Edline Grades Posted

Your grades are posted on Edline and many of you are still passing at the moment despite missing several point activities. This will change when your essay grades are entered, which will count for 40% of your 3rd marking period average. If you have not posted/emailed your thesis questions and thesis statement, posted your essay type, posted a comment about your project you can still make up those posts and emails. It's an easy way to add between 4 - 12 points to your total average. Please update your blogs and/or email me the missing information. Posting them on your blog will help improve your overall end of the semester blog grade.

Find an Expert

As you work on your project and your project essay, it's time to find an expert who can provide you with feedback about your project. Since we are in school, finding people who know about math, science, history, music, art, and law isn't difficult. They are your teachers. Think of a teacher who you think might be able to help you out with your project and write a brief letter asking them to look over your blog, your project idea (update it if you have to!), and politely ask them if they would read over the 1st revision of your essay. We don't want to send rough drafts. Send the letter to me as an email, and I will forward it to the appropriate teacher. They may also know someone who could help you find out more information about your project or recommend books, websites, and other resources.

If you want to take this idea of finding an expert one step further, do a Google search around your topic and see if you can find contact information with someone who might be able to answer some of your questions about the topic. Send them a polite email asking if they would be able to answer a few questions. If they respond, then you can send them a short list of questions to respond to. I was actually tracked down by a high school student in Williamsburg from the Academy of Young Writers to talk about my experience as a writer. She found me by searching for Brooklyn writers.

Independent Project Work

The semester ends three weeks from today, and your independent projects will be due Friday, January 11th. In order to help you accomplish your projects, you may need to get work done over the holiday break. At this point, if you were planning on developing a website you may just want to create a new blog on your blogger account and post your project on the blog. You can customize your blog layout to a large degree and even edit the HTML of the layout.

I will be working with you individually this week on your projects and trying to help you accomplish a draft of your goal. Take the first 5 minutes of class and post a comment about the most important thing you need to develop your project. If that is unavailable, how else could you proceed with the project? How else could you present your project?

After you write your blog entry, use your time in class today to develop your project. Conduct research, make a plan, write questions, work on your project essay, find images, create a new blog, develop a PowerPoint presentation. Whatever it is that you are doing individually, use your time wisely. Send me a brief email at the end of class every day this week about what you accomplished on your project. If you need help, please ask.

What type of essay are you writing?

Knowing what kind of essay you are writing can be helpful in refining your rough draft. To help y0u develop your essays, I would like you to visit Essay Info - and look over the basic structure of a 5 paragraph essay. It's worth noting how they organize the paragraphs to make your most effective argument first.

Then, look over the categories in the left sidebar and see if you can find the type of essay you believe you are writing. Post a brief blog summary of the kind of essay you are writing and give two reasons why you believe you are working on that type of essay. Then answer the question "Do you believe your essay will challenge or educate your reader?"

Essay Workshop

Congratulations to the following students who received a 100 on the quiz and submitted a rough draft of their essay.

Darielle
Shane
Dulce
Keron
Ayana
Keron
Michael
Mateia
Trisha
Devona

The essays that were submitted covered a range of progress from an outline with facts to a well-reasoned essay with many supporting facts. All of the essays need to be developed by putting the facts and ideas into paragraph form or citing the sources where the writer got their information.

In order to help each other out, we will spend a little time today reading over some of the essays that were submitted and making comments on the essay for the students to read. For those of you have not submitted an essay the examples we will read over should give you a model for posing a thesis question and answering it with a thesis statement and supporting paragraphs backed up by facts and ideas.

Read over 2 of the essays at your table and make comments or edits on the paper. Try and identify the thesis statement and the main ideas that support the thesis statement for the writer. Also note any questions or ideas you have for the writer in the margins. Please correct any spelling or grammar mistakes you may encounter. When you are finished, please write a brief paragraph giving feedback to the author and email it to them. Their email addresses are on the top of the essay.

When you are finished reviewing the essays please work on your own essay or review the feedback you have received. If you have not emailed me your essay yet, you can still receive a passing quiz grade if you submit it to me by tomorrow morning.

This Weeks Lessons

Writing Your Essay

Wednesday

Now that you have developed both a thesis question to guide your research and a thesis statement, you need to begin to formulate your supporting paragraphs. A good essay requires you to support an opinion or describe a process or event with factual information.

To help develop the body of your essay today choose three ideas, concepts, or facts that you have researched on the Internet and write a brief paragraph about how each supports your thesis statement. Type them in Word, but email me a copy of the paragraphs today.

For example: Michael’s essay is on early African-American athletes to play in the NBA and the obstacles they faced.

I learned that the first African-American basketball player wasn’t Nat “Sweetwater” Clifton, because he only signed a contract with the NBA. The first player to actually step out on the court was Earl Llyod in 1950. There is some dispute though, because Chuck Cooper was actually drafted by the Celtics in 1950. These were the first African-Americans to break the color line in professional basketball. Because of them, players like Michael Jordan and LeBron James are now able to command multi-million dollar contracts and represent the NBA. These early players are the historical precedent for the topic (Source: Wikianswers.com)

These are facts that explore the history of the African-Americans in the NBA. Based my interpretation of Michael’s thesis statement how could Michael develop this paragraph? What else could Michael write about to support his thesis? What questions could he ask?

Thursday

The three paragraphs you emailed me yesterday should have given you a good start on developing the body of your essay. Still, three paragraphs like the example paragraph above would not be enough for a two – three page essay. You need to develop your paragraphs further by elaborating on ideas you probably just touched upon.

For example: Devona has already sent me a first draft of an essay, but it is really three paragraphs loosely connected to her thesis question “How does a band form an identity?”. Her first body paragraph states:

In order to have success from your band you must first form a band. I know you wondering just how to form a band? I am here to tell you how. You must find 3 or more friends who play different instruments (including vocals) with no more than two of the same instruments. These people MUST share your creative thinking, and must be committed to the practicing schedule. Once the band is formed you can begin JAMMING, this is the beginning of building a band identity.

Devona’s paragraph is full of ideas about how to form a band, but makes a lot of generalizations. I know several bands that are purely instrumental like God Speed You Black Emperor or Explosions in The Sky. Forming a band also doesn’t require friendship, some people hire musicians to play instruments that they play in the studio themselves. A good place for Devona to start developing her first paragraph would be to research an established ‘indie’ band.

For example: One of my favorites bands is Neutral Milk Hotel, an indie rock band led by singer Jeff Mangum. The band was formed in the mid 90’s in Athens, Georgia as part of the Elephant Six Collective. Mangum was joined on a farm in Athens by several like-minded musicians and friends who recorded an album called On Avery Island. The Elephant Six was a loosely defined collective of bands that shared an independent recording label to distribute their records. Neutral Milk Hotel went onto receive critical acclaim for their next album In an Aeroplane Over the Sea. Unfortunately, Mangum quit the band in the late 1990’s to pursue other interests such as writing children’s books. The communal mystique of the Elephant Six recording label, Magnum’s creative song writing, and the band’s limited output has given the band a cult following and almost legendary identity in the indie music scene.

Now, I know all of the this information from reading about and following the band for years, but I could look it up and get more detailed facts from the biographies on their websites and articles about the Elephant Six and Neutral Milk Hotel. What Devona needs to do to really push her first paragraph is find an example of a successful indie band and delve into their history. What did it take for them to make it as a band? What instruments to they play? How do they dress? What kind of music do they identify with? Punk, rock, emo, hardcore, grunge, metal… All of these things contribute to a band’s identity.

Use your time in class today to develop and add to the paragraphs you emailed me yesterday. These should be the basis for your essay.

Friday

Today you need to email me the rough draft of your essay at mr.powhida@gmail.com At this point, you should have your intro paragraph and at least five body paragraphs. Please use your time today to organize your essay and write a brief conclusion that summarizes the main points in a way that supports your thesis statement. The mark of a really good essay is that you are able to draw some conclusions by synthesizing facts and opinions that you might not have really been aware of. A good essay helps you and the reader reach some understanding about your thesis or see the topic in a new light. Think about the most important things you learned, the things that surprised you or made you more interested in the topic.

I will be checking my email in Miami this weekend, and you will have a 100 point quiz based on simply submitting your essay. You will lose 10 points a day until I receive it. If I do not receive the essay by Monday you get a zero on the quiz.

Indepent Project and Project Essay

Independent Project Update

The first drafts of your independent projects will be due December 21st before the holiday break. What will your independent project look like? That is entirely up to your plan, but I suggest you really think about what you can realistically accomplish over the next four weeks in and out of class. From this week on most of our class time will be used to finish our project essays and create a mock digital portfolio in Word with your final essays, labs, and projects from other classes.

If you are still unsure of what you are doing please use your project essay as way to focus on the content of your project. You may find that what you learn writing your essay will help you make your project. If you don’t think you can complete your original project idea by the 21st, scale it back and think about how you can accomplish something similar with a smaller focus.

Take five minutes right now and write me an email about whether or not you believe you can complete your original project idea of if you will need to make some adjustments.

Project Essays

The typed first drafts of your project essays are due to me via email this Friday. By today you should be starting your first rough draft of the essay. Even if you feel like you don’t have enough research start your rough draft by writing your thesis statement and what you feel like you know in support your thesis statement. You can always go back and find information to support or back up your ideas.

The rough draft of the essay does not have to include quotes or cite sources, but your final draft will have to include quotes or paraphrased information from a minimum of five different sources, primary or secondary. An example of a primary source could be asking another person a question about your topic such as parent, teacher, or friend. A secondary source might be a newspaper article or website about the topic. For anyone studying art, a primary source could be looking at an artwork and discussing it. Try and get your information from a variety of sources.

Your essay should follow a basic essay outline and if you are struggling to organize your thoughts please follow the above link and read over the essay guide.

The final drafts of your project essays will also be due Friday December 21st.