Lesson Plan for Wednesday, Sept. 27th, 2006

Good afternoon, grade 8! You should be seated in PAIRS at the computers, so that you can work together on the exercises. I ask that Ms. Searle keep a list of who works together each Wednesday in the lab, so that you switch partners every week. The goal is that by the end of the semester everyone will have worked with everyone else at least once in class as partners. Thank you in advance for your cooperation.

Your GRAMMAR lesson today is to go to the link on our Blog webpage -English Online Grammar- and do the following:

1. Go to the section titled "English Grammar Exercises"

2. Go to the "Advanced Level" section

3. Click on the button titled "more tests"

4. Do Tests 1 through 5 :
1. Newspaper Headlines
2. Learning tips and instructions
3. Phrasal Verbs
4. Time Expressions (1)
5. Time Expressions (2)

5. While doing the tests write down the answers of the ones you got wrong, and review them completely on the website.

When you are finished, please go to the next link, "Write a Book Review", which is by the author of the book "Freak the Mighty" and tells you how he recommends you write a book review.

Thank you for your cooperation!!!!

Note Home to Grade 8 parents for Permission to BLOG

To: Grade 8 IST parents
From: Mr. Pastore, Director/Grade 8 Language Arts teacher
Re: Language Arts Class, Grade 8
Date: Monday, September 25th, 2006
Dear parents of grade 8,
It is a pleasure to be teaching Language Arts 8 this year to your children. As a part of this course, the students in grade 8 will read
17 books this year. After each book, they will write a journal entry that I would like them to publish on the internet. We will use a special website that has been recommended to me by several educational specialists from the United States. This site is www.blogger.com.
In order to do permit your child to design and use a “blog” (web + log = “blog”) of this type on the internet, I ask that you sign the permission form below. Your child does not have to have internet access at home in order to do this, as I have scheduled our class to meet three times per week in the computer lab. However, I will encourage all students to show their work to their parents at home on their computer or here at IST several times during the school year.
The goal of having your child write their journal entries about their reading books on the internet is to teach them technology and modern communication skills while also practicing Language Arts skills such as proofreading, spellchecking, and proper English grammar use and paragraph/essay writing forms.
Thank you for signing and sending in the form below, and if you have any questions, do not hesitate to ask me personally.
Sincerely,
Jim Pastore, IST Director/Grade 8 Language Arts Teacher

----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- -----
----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ----- ---

I give permission to my child
__________________________________________(print name) to use the internet to publish his/her work from Language Arts 8. I understand and accept that Mr. Pastore, the teacher of the class, will have complete control over what my child publishes, and that my child and Mr. Pastore are responsible to do this work at IST, not at home on the internet. I also understand that I my child is responsible to do this “blog” exercise throughout this school year as a part of his/ her grade in Language Arts 8. Finally, if I have any questions at any time, I will not hesitate to contact Mr. Pastore to discuss with him the course content and the course outcomes on the internet.
Parent Name: ___________________________________________________ (print) Parent Signature: ________________________________________________
Date: _______________________________

Lesson Plan, Friday Sept. 22nd

I wonder how many students in grade 8 at IST have found the spelling mistake in my first Blog entry? I have had them read the entire first entry, and the first "page" in three separate classes this week, and they have not said a word yet about the mistake.

This makes it very difficult to give them permission to have their own blog...since I need to trust them to proof, spellcheck, and proof again (and yet again for a third time) each time they post on their blog.

I also am going to have the Librarian come and speak to the students today about checking books out that they borrow from the library. I need the grade 8 students to set the example in Middle School for this. It seems that some books have been borrowed without being checked out, but I am sure grade 8 will figure out what to do.

I also discovered that I needed to click a few security buttons to ensure that whomever left a message on my teaching blog also left it with my permission. I appreciate the several students who left messages, and ironically it was good that they did so. This woke me up to the fact that I needed to ensure security.
And because of this, I am sending the permission slip home next week to their parents. I need to research teacher led bloging efforts a bit more to "cover all the bases".
Speaking of Idiomatic expressions (such as "cover all the bases" from American English), the website that I have as my first link leads to a great ESL site that has advanced ESL work on it. I have had the students do several sections on "Idioms" so far, and given that the site is based in the UK, they are learning some neat idiomatic expressions in British English.

Finally, they - grade 8 - should all be finishing their first independent reading book, now that we are at the end of week two of school. Given that they will read 25 books -8 (minus 4 for Lit class, and minus 4 for Italian) = 17 books, and given that there are a total (including vacation weeks) of 40ish weeks each year.

What do you think? Are they finished their first book? Perhaps I should require a written report for the first book in order to give them individual permission to "blog" for our class???

Step 1: Creating a Blog for LA 8 Class
Today we are going to begin the process of creating our classroom blog. I will show you how easy it can be, and you will replicate what I do on paper. You will also take home to get signed a parental permission form to create and use a blog in grade 8 language arts. You are to return the form to me this week (by Friday), so we can start making your blogs, and use them to write about your first reading book for Language arts.

In class today we will write down all the terms that you will need in order to create your blog.


First term: You will need a "user name". This will be your first name, last initial in lower case letters, and IST all together as one word. For example,

" mrpIST "

We will not use your last name so no one outside of IST will have this information, and it will not show up "live" on your blog.

Second term: password. For the time being we will skip this, as it can be done at the last minute. However, as is written on your parent permission form, I as the teacher must always have your password. This means I get access to your blog, and can help you keep control of what you post.

Third term: Blog title. This will be your FIRST NAME ONLY followed by IST Opicina. For example:

" MR IST Opicina "

I do not want your last name to appear on the blog- that is forbidden, (as I wrote in the parent permission form) and as your parents agreed when they signed to permit you to do this. This is a safety feature to protect what we will do online, and to protect you.

Fourth term: Blog address. This is the TOUGH one to do. It can take multiple tries to get a title that works. I am making this easy for you in this blog. The format we will use is the following one: IST + gr8 + first name + first intial of your last name

For example: " ISTgr8mrp "

This would be my blog address if I were doing this exercise.

You need to follow al the instructions and have them written in your notebook. I will check your work when you are done.