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F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby has to be one of my all-time favorite novels. Every time I read it (and that’s at least 15 times now since high school!), I find myself immersed in 1920s-era New York (one of my favorite cities even today), and I always find something I haven’t noticed before.

I enjoy the way Fitzgerald capitalizes on his characters’ weaknesses without condemning them (well, at least most of them). Gatsby has a good heart, but he’s a criminal. Daisy is sweet and witty, but she’s weak. Nick himself says, at the end of chapter 3, that he is one of the few honest person he has known, but it seems to me that he’s lying to himself if he believes this. Or at least he has a pretty shallow view of honesty.

The smallest details captivate me: Meyer Wolfsheim’s cufflinks made of human molars, the whistles of the National Biscuit Company factory (which, of course, later became known as NBC), Nick’s staring at Gatsby’s mansion from his lawn “like Kant at his church steeple” while Gatsby and Daisy do their reacquainting.

I generally reserve Gatsby for my advanced students, and it’s on the eleventh-grade reading list at our school. As with many other novels, my students usually hate the story at first, but once they get to the party scenes, they’re hooked. By the end, they’re pretty much as in love with Daisy as most anyone else who’s read the book and don’t want it to end.

• Anticipation Guide - Word File
• Quiz #1 (pages 5-51) - Word File (not available for download)
• Quiz #2 (pages 52-98) - Word File (not available for download)
• Quiz #3 (pages 99-145) - Word File (not available for download)
• Quiz #4 (pages 146-189) - Word File (not available for download)
• Venn Diagram - Word File

Send me a message if you are a teacher who’d like copies of my quizzes. I want to share, but I have to keep quizzes and tests secure. :)

Unless otherwise noted, my teaching resources are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License, which allows you to share and remix the works noncommercially, as long as all alterations or transformations are redistributed under the same or a similar license. Attribution is a part of this license; however, unless otherwise noted, I do not require any attribution for these materials.

“Can I borrow an eraser, Mrs. Hawke?” one of my eleventh-graders asked me one day.

“Um, why do you need an eraser?” I respond, before walking over to check out his writing apparatus.

Then, once I locate it (which is not easy, since it’s virtually hidden under his hand when he’s in writing position), it’s perfectly clear why he’s in dire need of an eraser! His pencil is so small that he can barely hold it in his hand to write. That eraser was probably used up two inches ago!

Okay, so it’s probably not the smallest pencil every, but it is most certainly the smallest pencil I’ve ever seen a student try to use in class (although my son, Ryan, swears up and down that he’s used one smaller…).

It may not be exactly PC, in today’s Green society, to toss out materials before they’re COMPLETELY USELESS, but come on!

I know my hand would cramp up like crazy if I tried to hold onto that twig of a pencil. (And, no, it’s not arthritis; I’m not that old! :P) And do you really want to have to dig around for erasers??

Time to toss this baby!

My 19-month-old, Atticus, and I went to the local Community Market to see some friends — Mike and Kristie Strange on acoustic guitars and Stuart Jennings on mandolin — play music last Saturday, May 3rd. They call themselves Little Stuey and the Strangers, and they sounded really good. The addition of Stuart’s mandolin added an extra dimension to classics like Cyndi Lauper’s “Time after Time,” the Beatles’ “Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da,” and Jimmy Buffet’s “Margaritaville” (on which Mike twisted my arm to sing harmony :P).

We stayed for a cool (enjoyable, not chilly!) hour and a half or so. I got to chase after Attie up and down the ramp (aside from when I was singing, when the Acoustic Groove’s Tony Turner was chasing him around by the overall straps ;)). I got to see Darrell and Ruth Whitt, who were there selling their Skunk Farm veggies and eggs. (The Whitts used to hang out with Dreams, the first rock and roll band I sang with when I was about 18 to 20.) And I got to see my good friends, the Stranges, after way too long!

I first met Mike in 1988. I was freshly home from my first year of college (where I completely flunked out in Life in General, not to mention my classes…) My friend from high school, Timmy Woodson (who passed away many years ago now :(), called and wanted me to come play with his band. So I did. It was in the attic of drummer Randy Johnson’s house on Ricketts Street. Mike was on electric guitar, Timmy on bass, and Eddie Wilbourne (who is now, according to MySpace pages, playing with Mike and Kristie in 3+1) on keyboards. It didn’t last long, but it wasn’t long after its demise that Mike called me to join a new project, the Flaming Blue Iguanas.

That was around 1991 and included Mike and Kristie (who were a long, long ways from being married at the time ;)) on guitars, Jerry Wade on bass, and John Stophel on drums. I lasted until I was pregnant with my oldest son, Ryan, who was born in ‘93. (I remember running offstage at the old Bogie’s to throw up in the bathroom during a guitar break one time; I was back by the next verse…)

Then, in about 1995 (?? I need some clearing up on the details ??), I rejoined the Iguanas. This time, Alan Rowland played bass, Todd Pinekenstein and William Gunnell both played drums (at different times, and I don’t remember when the switch took place or who played with us first…), Jeff Jackson played keyboards for a while, and Morgan Pinekenstein sang with us for a while. We had a great run, doing the community show circuit and opening up for bands like .38 Special, Steppenwolf, The Guess Who, and The Marshall Tucker Band.

Mike, Kristie, and I used to do an acoustic act on the side, as well, at local restaurants. I have tapes of our performances that I wish I could get digitalized!

The last time I sang with Mike and Kristie was New Year’s Eve 2004 at the Purple Onion restaurant. It had been years since we’d played, and I’m thinking I definitely don’t want to go three and a half more years until we do it again!

I recently stumbled upon an excellent SOL test practice resource: SOLpass. The site houses and links to a large number of released tests, both online and printable, in all SOL areas! The online tests are great because they give immediate feedback when an answer is chosen. Plus, there are a number of links to other sites with skills-practice activities.

The link has been at the top of my board for a week or so (see above!), as I’ve been encouraging my eleventh-graders — who take their RLR tomorrow! — to do a little more practice on their own.

To get to the end-of-course English tests, click on “High School.”

Then, click on either “11th Gr. Reading” or “11th Gr. Writing” (or scroll down the page).

The released tests that are available online are in the top right.

Clicking on the printable released tests open PDFs of the documents, so make sure you have the latest version of Adobe Reader installed.

One of the most tedious duties of teaching, in my opinion, is keeping up with students’ tardies. My school’s tardy policy involves giving students a warning for the first tardy, a day of detention for the second tardy, two days of detention for the third tardy, and a referral to the office for each additional tardy. The tardies are supposed to be cumulative for the entire semester (or year, at the other campus of our school, since they’re not on a 4×4 block schedule as we are).

One problem is that in all my years of teaching, I don’t think I’ve ever had so many students tardy so many times as I’ve had this year. Another problem is that even the days of detention must be written up on a referral and sent to the person in charge of after-school detention, so that means we have to scrounge up referral forms from the main office pretty much all of the time. Oh, and there’s the problem of students not serving their assigned detention, which means they usually end up in ISS, which in turn creates more work for us.

All policy and carry-out contention aside, I’ve been working on a way to keep up with all of the tardies for all of my students in one place, rather than having to continuously look back through all of my attendance records. (And, since I really love — seriously! — creating forms, it was a fun endeavor. :P) So, last week, I’d thought I’d finally come up with a great tardy form; then, I realized it wasn’t perfect and reworked it a bit. Now, I think it’s official. :P

I shared it with my fellow teachers and have gotten some very nice feedback. It’s a Word document, so it’s easily adjustable, in case your school’s tardy policy is different from mine. (And, if it is, I’d love to hear what it is and how it works for you…)

Unless otherwise noted, my teaching resources are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 3.0 United States License, which allows you to share and remix the works noncommercially, as long as all alterations or transformations are redistributed under the same or a similar license. Attribution is a part of this license; however, unless otherwise noted, I do not require any attribution for these materials.

If you haven’t tried Free Rice, you should! Not only is it a great vocabulary-building — not to mention addicting — game, but it also provides rice to people in need through the United Nations World Food Program.

According to the WFP site, the Free Rice game has enabled people to donate “enough rice to feed one million people for one day.” Advertisers pay for ads, and the generated funds are used to purchase the rice that is distributed by the WFP.

As you can see in the screenshot above, the game asks you to choose the best synonym of a given word from four choices. When you click your choice, it either tells you you’re correct, or it gives you the correct answer. You can set your options to quiz you again on words you get wrong or not.

There are 55 levels of difficulty, and the game adjusts to your current vocabulary level. It keeps up with your current level and your highest level from visit to visit. For each correct answer, twenty grains of rice are donated, and you can see how many grains of rice total you have donated.

I’m exploring ideas on how to use this activity with my students. Maybe it could be a bonus for finishing work early, although they’d have to switch around, since we only have three computers. If you use Free Rice with your students, I’d love to hear how you incorporate it. :)

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I found this list a few days ago, posted at lifehack.org: 10+ Things to Do with Dry-Erase Markers. It’s by writer/educator Dustin M. Wax. I like the one about the bathroom mirror, especially, and I’m definitely going to put the homemade white board idea into use.

Unless otherwise noted, all images and text are copyright © Viable Design. All rights reserved.