Eighth Grade LAnguage Arts 9/9

Hello Parents,
     The SpringBoard books the district adopted last year are set up around a theme for the year. The theme for eighth grade is challenges. The first unit is a study of the archetypal hero's journey. We have been studying the pattern of the hero's journey in class. Students chose an individual book last week in the library and should be reading 30 minutes per night. Part of this weeks homework is to chart the first few phases of the hero's journey for the book they chose.
     Students also have a review packet on identifying subjects and predicates that is due Friday.

Thanks, Jim Sheufelt

Seventh Grade Language Arts 9/9

      We have been working on a unit in our SpringBoard books revolving around choices and consequences. The focus in the first unit is personal narrative. To supplement SpringBoard we have just finished the novel The Outsiders. I chose this book as it fits the theme of choice and consequence and is in the format of a personal narrative. It's also universally popular with middle school students.
     We started writing the rough draft of a personal narrative based on a choice the students made. The focus for this paper is the revision process, and the students will be graded on the revision process. The class will be working on this most of this week and next as we fit our writing in around MAPS testing.