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This past year, I had the opportunity to teach all of the English 11 classes at the Langston campus of GWHS, and although I used to teach the course every semester my first five years of teaching, it had been years since then, and I really had to rework my materials to get my students ready for those end-of-course achievement tests.

In Virginia, once students reach the high-school level, they take English Standards of Learning (SOL) tests only during their English 11 classes. The English SOL is in two parts: one part covers writing, which is made up of two parts in itself (direct writing, which is writing an essay from a prompt, and multiple choice), and the other part covers reading, literature, and research. Students must pass both of these end-of-course SOL tests in order to graduate.

One method I used for helping my students get ready for the Reading/Literature and Research SOL was to immerse them in literary terms. I went through the handbook in the back of their literature book (Prentice-Hall’s 2005 edition of The American Experience) and separated every single term into six sections. I tried to categorize the terms — with a section of genre-related terms, drama-related terms, poetry-related terms, etc. There is some overlapping, though, because I wanted to keep the numbers fairly consistent.

I created a review worksheet for each, in matching form, with the terms at the top and the definitions directly from the book to match. I didn’t use letters, so my students would have to write the actual words (and I took off points for spelling errors, since the words are right there ;). I used the same format for the quizzes, simply mixing up the definitions.

On one day, I had students complete the review worksheet, which wasn’t as easy as it sounds, since some of the definitions are within the definitions for other terms (and I didn’t tell them which…). Then, I took a cue from my fellow teachers in the GW Langston Social Studies department and had students make flash cards with the terms (the term on one side and the definition on the other). I checked and gave a grade for the review and cards.

I allowed classtime for reviewing the flash cards, individually, in pairs, and in groups. The day after the reviews and cards were due, I usually went through the terms with them, giving them some mnemonic devices here and examples of the terms in use there, focusing especially on the ones I felt were most difficult or confusing. About a week after the initial review assignment, students took a quiz on the terms. Usually, right after they turned in the quiz, they began working on the next set of terms, and the process continued.

I’m planning to use these reviews and quizzes with my classes this fall, and I will definitely revise them to match the terms and definitions in the handbooks in other levels’ textbooks. (I’m not sure yet which classes I’ll be teaching this fall, back at GW’s main campus…)

Term review in itself isn’t especially helpful, but alongside a lot of practice in examining literature, it’s vital. And — though students aren’t tested on the definitions of any terms, per se — without understanding the meanings of the terms, students can’t possibly answer questions concerning their usage in literature.

I would love to hear about other methods you’ve used to review terms! Please contact me through this site or e-mail me at mrshawke(at)gmail.com.

• Literary Terms Review #1 - Word File
• Literary Terms Quiz #1 - Word File (not available for download)
• Literary Terms Review #2 - Word File
• Literary Terms Quiz #2 - Word File (not available for download)
• Literary Terms Review #3 - Word File
• Literary Terms Quiz #3 - Word File (not available for download)
• Literary Terms Review #4 - Word File
• Literary Terms Quiz #4 - Word File (not available for download)
• Literary Terms Review #5 - Word File
• Literary Terms Quiz #5 - Word File (not available for download)
• Literary Terms Review #6 - Word File
• Literary Terms Quiz #6 - Word File (not available for download)

Send me a message if you are a teacher who’d like copies of my quizzes or tests. I want to share, but I have to keep quizzes and tests secure. :) Please include the name of your school and/or district, your school e-mail address, and the title you’re interested in.

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.

I spent from 9 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. (minus an hour’s lunch break) yesterday in a computer lab at the grand Institute for Advanced Learning and Research, participating in one of the Summer Educators’ Development Institute (SEDI) workshops. It was without a doubt the most interesting workshop I’ve ever been a part of, and I earned recertification points for it, too! (5.5 points down, 174.5 to go…)

Virginia Tech professor Dr. John Wenrich started off the workshop, “Teaching in a Web 2.0 World,” by taking each participant’s digital picture and having us sign a sheet with our names and email addresses. He then showed us a thought-provoking video set in a college classroom; from their seats in the huge auditorium, students held up placards with statistical results from a survey. (If I can find it, I’ll post a link…) If I remember correctly, the video was made as part of a college course.

We were asked to tell the rest of the group a little about where and what we teach and how much experience we have had with Web 2.0. More than a few had never even heard the term, but I’m sure after yesterday, they have a pretty good understanding. Throughout the day, Dr. Wenrich discussed Internet safety, social networking, Wikis, blogs, Google applications, and more using videos, screenshots, PowerPoint presentations, and a lot of hands-on activities along the way.

One of the most fun parts of the day was registering for and exploring the social networking site Facebook. (You can see my Facebook at left!) I had seen my students’ pages several times and had heard many discussions of how it worked, but I’d never been myself. We found the “friends” that were our fellow workshoppers and joined Wenrich’s Web 2.0 group. I got to see several faces (I didn’t recognize anymore) from my high school years, too.

Another activity was on using Google Docs, which I’ve already decided to use with my English students this fall — probably in a collaborative story, which we usually do with paper and pen. I know my students will absolutely love it, and we’ll be able to use it as a peer-editing activity, also. (The rubrics are already forming in my mind! :P)

Dr. Wenrich had already set up the framework of a form for us to fill in with our contact information. He invited us to collaborate in a document by email with the addresses we’d given him at the start of the day, and we had to click on a link in the email to gain access to his document. Unfortunately, there was some difficulty with the emails (including mine!) not making it to many of our inboxes, which would be something to consider when using the application in the classroom. It would be a good idea to make sure that everyone was able to log into the document before actually beginning the collaboration.

I was able to type in the address manually, and since I’d given him my Gmail address, my access was granted immediately. The application looks very much like any other word-processing program, with the standard menus at the top of the screen. I typed my contact information in one set of blank fields, and within seconds, the projector screens at the front of the lab refreshed to reflect my changes. Very cool, indeed.

Another fun activity was creating a movie using our digital pictures at JibJab. There are tons of movies to choose from, but I picked the same Charleston one that Dr. Wenrich used to show us. (I love flappers and zoot suits. :P) You can upload your own pictures and crop them (I used the one he took at the beginning of the day for mine), but you can also choose headshots of famous people like Barack Obama, Britney Spears, or George W. Bush (whom I chose to dance with me :P). I’ll try to do one next week and post it here… FUN!

I was fortunate to sit next to two very sweet fellow educators, Jennifer and Sydney. I’d known Sydney years ago when she used to come see my old band, the Flaming Blue Iguanas, play. They invited me to Arby’s for lunch (with our discount card from SEDI), and I’m glad I accepted. I hope to keep in touch with them — on Facebook, perhaps?

I’ve signed up for two more workshops: one is on United Streaming, and the other is about writing educational grants. (I even talked Mr. Hawke into accompanying me to the latter, since he’s not working that day!) I hope that both are as entertaining and informative as this one!!

On the home front, I’m still not totally unpacked and settled, but we’re loving the country as I knew we would. But in the morning, we’re off to Blowing Rock, North Carolina, for a magical family weekend at Tweetsie Railroad and Grandfather Mountain. Au revoir. :)

Today is moving day, and we’re still not packed. We gave our landlord two-months notice, and I thought for sure I’d have everything organized and ready to go by now.

Oh well, the kids are ready. Three-year-old Lucas and my husband, Kevin, were discussing the impending move when we first decided:

L: When are we going to move?
K: It’ll be about two months.
L: Why?
K: We have to get the house ready.
L: How are we going to move the house to —?
K: It won’t be easy.
L: I’ll help you push it.

So I have lots of excuses about why I’m not ready: kids and work and papers to grade and novels to read and quizzes to make and papers to copy, etc., etc.

I used to say that I did my best work at the last minute: cramming for exams, pulling together a research paper in a frenzied Sunday afternoon at the library, saving the front-page story two seconds before my page editor was screaming for it, sitting down at the computer with ten notebooks of pieces of poems and pulling a pure gem out of it all.

But it’s just not worth it. It drives me insane.

Luckily, the older I get, the more organized I become, especially in my job. My files are still not as together as I’d like them to be, but I have gotten better about putting files back when I’m done with them. The worst part is the brand-new material that doesn’t yet have a place; I stacked a pile of it in my storage crate yesterday afternoon, so it wouldn’t be in my sub’s way.

So, yeah, here I sit, about to cram again.

I’m excited about the being-there, but not so much about the getting-there. (Especially when it’s 12:30, and there’s so much work to be done, and I know I’ll probably be without home Internet service for a few days at least because — even though they initially said they did — our cable company doesn’t go out that far, and we’re having to pay hundreds of dollars upfront for a satellite, and the monthly bill is doubling, and I didn’t have enough time to make installation arrangements…)

It’s worth it, though. The house is big enough for each of our three boys to have his own room. Plus, it’s in the country next to a field where horses graze; since my husband and I both grew up in the country, we feel sort of like we’re going back home.

So maybe instead of packing it all up and renting the truck, we should just take little Lukie up on his generous offer. :P

I’ve been rereading D.H. Lawrence’s Women in Love. It’s not the simplest novel to read, set in the early nineteenth century and filled with detailed settings and characters and their differing views on politics, art, economics, education, society, industrialization, sexuality, and the like. So it’s not abnormal for me to skip back and reread a passage to pick apart the arguments made or to make sense of the motivations involved.

Yesterday morning, though, I had to reread a paragraph because of the way it was punctuated, and I think it’s a great example of one of the uses of the semicolon.

To set the scene a bit, Gudrun and Ursula have arrived this morning at Hermione Roddice’s Breadalby estate, “a Georgian house with Corinthian pillars, standing among the softer, greener hills of Derbyshire, not far from Cromford” (85). And at this point, lunch was being served “under the great tree, whose thick, blackish boughs came down close to the grass” (87).

There were present a young Italian woman, slight and fashionable, a young, athletic-looking Miss Bradley, a learned, dry Baronet of fifty, who was always making witticisms and laughing at them heartedly in a harsh, horse-laugh, there was Rupert Birkin, and then a woman secretary, a Fraulein Marz, young and slim and pretty. (87)

How many people were present at Hermione’s characteristically epic luncheon? Well, it’s difficult to decipher because of all those commas. I count eleven. Some of those commas, however, are separating not the characters, but the characters from their descriptions.

The “young Italian woman” is obviously the “slight and fashionable” one. That’s easy enough. We’ll label her character number one. But her name is not mentioned, so is she the “athletic-looking Miss Bradley”? It doesn’t seem so because their descriptions differ (and Bradley doesn’t seem an Italian name to me). No, Miss Bradley must be character number two.

So is Miss Bradley a “dry baronet of fifty”? No, baronet is a masculine title, the diminutive of baron but very different in its social and political status. So the baronet must be character number three. He is the one who makes laughs at his own jokes in a not too pleasing manner, we know, because the who clause follows his “name.”

Rupert Birkin is clear enough here, though overall he is debatably the most enigmatic of all: character number four.

And the woman secretary is next. Is she unnamed, or is her name Fraulein Marz, who is “young and slim and pretty”? Or are they two separate characters? Because Lawrence writes “a Fraulein Marz,” we can assume that the two are one in the same.

So we have:

“There were present

1. a young Italian woman, slight and fashionable,
2. a young, athletic-looking Miss Bradley,
3. a learned, dry Baronet of fifty, who was always making witticisms and laughing at them heartedly in a harsh, horse-laugh,
4. there was Rupert Birkin,
5. and then a woman secretary, a Fraulein Marz, young and slim and pretty.”

Well, whenever we use three or more items (nouns, which are people, places, things, or ideas) in a row with a conjunction (and, but, or, nor, so, for, or yet) before the last item, we call it items in a series (or in a row). Above, we have five items in a series.

The general rule is to separate the items in a series with commas. For three items, we would need two commas; for ten items, we would need nine. The last comma always goes before the conjunction. So we would need four commas in our sentence, one between each of the items and the final one just before the “and then.”

The problem arises when, as in Lawrence’s sentence, we have more than simple items listed. All but one of the five separate items in our list include commas; one of them (about Fraulein Marz) has two commas; and one of them (about the baronet) has three commas within.

In this case, we have to make the separation between items stronger by using semicolons rather than commas.

So the comma at the end of each item will need to be replaced by a semicolon so readers can better understand the meaning of the sentence, which would leave us with:

There were present a young Italian woman, slight and fashionable; a young, athletic-looking Miss Bradley; a learned, dry Baronet of fifty, who was always making witticisms and laughing at them heartedly in a harsh, horse-laugh; there was Rupert Birkin; and then a woman secretary, a Fraulein Marz, young and slim and pretty. (87)

Much easier, I believe. Reading on would have answered all of these questions, of course, but I really like to know (*wink* @ Hermione) right upfront.

As to why Lawrence chose to punctuate his sentence this way, I have no idea. It could be that punctuation rules have changed in the past 80 years or so. Maybe he had a hard time finding an editor back then, since he was hard-pressed in the beginning to get published; everyone thought his writing a bit too racy for the era.

I like to think that it was Lawrence’s plan that the reader’s confusion here would emulate the guests’ about who was who. I know when I’m introduced to a roomful of new people, I smile and say hello, but I don’t usually retain any of the names unless I spend a few minutes getting to know them.

What do you think?

Work Cited
Lawrence, D. H. Women in Love. New York: Bantam, 1996.

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. Narrator Nick 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 has to be lying to himself to he believe it. 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 or tests. I want to share, but I have to keep quizzes and tests secure. :) Please include the name of your school and/or district, your school e-mail address, and the title you’re interested in.

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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