Hey Everyone,

This quarter in English we covered the poetry unit. At the end of the quarter we showed what we learned by making a poetry book, by having a poetry night and as we know at the end of every quarter we had to write a journal! Well this quarter was no different!

We also worked on a Teen Life project during this quarter. We worked with students around the globe to make a final animation. My group’s topic was the cause and effects of teenagers using drugs. I wrote several poems and made several picture to contribute to this project.

As you may know, this journal is written according to the Expected School Wide Learning Results and the 6 traits. For the ones who do not know what these things are, I will explain. The Expected School Wide Learning Results or in short the ESLR’s are 5 things the students have to be at our school, they are as following; Critical thinker, Academic Achiever, Involved Citizen, Effective Communicator and Self-Directed Learner. Secondly the 6 traits are areas to improve your writing. The 6 sections are, Ideas and content, Organization, Voice, Word choice, Sentence fluency and Conventions, we will also be graded on these traits.

To make our writing more detailed and in depth we used the Blooms Taxonomy. This is a 6 step way to make your writing thorough, the 6 steps are, Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis and Evaluation. Where knowledge is the easiest level of description and evaluation the hardest or most professional!

Now, after a long and boring introduction of 4 paragraphs let’s start the actually work!

To start with, I was a critical thinker this quarter because I applied problem solving skills to facilitate learning. To me this means that I used prior information and new information to make my learning easier and that I was able to solve problems by myself and in a group. I demonstrated this while working on the teen life project; I worked independently but still communicated with my team mates to clear our thoughts. Another thing that showed that I met this trait was by solving problems that came along. If I would have the opportunity to do the teen life project again I would adjust my behavior by getting my team mates email addresses and talking to them more often.

I was also being an academic achiever. This is because I demonstrated progress in all curricular areas especially in writing poetry. When I started writing poems I did not really get it nor like it too much, but at the end of the quarter, my poetry book had some really deep poems in it. This shows I learned to respect the art of poetry and learn that it is not that bad. I also showed that I was an academic achiever by demonstrating that I could use technology as a tool for efficient and creative achievements for a project. This applied to the Teen Life project where I used the computer to modify pictures and I went to websites to help make my poems sound more professional. If I would like to modify my work on this ESLR I would have worked harder at writing poetry and really used metaphors, similes and personifications. I would also have made them longer like the one poem called “Death”.

Thirdly, this quarter I was an involved citizen. This is so because I demonstrated care and concern for the environment by not printing every single poem that I wrote, instead I put them on the Teen Life wikispace or my web log. I also showed care and concern for the environment by recycling sheets of paper by using them more then once.  For example, when I printed a poem and Mr. R had corrected it. Later that day or the next class I would use that paper to write a first draft or drafts of a new poem. Next quarter I would like to improve in this area because believe that I could demonstrate an other reason why I was an involved citizen, for example I could demonstrate responsibility in active decision making or demonstrate awareness and respect for the rights of other.

During this quarter I was also being an effective communicator. This is because I collaborated with others in appropriate learning situations to achieve group or individual goals. This means that I talked to others to make sure we understood what we had to do to achieve our assembled goal. This situation applied to the Teen Life, because we had to make sure we were clear on our task. Also it applied when we had to make a class slide show to show who we were. This demonstrates this trait because our class had to establish good communicational skills to make sure that everyone contributed to the project. Moreover, to me this trait means that you put effort into joining in conversations we were having during class. I showed that when I was being an effective communicator by listening respectfully to others and by asking questions to achieve better understanding. I confirmed this in class when we were doing the Hai Ku’s. I was not totally clear what standards you had to meet for a poem to be a Hai Ku so I asked questions to clarify my self. An other example was when we were talking about the different kinds of poems, like image, sound, or message. I could improve in this area by mixing my communication skills with my creative talents so that the general out come would be more resourceful.

Lastly, I was being a self-directed learner this quarter because I accepted responsibility for my own learning and evaluations. I illustrated this by doing my homework and doing my work in class. Mr. R had told us a couple of times that if we just wrote the poems in class, we would get a good grade. So that is what I did! Also I showed that I was a self-directed learner by taking creative risks in developing untried ideas. I applied this to the poetry unit while making my poetry book. I made the cover really unique and exceptional and as it turned out no one else did it the way I did it! What I would like to change for this ESLR is that I would like to monitor, adjust and document all my work in progress. This is because at the end of th poetry unit I had all loose papers with poems on it lying in my binder.

Over all, I thought that this unit was really fun and that I learned how to admire poetry a little more and also, I learned how to have a higher opinion of it. In conclusion, I think the memories of this quarter will stay with me forever! Compared to the first and second quarter I believe that I have grown physically to become a more efficient and better used of all the ESLR’s!

This essay is 1173 words!!!

Hey everyone,

For in english we had to write something about a famous poet, or in other words a BIGGY as Mr. R calls it. I chose LAngston Hughes because i think his poems have a meansing and teaches people a lesson.

Here is my write up:

Langston Hughes was born February 1, 1902, his parents divorced soon after that and so he went to live with his grandmother. Mean while his father settled in Mexico. When he was thirteen he moved in with his mom and her new husband. After that they moved to Cleveland, Ohio. It was when Langston moved in with his mom that he started writing poetry. After graduating, he spent a year in Mexico and a year at Columbia University. During these years, he had a lot of odd jobs, like assistant cook, launderer, and a busboy. He also traveled to Africa and Europe working as a seaman. In November 1926 he published his first poetry book called “The Weary Blues. 3 years later he finished his college at Lincoln University in Pennsylvania. Langston Hughes died on May 22, 1967 in New York form prostate cancer.

A poem this I really like that Langston wrote is called “Dreams” it is as following:
“Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.”

”Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.”
I like this poem because it is short and because I think it is true what he is saying about holding on to your dreams. This is because if you don’t hold on to your dreams you will never reach them either and also if you let them go you have no reason to live any more. He said this by saying “For if dreams die, Life is a broken-winged bird, That cannot fly” because if a birds wings break they can not fly and that it the whole purpose of them living and it is what makes them special! The only thing that I dislike about this poem is that is repeats lines. Some thing I would like to know is what he means with the last 2 lines. I don’t get them.

Some figurative language that Langston Hughes used in this poem is metaphor; he used 2, in the first stanza and in the second/last stanza. In the first he is comparing lost dreams to a birds broken wing and in the second he compares the lost dreams to a barren field frozen with snow.

This is a picture of Langston Hughes:

Click HERE for alink to the asignment description.