2013 Argument Scoring Guide along with the AP Language rubric, located within the Quarter 2 BWA folder on the Hub, for specific guidelines on grading BWA 5. The Wednesday Webinar will also provide opportunity for norming around the essay assessment. Remember to provide specific feedback to students, and establish specific goals with students to inform areas of focus in preparation for IA 2.
Webinar Focus: Teachers will norm on the first formal Argument FRQ and discuss the upcoming Satire focus in SpringBoard. All teachers should send two essays to Odell Brown so he can compile a collection of essays for the norming activity. Make sure to send an essay demonstrating limited proficiency and an essay demonstrating adequate proficiency. Through the norming process, teachers will discuss how to set goals with students with large gaps, as well as setting goals with students close to or at proficiency.
Archived Webinars: Please use the links below to view previous webinars:
October 28th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8Kwa/
September 30th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8E2G/
September 16th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8ANu/ (Norming the Synthesis Essay for IA 1)
September 2nd: https://bluejeans.com/s/8zsh/
August 19th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8zsi/
AP Literature
SpringBoard: Students will continue to study archetypes through their reading of Pygmalion. Students will also view a musical theater adaptation of Pygmalion and analyze tone and character through the film. The week concludes with a written analysis of Pygmalion through the perspective of Archetypal Criticism. In these analyses, students must include examples from text to support a claim. Students might need support with embedding quotes in their writing; this skill is essential to strong analysis pieces, so students must know how to effectively include quotes in their writing. Mini-lessons on embedding quotes is time well spent!
Assessments: Teachers have until Friday, November 13th to grade all BWA 5 Prose Analysis essays that were administered last Friday. Teachers will assess student essays using the AP Lit Rubric, which can be found on the Hub within the Quarter 2 BWA folder. Remember to provide specific feedback to students, and establish goals with students to inform areas of focus in preparation for IA 2.
Webinar Focus: Teachers will meet together at an off-site location to finalize the IDEA Independent Reading Logs that students will begin creating in 6th grade. This initiative will roll out next year, fostering increased independent reading requirements that will prepare students for success in AP English courses and through college. Make sure to attend to share ideas and finalize the product that will roll out to the whole district next year!
Archived Webinars: Please use the links below to view previous webinars:
October 28th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8KwI/
September 30th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8E2W/
September 16th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8ANI/ (Implementing timed writings in class/Integration of poetry during prose lessons)
September 2nd: https://bluejeans.com/s/8zsn/
August 19th: https://bluejeans.com/s/8zsm/