Ms. Saidi's Classroom Blog

SHARES YOUR VIDEOS AND PRESENTATIONS!

ammerahsaidi — Tue, 26 Jan 2010 16:06:03 +0000

Hey Everyone,

Very impressive first day!

Everyone who presented a video today, please upload your video onto YouTube and paste the hyperlink as a comment onto this post! I want to make sure to share your hardwork with all of your peers! Please pass the word along by posting a link to my blog as your status messages on Facebook.

I have uploaded 3 of the PowerPoints shared today on the following website: www.saidishare.wordpress.com

If you’re proud of your paper, please email it to: saidia@dearborn.k12.mi.us so I can post it on the website as well!

Can’t wait to share your work!

Ammerah

Community-Intervention Final Project

ammerahsaidi — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 13:24:59 +0000

Post your thesis statements and ideas on this post here.

Remember, the more specific you are, the better your research.

Here’s a link to the research links found for you by Mr. Haugen: http://blog.dearbornschools.org/fhslibrary/?p=472

Here’s an important piece of advice from Mr. Haugen:

Go to library home page: http://fhs.dearborn.k12.mi.us/Library
Near top of page, just above yellow TODAY box, click on “Book (& videos) Search”

Again, best sources we have for this project will be the databases.

Use same library homepage, and then below yellow TODAY, see the Blue box “Research” section. Especially 1. Gale one file, and 4. Opposing Viewpoints.

These do not need a password in school. At home password is fordson (all lower case).
Work hard!

Imagery

ammerahsaidi — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 13:32:06 +0000

Here’s where you post your samples of lines of imagery. One complete sentence for every type of imagery we discussed in class. GO FOR IT!

Scarlet Ibis

ammerahsaidi — Wed, 06 Jan 2010 13:31:16 +0000

For those students who want to push their analytical skills, I offer you an opportunity to choose a line or section of the short story and analyze it for its deeper meaning. Analyze it like you would if I selected it for part of the exam.

Here’s a link to the short story: http://www.calapitter.net/dead/39/scarlet_ibis.html

Commercial Analysis

ammerahsaidi — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 14:30:44 +0000

Here is where you post your responses to the commercials you have viewed. If you could put up a video link of the commercial you’ve watched, that would best help us to understand your paragraphs.

Remember you are writing two paragraphs: The first is WHAT does the commercial make you feel. The second is HOW did the commercial influence this feeling.

Think deeply and analytically. This is only for 1st, 2nd, and 5th hour.

**EXTENSION OPPORTUNITY FOR WILLING STUDENTS: Will students interested please write down off of their Facebook livefeed their status message and the status message of 10 friends?!**

Ms. Saidi is not checking your work over break

ammerahsaidi — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 18:26:55 +0000

Hi Everyone,

Hope you’re all enjoying the break. I have been MIA because I’m working on stuff for the last month of school (lesson plans, exams, projects, etc). You have your work to do–I am not here to check your work for you until the 4th. You have to use this website amongst your peers to help you check your work.

Tips: Do not put whole papers onto the website. Post up one paragraph at a time with your thesis so others can see if you’re making a point, explaining it, using textual support, explaining the support and then restating your point. Also, follow the rubric very closely! And follow comments I’ve placed on past papers.

You’ve been assigned this paper since early December. You have no excuse if you’ve waited until the start of break to start your paper.

Continue to work and help each other out. This class is about you finding your own voices and developing the ability to solve your own problems without depending heavily on the teacher.

Summative Assignments

ammerahsaidi — Fri, 11 Dec 2009 14:41:12 +0000

We’ve wrapped up reading Othello this week and I am so amazed at the conversations you, the students, are able to orchestrate in class. You choose important quotes, you discuss the motives of certain characters, you make educated predictions and you complete tasks that are not for a grade but are important to you because they help you think deeply about the work in front of you.

Next week, make sure to prepare for the essay exam. I will be available after school for any enrichment: for questions on the play or the analytical essay.

As I’ve stated in class, there will be no class time devoted to the analytical essay in class. You must do work on your own, review your past work and my comments, and then come see me after school to check any rough drafts or outlines you have created.

Here are some important rules to take note of on the due date:

Essays will be collected AT THE DOOR on January 4th
Everything must be stapled in reverse order before you enter class
Every rubric criteria must be followed
Your essay will be considered late if you enter my classroom without it being stapled in the appropriate order
You will lose 5 points for any rule not being followed for turn-in (35/25 points)
Absolutely no excuses; if you will be absent or late on Monday, the 4th, you must email me your essay: saidia@dearborn.k12.mi.us

Remember to use this website as a resource for help.

Analysis Challenge

ammerahsaidi — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 16:02:05 +0000

Remember next week, you will have an essay exam wherein you will analyze important quotes from Othello.

I’m posting here a famous soliloquy. Analyze it. Take it apart line by line, word by word. Offer your opinions and support with text. Each of you can build off of one another. You can disagree and state why you disagree.

Post your thoughts and comments on this posting, not under your hour’s tabs. Here’s the soliloquy:

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there’s the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,
The pangs of despised love, the law’s delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover’d country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.–Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember’d.

Continuing and Completeing Othello

ammerahsaidi — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 01:09:44 +0000

For the second week of December, we will focus on reading an Act a day until we complete all five acts of Othello.

Some of you have read ahead and some of you have extended your participation outside of our classroom and it has obviously paid off. I have noticed a deeper sense of analysis in your comments and a greater independence in your work together.

Keep it up!

Beginning Our Journey with Othello

ammerahsaidi — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 17:01:41 +0000

We’ve begun today to read Act I, scene I of Othello and I am just as eager as you are to read on and learn more about this man named Othello who has so many around him angry and jealous.

I want you to engage this blog over the weekend as you read and re-read Act I. Ask questions, post your thoughts on certain quotes, share your feelings, state your predictions. This is REAL learning at its best–you should not be doing this work because you HAVE to but because you WANT to.

By Friday of next week, we would have finished reading the play. We will then begin a series of summative assessments which will include an essay exam, mini-essays to be completed in class, and discussions.

Remember that I will not be directing you with your essays, It’s your turn to take control of your learning and get started on your analytical essays as soon as you have a thesis (something you want to analyze connected to the play).