Good afternoon everyone,
This week we have focused on the text-dependent analysis from the M-STEP released items, which is a fancy way of saying to read a passage, annotate/talk-to-the-text, and create an essay. This is in preparation for the spring M-STEP assessment. The major skills needed are to understand the what the prompt wants you to write, to use text evidence to support the claim, to use direct quotes or paraphrase, and give credit where credit is due, plus counterargument if writing an argumentative essay.
The 2nd card marking / first semester for middle school ends on Friday, January 26th. The 26th is a half-day for middle school. The second semester / third card marking for middle school begins on Monday, January 29th. The 29th is a half-day as well for middle school.
For the second semester, the language arts department is looking at using an article of the week with comprehension questions to be answered after the reading. This change is because we are seeing too many students ‘rehashing’ old books that were ‘read’ in previous years, or watching a movie, yet claiming that the book was read, or reading books that are not at the appropriate reading level for that student.
Have a great rest of the week.
Thank you,
Mr. Drinkert
