Welcome to Junior High Language Arts! Metaphors Be With You!

 L.A. Grade 8

Week of Feb. 22 - We will add to our historical context freedom rides, sit-ins, protest marches, civil rights policies, the Civil Rights Act, and the Voting Rights Act.  We will learn about poll taxes, grandfather clauses, Jim Crow laws and literacy tests; we will even take a "literacy test" to see if we can pass and earn our right to vote.  As we listen to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s speeches, we will analyze the strategies he used in persuasion.  We will revisit fact/opinion, denotative/connotative meanings, word choice, and figurative language.  This background information gives us a context for the landmark court case "Brown vs. Board of Education" and the story of the Little Rock Nine and the integration of Central High.  Teaching tolerance is always a valuable lesson. 

Week of March 1 - The students successfully completed two days of ISTEP.  Our literature stories this week include "Choice: A Tribute to Martin Luther King, Jr." by Alice Walker (The Color Purple),and "Brown v. Board of Education" Walter Dean Myers.  Areas of study in literary analysis include reading strategies in analyzing word origins and analyzing tone in informative essays.  Our work continues in justifying answers by focusing on specific details.  Distinguishing between fact and opinion will also help the students as they prepare persuasive essays and speeches.

Week of March 8 - We will define, explain, and connect to other words the roots of legal terms, work for a better understanding of distinguishing the often fine lines of fact/opinion, and take a quiz on "Brown vs. Board of Education.  We will then connect that story with "A Class Divided" to establish a common thread and a conceptual understanding of the two.  A paper on these two will be due on Thursday.  Our next project is to listen to and analyze the writing and speaking of the famous "Dream" speech by Martin Luther King, Jr.  We will analyze not only the content of his speech, but also the techniques he used in delivering his speech.  We will begin this week switching classes with Mrs. Parden as we work on our persuasive research paper and speech.  This will be a week of difficult thinking as the students get closer to the goal of being a high school student.   Seventh graders will assess what they bring to the table in language arts as they edge closer to being eighth graders. 

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My email: cschmidt@saintbarnabasparish.org 

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