Do not just fill up pages just for the sake of completing homework assignments each week.   Don't fill up pages with random/blah entries that will never be useful for developing thoughtful writing that matters.  I'd like you to make observations and share your thinking about your world.  We will re-read entries all year long and hopefully find seeds in them, from which other writing will blossom and flourish.  We get better at writing by writing!

  

The following entries must be in your notebooks for the First Marking Period:

 

                             Type of Entry Assigned                                          Date Due

1.                           Memory Quilt                                                                9/21

2.                           Write out the story of one of your memories           9/21

3.                           2 Pages of Writing Territories in list form                 9/23

4.                           2 Pages on a Memory - tell how you felt

                                  at the time & how you feel now, looking back     10/2

5.                           Cover of WN decorated artistically w/ name/HR#  10/5

6.                           List of 2 possible memoir events from your past     10/6

7.                           Write a full page for 2 out of 3 in-class prompts:

                               1)  Update Cinderella for 21st Century

                               2)  Use hyperbole to describe your favorite superstar/yourself/etc.

                               3)  Write an story using at least 10 'ugly" words    10/15

8.                            First & second draft of a poem (any topic)               10/23

9.                            Persona Poem - from someone else's POV                10/27

 

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from p270, Jeremy Fink and the Meaning of Life by Wendy Mass (2006 Little, Brown and Company)

 

 

           

            I asked my father – your grandfather- if someone could really predict the future.  He said the future changes every day.  He said we, not someone else, have the power to create our own lives.  Then he told me an old folktale that I asked him to write down afterward.  Now I’m going to pass it on to you.

            An old man is teaching his grandson about life.  “A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy.  “It is a terrible fight, and it is between two wolves.  One wolf is evil.  He is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.  The other wolf is good.  He is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith.  This same fight is going on inside you – and inside every other person, too.”

            The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, “Which wolf will win?”

            The old man replied simply, “The one you feed.”

            Even as children, we have the power to create our own lives.  We choose which wolf to feed, and this creates who we become, how we see the world, what we do with the brief amount of time allotted to us.