ROSALES (7/8): Things are happening in our Humanities class this week. Students have taken their current Ancient Civilizations project to the next level. There are several components to their project, and they have been asked to take on an approach as if they became the experts in that field of study. The class is divided into three different sections, each section also divided into smaller sections. The three sections include Ancient India, Ancient China, and the Ancient Hebrews/Ancient Israel. For Ancient India, we will have a Geography expert, a Rules and Society expert, a Caste System expert, and a Belief Systems expert. For Ancient China, we will have a Geography expert, a Belief Systems expert, an Economy expert, a Chinese Dynasties expert, and a Government and Military expert. For Ancient Hebrews, we will have two experts that are covering the Roots of Judaism, the Legend of Exodus, Moses/Abraham/King David, Women of Israel, The Three Faiths, and The Torah. For Ancient Israel, we will have an expert on The Diaspora, Jewish customs, Keeping the Sabbath, and the Temple of Solomon. Students are creating a presentation, an artifact, an information card, and five poems that will showcase their expertise. Students have been diligently working on each item; I am very excited to see what they produce. Above are some works in progress.

We have also continued our Poetry unit, defining terms, and understanding how poetry works. Students were able to choose a poem and analyze it, looking for different poetic devices. We have also started exploring the different styles of poetry, beginning with Acrostic Poetry, examples of which are above. Be sure to check these out in the back hall of the building. They are currently working on writing a Ballad along with a Ballade, which are actually two different things. A Ballad is a poem that tells a story, while a Ballade is a type of poetry that has a very distinct rhyme pattern and structure. We have been having fun with poetry, getting them to express their creativity in written form, which can be extremely difficult to do.

MODRZEJEWSKI (5/6): What do the spines of books, video games and movement have in common? All three provided starting points for writing this week! We spent a good deal of time discussing, listening to, and reading free-verse poetry. Scholars participated in a "Poetry Walk." They moved around the room to readings of both "Sharks' Teeth" by Kay Ryan, and "Song of Myself "by Walt Whitman, freezing at the end of each poetry line. After scholars spent this time thinking on their feet (and with their feet), we compared the line break structure of the two poems. Scholars concluded that Whitman covers a lot of ground with each line in part because his ambitions are huge. His is a poem about the limitless possibilities of the self and the magnificent expanse of America. Kay Ryan's poem features very short lines (only 3-5 words per line) that seem well suited to her topic: carving out small moments of quiet in our noisy, technological age. Next, we looked at an excerpt from Toni Morrison's novel Jazz. The excerpt was part of a large prose paragraph, so there were no line breaks within the paragraph. Yet the words are striking, beautiful, and poetic. Scholars were then asked to rewrite the passage in poetic lines. The length of each line was up to each scholar, but they were required to have clear rationale for the choices they made. Scholars enjoyed the opportunity to play around with language, the way poets do.

Scholars tried their hands at writing "Book Spine Poetry". (Thanks to Mrs. Sheffield for sharing this activity). Scholars had to write a poem based on the book titles on the spines of books. It has been inspiring to watch scholars transform from hesitant writers to poets who find inspiration all around them.

I am always encouraging the scholars to "write what you know." This week, we discussed the role of narrative in video games. Scholars then had a choice of writing a paper about a character from their favorite video game doing the exact opposite of what he or she usually does, writing a scenario about the places that are blocked off in video games, in which they tried to account for why these blockages, or analyzing the differences between the story they're being told by the game and the story they create as a player going through the game (the emergent story). Scholars really enjoyed this writing assignment and begged for more time (which I gladly granted them).

Finally, this week I began to read Rudyard Kipling's classic novel The Jungle Book to scholars. In the coming weeks, we will be comparing Kipling's work to the book scholars are currently reading, The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. Next week, I will also start reading How to Fly a Horse by Kevin Ashton to them. Mrs. Cowley recommended this wonderful book on the secret history of creation, invention and discovery. Thank you, Mrs. Cowley, for the suggestion!