Miss Leach Language Arts Quarter 1 Recap

Hello! What a great start to the school year! Let’s take a look back at some of the highlights from the year so far, including some of the students’ favorite lessons and activities.

“ You can learn new things at any time in your life if you're willing to be a beginner. If you actually learn to like being a beginner, the whole world opens up to you. -Barbara Sher

Big Topics in Quarter 1 ■ We started off the year with a review of the 8 parts of speech. ■ Grammar Flip Books ■ We used our knowledge of parts of speech to create better sentences with phrases and clauses. ■ Phrases and clauses led to sentence types! ■ Simple ■ Compound ■ Complex ■ Compound-Complex

BIG CONCEPT Words are like Legos: the more parts we know how to use, the better our creations become!

Big Topics in Quarter 1 ■ Memoir Study ■ We read “The Bracelet” by Yoshiko Uchida to get first-hand knowledge of life in Japanese internment camps during WWII. ■ We wrote our own 6-Word memoirs to practice using descriptive adjectives, punctuation, and tell our own stories!

BIG CONCEPT Memoirs are the snapshots of our lives.

Big Topics in Quarter 1 ■ “Discovering Wes Moore” by Wes Moore ■ We introduced big concepts in the memoir by discussing how Values and Beliefs shape our lives. ■ We started reading “Discovering Wes Moore,” the story of two men with the same name but drastically different lives. ■ Our work on Google Classroom has helped us become better digital readers and writers.

BIG CONCEPT The choices we make influence the people we become.

Miss Leach’s Tips for Continued Success Set Goals! What do you want to accomplish this quarter? How can you improve? Set a daily, weekly, or quarterly goal for yourself and see how much you can succeed. Participate! Class conversations are much more meaningful with your input. Be engaged every period. Ask Questions! Confused about a concept? Need clarification on an assignment? Don’t hesitate! Ask Miss Leach if you find yourself stuck. I promise I will do my best to help. Use Your Resources! Keep filling our your planner, lable your binder, and checking the online Maverick calendar every day to keep yourself organized and on track! Connect! Many of the concepts we discuss in class connect to events happening in the community and the wider world. Watch the news, read online articles, and discuss with family and friends to make connections.

Voices of Room 310 One thing that I enjoyed doing during 1st quarter was playing “Four Corners.’’ Each student was given a set of questions, and were free to voice their own opinions on the matters. In each corner of the room was a sign. These signs read”Agree,””Disagree,” “Sort of Agree,” and “Sort of Disagree.” For each question, a student had to go to the sign that best fit their choice, and then got to tell the class why they agreed/disagreed on the subject matter. I enjoyed this not only because it was fun, but because I got to freely voice my opinion without getting negative criticism. -Grace Cotton, 5th period

Voices of Room 310 My favorite thing we did this quarter was the (Values and Beliefs) discussion in the hallway. I loved arguing about what each of us thought was right. The thing I liked most was hearing everyone else's opinions. I wish we could do more stuff like that. The one thing I didn't like about it was the middle section where you didn't know what side you were on. I hope we can do discussion questions for Wes Moore like that. -Garett Manney, 6th period

Voices of Room 310 My favorite thing we did this quarter was making sentences during the dice game. We had to roll dice with a lot of different sides and make sentences with that many words. We got points for having the different sentence types. I liked it because I like playing games. -Anonymous Student

Thanks! We’ve had such a great first quarter and I look forward to an exciting rest of the year! Any questions? You can reach me at: ■(440)