Charles’ English Blog

  In class today we had a pop quiz in illuminate. The pop quiz was what we had been learning about argumentative writing over the past weeks. It included questions over claim of fact, claim of policy, claim of value, evidence, explanations, conclusions. I have learned a lot of important information about argumentative paragraphs and making claims that I think will be useful for the classes EOC in April.

Today was my first day of the week back from being out sick.  Our lesson was on claims and making a short argumentative paragraph. There was an example put in canvas on how we should set them up. Our paragraphs had to state the claim, first evidence, explanation, second evidence, explanation, then conclusion. We did this for both of our claims, then had another person peer review it. 

Today in class we read an article about whether 4 year or 3 year degree programs in college are better. We went over claims before, and their meanings in the context of the article. The claims were very easy to grasp. We then did two examples sourcing the claims, and determining which claim would counter it.

  Today we had a sub, an assignment on Newsela and time to finish our benchmark. The Newsela was an article about how snoozing your alarm can affect cognitive abilities. The article was interesting to read and see studies from scientists who have actually done experiments to determine whether snoozing the alarm helps a person cognitive abilities or other effects. I then did the writing prompt, quiz, and word wall based on the article.

  Today we did another assignment on Newsela. The article was about fast food places illegally overworking minors. The article provided a lot of information to support the topic. After I finished reading the article, I completed the written response question and quiz on the assignment. 

We worked on a Newsela article that was about the future of technology and how it could affect jobs. We practiced with a LOT of examples beforehand. I knew a lot about the articles topic because I am into I liked the article selection because Im a really tech savvy person, and like to educate myself on how things like technology advancements and AI could have a negative impact on jobs. I then answered questions on the article on Canvas. We were also met with the news that another Lakeside student passed in a car crash and had a level 2 lockdown because of a fight.

Today was my first day back after not being in class Monday or Wednesday. The class was given time to finish the benchmak, and I was able to start and finish it in the same day. Thanks to my Survey of American History class, I was able to understand the two documents (Monroe Doctrine and FDR’s Second Bill Of Rights) on a much deeper level.

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  Today in class we took a test on the poems we had been analyzing by Langston Hughes. We also got assigned a project to do about our own culture with inspiration from Hughes’ poems. I was able to see my score (96%) so I was pretty happy about that. I chose to create a poem about how black people are “overcoming” oppression through expressionism and fashion.

Today, we continued what we were doing on Friday. We analyzed Hughes’ poems, and wrote down the themes, evidence, arguments, and unanswered questions of each. It seemed like it would be easy, and was at first, but it gradually got harder after each poem. I, too was probably the hardest to complete for me. Today we were also met with some tragic news involving three students in the Lakeside community. 

    We read another poem by Langston Hughes, about called Make America America again. The poem talked about issues the oppressed people in America face. After analyzing the poem, we discussed the issues that were pointed out in the poem and had to make our own resolutions to them. The overall message of the poem was similar to Donald Trumps campaign motto, “Make America great again”. I think the poem had a great message about how everyone essentially needs to be apart of America’s promise for it to actually be America

We read another poem by Langston Hughes, called Mother to Son . The poem was about a mother giving advice to her son about how life isn’t always going to be perfect and that he has to get through the bad times. There was a lot of interesting imagery used to describe her hardships. The poem has a very simple and powerful message overall. We also answered some questions about the poem.