1. The students have a personal blog project that they are to work on as the semester goes on and will be evaluated at the end. They were promised blog time and today was the day – a whole class with enough computer access for everyone to have their turn! Surprisingly, things went fairly well. The internet cooperated, students were patient and seemed interested and engaged by the assignment and they’re on their way … yay! I’m looking forward to what kind of blog posts and thoughts they share with each other.

1. Students wrote another comma quiz. They did a great job on yesterday’s quiz as well.
2. We read through the poem titled “Select Samaritan” and had an enthusiastic talk about the responsibility of those of privilege. We considered the moral dilemma  when trying to decide from which country you should adopt. When adopting a child from a country where their nourishment and health has been so deprived, taking on an infant with that health history would obviously be a huge burden financially. For Canadians, this may not be such a problem but for others who have to pay so much for health care it could mean big medical bills. We also talked about the perspective of children waiting to be adopted. It was quite a lively talk today.
3. Tomorrow, students will use their class time to blog. It will be the first class set aside for the blog assignment, but I am pleased that several have begun their blogs on their own time and are becoming familiar with it. They will have three blog topics to discuss tomorrow.

1. We pushed through two tasks today. Students completed another comma quiz, after I addressed one common error I was seeing from yesterday’s quiz. Once that was finished, I asked them to settle in and get comfortable because we had a rather long story to read and try to get through. We ran out of time with just few paragraphs left. I asked students to had it finished for tomorrow’s class.
2. Tomorrow the class will have Blog Time, as promised. There are three blog topics for students to work on and they’ll have the duration of the class.

1. We began class quickly with a review of the common uses of commas and a 15 sentence quiz / practice of those commas.
2. Students were given a handout that introduces the new sub unit that focuses on Human Qualities. We discussed what these are, how they are the things about humans that separate use from other living things on earth, such as qualities of Frustration, Anger, Joy, Compassion, etc.
3. I showed a portion of the movie Crash to use in looking for these Human Qualities. It nicely fits with our recent look at Identities and the labels people use to describe themselves. The man in the movie had molested a woman but later found himself in a situation where he was her rescuer. There was a pretty complex relationship that was formed between the two of them.
   Students had to consider other movies and literature they have read and list the types of qualities displayed through the plot.
4. Then I introduced them to author Leo Tolstoy. We read a short biography of the man and a list of deep questions that relate to the focus of his writing. Students had to choose one of these questions and do a four minute Free Write like they had previously done with their Identity topic. They did great. I tried to take a picture of this FULL classroom with all students working so hard but my battery was dead. They are working so well, though, that I’ll have the opportunity again soon. I really appreciate your focus, Gr 11 and 12s. Keep it up!

Watch the scene where the officer rescues the woman from the vehicle.

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1. We began the class by reviewing the three common uses of commas and then students did a 15 question quiz. We’re still working on improving our commas use.
2. We started going through a handout given that focused on the Rights and Responsibilities in Canada and then asked students to guess what might be some of the 30 Univeral Human Rights as declared by the United Nations.
3. We watched a few videos that focus on this topic. However, as we later discussed, these videos were funded and put together by the Church of Scientology. We discussed the church’s history a bit, that it is quite a controversial subject and has been rejected as being a church in Britain and is tagged as a cult instead. The question I asked students to consider was whether the source of the videos changes how effective they could possibly be. Could the prejudice people have against this organization stop them from understanding the message?
4. They then went back to the questions they were given at the beginning of the course that were for this sub unit. Students were asked to have them completed for tomorrow.

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1. Students got a handout today ( ela-b10-factual-report.doc ) that outlined the requirements and procedure for their report. I explained the process of brainstorming first, filling out the essay outline and having it checked by me before they began researching for information. The benefit of having your essay outline checked is so that you do not write a whole essay only to find out it is off the topic and confusing.
2. Students were then able to begin their research. Each has to have a reference that is not internet related so they’ll have to use the library to find some sources. They should come to class on Friday with their information ready and be prepared to write their essay in class. This will only be worth 8 marks of the total 26. Once we are back from the holidays, they’ll be able to take their essay and improve it and type it our properly.