February 14

English 9

As a pre-reading exercise for A Midsummer Night's Dream, we have been debating the question, "Should parents have complete control over their children?" What a spirited class discussion we had yesterday on that topic! Students had filled in a yellow 'Thinking Yes...Thinking No' sheet of notes for both sides of the argument prior to the discussion, and afterwards, filled in the planning sheet on the back, so they are all ready to write next class.  We will be completing a written composition every two weeks through this term, completing one step of the writing process each day. (Planning, writing, more writing, revising, and publishing.)
Tomorrow we will also begin watching A Midsummer Night's Dream.  We will watch two versions in bits and compare scenes as we read over the unit:
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0140379/
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0026714/

Please ask your child about the play and which movie versions he/she enjoys, and ask them about their writing topic of the fortnight, to use a Shakespearian term.

English 8

Student are participating in a Book Pass Review, in which they have 2 minutes to read a passage from seven or eight novels and rate them for interest level and difficulty.  Then they choose the book they want to read this term.  At the same time, this week they have completed a planning sheet on the topic of What helps you survive: hope, knowledge, friendship, or one other thing? Then they have started writing on this topic.  Like the grade 9s, we will be completing a written composition every two weeks through this term, completing one step of the writing process each day. (Planning, writing, more writing, revising, and publishing.)

Social Studies 11

This week we have focussed on World War 1: the causes, main battles for Canada, general warfare of the era, and the ending. Students completed a map of the pre-war European alliances, viewed clips from the DVD, Canada: A Peoples' History, and made notes.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1948280/

Tonight they are to go to webpages specified on their notes to find points to add about each battle a few other topics. (We lost a class today due to course selection.)  Tomorrow students will learn to make questions at literal and inferential levels and will have to answer them for Monday. On Monday, we will focus on the homefront.  At the end of next week, there will be a test on the pre-war period and WW1.

Students should be reviewing their notes or reading sections of the textbook every night.

I have also recommended that they watch the movie Passchendaele.  It does have some PG scenes, but  provides a great social history of Canada during the war as well as enriching their knowledge of the war specifics. We had time to watch only one battle scene in class.
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1092082/