September 14, 2011

Issue: Students have asked to move beyond just taking practice tests to actually determining how to find the right answers. Solution: Shorter practice exercises with TEACHER LED review time.

 What will teachers do during PLC? (Maners)  What will students do during PLC? (McDaniel)  What will administrators do during PLC? (Murry)

 Covering Classes  Bell Schedule Bell Schedule 1 st Block 7:15-8:25 Class Change 8:25-8:32 2 nd Block 8:32-9:42 Class Change 9:42-9:49 PLC time 9:49-10:49 3 rd Block 10:49-12:38 4 th Block 12:45-2:15

 Yearbook will conduct a survey for the first 10 minutes of PLC (Ellington).  ACT practice activity  Actual ACT that Haydn (Dr. Mac’s son) took this fall  English questions 1-15  Overview: Students will complete the 15 questions, then the teacher will go over the answers.

 Passage I “Taking Wing” ACT Strategies  Teachers, have students read the directions every time in PLC (so that by the time our students take the REAL ACT, they will already know exactly what the directions say and will not have to waste precious minutes reading directions.  Read question first Many English questions are grammar questions that do not require comprehension.

 9:49 Yearbook Survey (10 mins)  9:59 Explain and read directions (5 mins)  10:04 A-C-T English practice test A (20 mins)  10:24 Discuss English Answers (20 mins)  10: 44 Take up Practice Tests and Answer sheets

 MAKE SURE STUDENTS WRITE NAME AND HEADING CLEARLY  Heading LAST NAME, FIRST NAME ACT ENGLISH PRACTICE TEST DATE SCORE (number correct / 15)  ACT  College entrance  21 and Above Club for Hope Scholarship  $4, per year at 4 year University for 5 years  ACT, fairly simple test because the questions are always based on the same skills/objectives, just using different words

 During the Test  Treat the practice like a REAL test  Monitor students as if the test were real  Take the test with the students  Discussion  Give the correct answers  Demonstrate the “logic flow chart” for the first five questions.  Point out that “NO CHANGE” is always “A”  Ask for a show of hands (thumbs up/thumbs down) of who got the question correct. If all got the question correct, quickly move to the next question.  Ask for someone who got the answer correct to give a “logic flow chart” of how they arrived at the correct answer Encourage students to demonstrate their thinking process, you might even create a flow chart on the board KEY 1D 2F 3B 4H 5C 6H 7D 8G 9C 10G 11C 12F 13A 14G 15C

1. Correct Answer D  A. NO CHANGE: “From her wooden…” is a sentence fragment because it does not express a complete thought, does not have a subject/verb, so you can not have a period after “cockpit.”  B. “From her wooden…” is a sentence fragment because it does not express a complete thought, does not have a subject/verb, so you can not have a semi-colon after “cockpit.”  C. “From her wooden…” is a sentence fragment because it does not express a complete thought, does not have a subject/verb, so you can not have a period after “cockpit” even if you add the word “she” to the next sentence.

2. Correct Answer “F” NO CHANGE o An introductory phrase has a comma after the end of the phrase, not after the first word o Born is the better than some possible choices (i.e. living, alive, working) because the paragraph refers to her childhood

3. Correct Answer “B”  A. NO CHANGE: Not correct because “had been bought” is passive voice  C. “was taking” is past tense, so the second part of the sentence must be past tense; “buys her first plan” from answer “C” is present tense.  D. “was taking” is past tense, so the second part of the sentence must be past tense: “her first plan is bought” is present tense.

4. Correct Answer “H”  F. NO CHANGE: not correct because “showing what a person for Kansas can do” does not explain what Earhart actually did and does not provide a summary of the paragraph.  G. Next, “graduating from high school in 1915” is an accomplishment, but not the accomplishment that gave her “record after record” or made her special, so it does not summarize the paragraph.  H. CORRECT because “defying expectations and shattering gender stereotypes” is what made Earhart’s accomplishments important and does summarize the paragraph.  J. And “having seen her first airplane when she was only ten years old” does not have anything to do with “record after record” or “becoming the first woman to cross the Atlantic.”

5. Correct Answer “C”  A. NO CHANGE: Not correct because “whom” is not the correct word choice because whom is an objective pronoun  B. Not correct because “that” is not the correct word to connect clauses dealing with time  C. “When” is the correct word because the sentence refers to the time she became fascinated.  D. Not correct because “however” introduces a contradictory clause rather than an explanatory clause

6. Correct Answer “H”  MUST READ entire paragraph  Identify sentence 6 and what it is saying “She became fascinated with flying as a young woman when she took her first flight—with a stunt pilot.” The sentence is explaining when and how Earhart became fascinated with flying  Identify the logical flow of the paragraph Sentence 1 starts with when she was born Sentence 2 talks about her childhood Sentence 3 talks about taking lessons and buying her first plane Sentence 4 Discusses her accomplishments in flight Sentence 5 also discusses her accomplishments in flight  Ask yourself where sentence 6 fits into the logical flow of the paragraph  F. Where it is now is not correct because the paragraph is arranged chronologically, and sentence 6 comes before she actually takes lessons and flies  G. Not correct chronologically  H. Correct because she became fascinated after her childhood and before her first flight lesson  J. Not correct because she had to take her first flight before she could set records.

 FACULTY MODEL  Mrs. Dalle-Valle will model as if she were the teacher  Faculty will model “logic flow chart” for questions 7-15