Dontcha HATE when you REALLY NEED Something??

Hi Secondary Folks and English Teachers!

I missed Blogging something awful!

TeachersPayTeachers has had me working night and day, making products.

One of the best and worst things about summer is low sales. It is terrible because, of course, no sales. It is great because, when no one is buying, you feel motivated to get all those other, equally important things done.

Things to Do When the Store is Empty
FILL it up...with products
Start to pin again in preparation for Fall
Redo those old-school covers.
Rethink some of your failed strategies - and maybe repackage some things?
Actually get out and enjoy yourself - holy cow! What a great idea...recharge that battery!


**A QUESTION FOR ALL THOSE TEACHERS out there ***
What do you need. What would you never want to make, recreate, or what resources do you value but struggle with finding? 

The product I made that I love the very most is my literary term glossary because is was, hands down, exceedingly difficult to make. It was also a labor of love, compiled with care, and I know (or at least at hope) that it is very useful. More useful say, than a general dictionary, or a high level dictionary of critical, literary and rhetorical terms that would be exhausting for a teacher to use.

Every once in a while as a teacher you think, GOSH, I really wish I could find ....and fill in the blank. Because if you had this thing, you KNOW it would help you when you were teaching or planning, and you know you'd use it over and over.


So what are those products for you??

Why is Sonnet History AS IMPORTANT as The Sonnet Itself? - A Primer for Writers and Teachers Alike with Free Lesson Ideas and a FREEBIE!

Pin of my newest product - History of the Sonnet - a Common Core Presentation (Gr 8-12)

I am just going to TOWN with freebies now that a wonderful lovely superwoman teacher, blog tutor extraordinaire, and new friend has taught me to provide freebies (Kristy Bearfield, I salute you!).  You the reader of course benefit, and you can follow me on Bloglovin' so there's always that to get excited about.

WHY We Are Really Here - The Sonnet!

Today we are coming to the PerfettoWritingRoom(c)  to discuss the benefits of introductions in general, the history of form and the history of the sonnet in particular!

First of all, the benefits of introductions, history lessons, backgrounds, or fun Power Points: 

1. Interest - In the typical English classroom or language arts, the current lingo for creating interest about a topic, and, the first part of a lesson plan, is the anticipatory set. To start a unit on sonnets, or really ANY poetic form, it creates interest to talk about its origin.
2. Groundwork and Foundation - in order to teach rhyme, meter, form, and themes, eventually you may face a problem. You will end up having to go back. Back WHERE ask? Well, to the beginning. Perhaps not to Giacomo Da Lentini, but at least to Petrarch and his conventions. . . right? Why not save yourself and your students the trouble by doing a formal introduction, hmmm? 
3. Counter-intuitively, it may save you some time. Sure it will take a day or two to start from the 13th century. Once you are analyzing Shakespeare, and the students are finding the theme or the conventions and the rhyme scheme, it just might go faster, and you'll make up the time!
4. Retention and a deeper learning experience. There is nothing like understanding the background and history of a form to provide a sense of respect for the subject matter at hand. Students are more likely to retain information about the sonnet when that information is WHOLE. Its beginning and its story, its structure, and then, some examples. Teachers are always busy and have to make tough decisions about what is valuable. It doesn't take a lot of time to review the history of the sonnet, but it will make the iambic pentameter that follows a whole lot more enjoyable. 

And Now a FREEBIE FOR YOU!!!

The following is one page of the notes overview - a compilation from the Power Point - but I think it is fun and helpful. I have seen some of the wondrous K-8 freebies - my material is for high school all the way up to college (sometimes!), so it is never as cute. Sorry about that.
       This FREEBIE is the first page of the Sonnet history. 

The definition doesn't include the rhyme scheme, the volta or turn - I leave that for the SECOND part - the teaching of form, which I am currently working on. 

but it is complete in the Petrarchan Conventions, which is very cool, and a great bargain. YOU CAN'T beat FREE!

Grab the First Page of Sonnet History! 

I hope you enjoy it!!!

Keep learning, living, working and playing, 

PerfettoWritingRoom(c) 

- Gina

Usual and Extraordinary Figurative Language PART FOUR! By PerfettoWritingRoom(c)!

This Photo, taken only a few months ago, 2014, in memory of Dorothy Parker, pioneer, female writer, and all around wit.

PART FOUR - TWO of MY FAVORITE Figures of SPEECH!!!

 I'd be a fool and liar both if I said metonymy and synecdoche were easy to tell apart. However, I love wordplay and if you read the differences and then follow the examples below, I think you'll begin to love these as much as I do!

 

11.   Metonymy – A trope in which a thing is represented by another thing that is near, around or closely associated with it. For example, when people refer to: 

• The crown. . . they really mean the king, meaning the entire person, not just the crown he wears.
• The bottle. . .  they really mean liquor in general,  not just the container that holds it.
• Suits. . .they are referring to an entire class of business professionals who wear suits, not just an ensemble that these people might wear on a meeting day.
• The White House. . .they may be referring to government, the governing body, and not to the building itself. 
• Similarly, people may refer to Washington (the District of Columbia) where major political activities take place, even though it is actually district where many other, nonpolitical events take place.
• "Coke" or "Coca-Cola," they may be referring to any dark-colored cola beverage that is near or closely associated with Coke. This would be using a Metonymy, and people do this all the time with brand names like Q-tips, Pampers, Cheerios and other brands out of habit. 
• the statement . . . "Give me your John Hancock" they are referring to a signature in general, and playfully to the famous signature on the Declaration of Independence. In this way your signature is related to another's signature. They obviously want you to write YOUR signature, not Mr. Hancock's! 
• or the saying “The pen is mightier than the sword”. . . they are referring to the written word or even legislation in general for "the pen," and for the "sword" they are referring to combat, war, or violence in general.
• A sweet ride. . . referring to what a car does, and calling it that, a "ride," as opposed to a car.
• "Let's get a keg." (A keg is the large container associated with beer)
• "He drank the cup." (A cup is a container so closely associated with liquids that you understand you are not literally drinking the CUP, but its contents.)

12. Synecdoche - A figure of speech in which a part stands for the whole, or vice versa. If you look at the examples above closely, you will notice that they are not parts of the whole; all the the items are near, associated with, or related to the items mentioned. For synecdoche however, let's see if we can come up with some examples for you. All of these are examples of a PART standing for the whole. In order to make the differences crystal clear, just a few examples of Synecdoche are:

• “Wheels” for a car. (Wheels are part of a car).
•  “Two suns” for two days (the sun turning is a part of what makes a day.)
•  “May I have your hand?" for marrying a person (hand is part of the body).
• "Long-hair" for a hippie, (as this was usually part of a their distinguishing look).
•  "Hired hands" for workers (hands are only part of the worker though we understand the meaning here) 
• "We need a head count!" (heads count as entire people, using part for the whole).
• "He got pumped full of lead" (Traditionally lead is part of a bullet's makeup)
• Ivories for a piano and its keys 
• Threads for clothes
• Glasses - for eyeglasses or spectacles       
• Pigskin for a football, based on the material it is made out of
• strings, brass, for instrument types
• "I will use my good silver" for cutlery or tableware, provided it is made of silver or at least silver plated.
• plastic for a credit card (Plastic is what credit cards are made of).

            

Note: that synecdoche differs from metonymy in that metonymy is a trope in which a thing is represented by a thing that is near, around or closely associated with it. For a term to be synecdoche is must be PART of a larger thing, not merely near or associated with . 

PLEASE ALSO NOTE: WE Here are not Done! Not by a Long Shot!!! I hope you are reading and enjoying this figurative language tutorial. Our goal is to be informative and fun. Even more good stuff tomorrow!!! Keep reading, writing, living, growing, learning, laughing, and loving life!

PerfettoWritingRoom(c)

The Importance of Gratitude, During the Holidays and Year Round.

I've been a teacher for many years. Part of this time was spent as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Ethiopia. Years later, I am married, living in New Jersey, and creating teaching and writing materials for teacherspayteachers.

While I was in the Peace Corps...and anyone who spends their time in service I am sure can understand...that realizations assault you at all turns. Even the realizations you have at the beginning are questioned towards the end as you grow into a new person. It is true: the more you give to others, the more you receive in return. You often receive more than the people you help.

Throughout the many years of teaching, in New Jersey, as a tutor, adjunct professor, or high school teacher, and in Ethiopia at the high school level (grammar and English), I feel truly humbled.  It is an honor to teach and to be of service. I know. This is something people say all the time. "It's been an honor." You wonder, "What does that mean? That is just so disingenuous!"

But it IS an honor to help others. It is wonderful to be powerful, a mover-and-shaker, and an entrepreneur in the great and exciting world. But it is a gift to be able to help others, if only because you receive such a depth of satisfaction. It is humbling to know people in a more intimate way, to be allowed to help them, and to feel the reward knowing you had some small measure of agency in helping them grow or improve. THAT is why it is humbling and an honor. That is why to say "It's been an honor" is honest and not a lie.

To be a nurse, a teacher, anyone who helps others, and yes, a person who creates and makes things and puts them new into the world can feel this kind of gratitude about life and the work they do...


BUT HOW TO SUSTAIN A SENSE OF GRATITUDE IN YOUR JOB?
How do you keep feeling this way, when your students don't do their homework, the other teachers are really keen on entering your classroom to complain, the parents keep insisting their child did SO much better last year, implying it just might be your fault, or the upper management is not being nearly as supportive as you'd like?

The key to keeping a sense of gratitude is keeping above the daily grind, the annoyances, the pesky irritants.  Focus on why you ARE a teacher, what you love, and what you have and are grateful for.
Know why you are a teacher and be grateful for that, for your students, for all of the things you are, and can do and can change in the world and in your class. If you focus more on what you are thankful for, you will be happier and more productive. Also, you will concern yourself less with those things that annoy you and cannot be changed. Superintendents may come and go. Do you want to be grateful for the new books, the student who finally came out of her shell, and the angry student who did her homework every day this week, or do you want to feel shortchanged because the Superintendent changed the rule and now everyone has to go to school? Remember that you have chosen this job. If this is the case, you are free to "un-choose" it. Would you really do that? If not, then your time would be better spent HAPPY and grateful for what you DO have, and spent thinking about what you can do to make it even better.

HOW TO SUSTAIN A SENSE OF GREATITUDE IN LIFE?
To focus on what one DOES have, instead of what one WISHES to have, what one WANTS, what one does not have or worse yet, what others have, is a recipe for disaster. The idea of being grateful, in oneself, for what one has, to God, or for one's family or situation, very much seems saccharine and corny and also THEMED for the Thanksgiving and Christmas rush, conveniently sandwiched in between pumpkins  in October, and the need to join your local gym in January. Nothing could be more off or slant.

The happiest people are those that take time. Time to breathe and to realize "I am here, alive, and breathing. And right now all is exactly as it should be." Though this is for writers, teachers, designers, creators of all stripes, EVERYONE should know that all you have is enough. If you have a person to love, if you have food on the table, if you are warm enough at night, and if you can find some joy in the work that you do and the things that you create, be grateful for it, and practice focusing on those things that you DO have. The world will notice! You will notice, your family, customers, students will notice. And if gratitude is something you only do for a day, when then shame on the advertising executives.

GRATITUDE CAVEATS
PLEASE, don't misunderstand. I fall off the wagon all the time. Being grateful takes practice. My husband drives me crazy. I drive down the highway and someone veers over into my lane. While I usually feel bad because I just know through this Italian intuition of mine that it has to be an old person who can't drive very well, on this particular day I am incensed and frustrated and yell out in my car "Oh Yeah? Sure, why don't you just drive wherever you feel like it?"

Then I'm in Shop Rite, notorious for having small aisles (is this just near me?) and of course I'm in a rush and people love planting their cart in the center of the aisle to just stand and stare. This doesn't even make me upset. It's the maneuvering of the cart around them; there are always boxes of food not yet put away. Then another shopper shows up, and looks as me as if I'm in the way.

THE TAKE AWAY
And yet, I too try to feel grateful. In the end, character is what you do when no one in looking. No one may truly know if you practice being grateful for others year-round. But inside, you will know. You will feel lighter and happier. The carts and cars, the people by the water cooler or coffee station may simply not bother you as much. There is a freedom in that. And we return to the beginning, in doing something for others, we will get much more in return. Freedom, happiness, peace of mind? I'll take that everyday and twice on Sunday!

Poetry UNITS, And the Value of talking to other Teachers. . .

Today I was on LinkedIn.

I had the good fortune of falling into a group - teachers anonymous of something silly like that. One of the benefits of helping other people is that it really benefits you MORE, almost all of the time. You feel good about yourself, you feel inspired. It feels good to do good. And then there's the fact that you read about all these other fascinating ideas teachers have for poetry units.

The found poem is always fun. The acrostic? - why not... One professor suggested giving each student half a line, and having that student meet up with his or her "other half" in order to discern the line's meaning. Still another teacher suggested drawing the impression or meaning the poem has for them. A final one I read thought a variation on the "cut up" poem would be fun. Instead of cutting up the entire poem, just cut out certain phrases. Students can fill in what they believe would work provided they can justify it.

I've always thought the Exquisite Corpse works well, whether you are doing it for the short story or for the poem. Most people don't call it the "Exquisite Corpse" because it sounds eerie and odd, but most of us have done it before. If you use rows, and have five students in each row, each has a sheet of paper. The entire class begins their versions of a story, OR a POEM.
      When they have gotten a stanza or a few good lines down, each person passes it back (well, except for the poor people in the back who must run very fast up to the front. Now, everyone quickly reads the first stanza, and continue the poem, until it is time to pass back again. When each person has the honor of getting back his or her paper, let everyone read, and then finish their own poem. This round will take the longest.  Everyone may share out loud afterwards.

If you want a longer more far-reaching and skills-based poetry unit....

An idea I have had much success with is using the Romantic Poets. This is nothing I am currently working on for the PerfettoWritingRoom. If and when I do, it will be a full unit. Whether you do one poem from each: Shelley, Wordsworth, Blake, Coleridge, Byron, Shelley, and Keats, use the poems of the Romantic poets that are available in your text, choose your favorite or have the students choose their own, it can be very successful, and will have a different slant.

Once the poems are chosen, create a prompt for each poem. Assignments can vary and can be: personal reflection, close reading, summarizing the poem but moving on to a related writing topic, or a targeted writing activity geared towards studying the poems' literary devices, structure, pacing, symbolism, tropes, or other goal you may have. Ideally, you may want to do a variety of each of these, not just summaries, or reflections, etc. I always got permission to take the student out of school for one or two periods, to sit outside and read poetry as the Romantics would have done. This was Grade 11, and they appreciated it and as a result were reasonably well behaved!

The Unit grade is based on a major test that includes all of the poetry and information covered, all of the writings done in the "Poetry-prompt journal," as well as one-two poems they must write that use the style and the subject matter of the Romantic poets. Lastly, there is a small art component: some students take pictures of nature, other draw, sculpt, do computer renderings or animation. For those who "swear" they are completely dull at art, an extra poem or two may be submitted.

Outside of the unit itself, there is a major poetry analysis paper in the works; this is not included in the unit grade, but shows that the students have a very well-rounded activity and lesson load during the spring. I feel it is very holistic, or "whole-istic."

I hope you think this is a useful approach to teaching, not just "a few poems" but the style and structure of poetry, and background of the poets, all the while giving the students some time to slow down and soak up some sun, time to reflect and write as the Romantics themselves would, before quizzing, testing, and writing an analytical paper and some poems of their own. Who knew you could be so industrious in March?

I hope you enjoyed my idea for the Romantics teaching unit. So in the spirit of talking to our teachers and yes, our writers too, any other ideas for great poetry units? I'm all ears. Stop by and drop me a line, or visit my store, posted on the side bar of my main page.
Best,
Gina
PerfettoWritingRoom

When Can One Writing Activity Be Used 900 Times?? Well (if you Really Push Your Limits)

http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/PerfettoWritingRoom

Yes, Yes, this is ONE page. A mere single page. On the left are positive attribute adjectives, and on the right are potentially negative attribute nouns, or at the very least nouns that are frustratingly ill-fitted (on purpose, I assure you) to the words on the left!

The ENTIRE activity is SIX pages. A writer, teacher, lecturer, professor or coach, can do SO MUCH with an exercise like this!!

I have used this activity for years, and writer always always love it, not to say they don't sometimes HATE it first....but they are allowed to choose again. The light bulb always goes on.

Whether you give one page to each row or aisle, or cut them into squares and have one "noun" bag and one "adjective" bag and let the writers choose until they have a suitable pair that makes them suitably excited and inspired, it almost always leads to something bizarre, outrageous, beautiful or at least beyond what a writer felt he or she was capable of writing before attempting such an extreme assignment.

I have named this the "Extreme Perspective" Writing Activity. In total, there are up to 900 possible adjective-noun matches. Here are the directions, knowing FULL well that if you wanted, you could all just shut off the computer and make it on your own. While I am admittedly selling it (yes, the amazingly high price, if I recall properly of $5.00 bucks?), the idea, work, effort, directions and embedded freebie alone (which you'll never really know about unless you buy it, so ha) is more than worth it....

Back to the Directions -

While you have chosen a bizarre, odd, or unlikely adjective-noun scenario, write a scene in which the pairing you have chosen not only is feasible, but is downright believable and likely given your setting, atmosphere, narrator, or all three. In short, what scenario can you create in which the unlikely pairing you have makes perfect sense?

Just a few of the 900 pairings could be

Brilliant Industrialization
Fascinating Agony
Glorious Destruction

As you can already guess, such pairings have the potential to PUSH writers into lesser traveled genre or historical eras, can force writers to make less safe writing topics, choose more interesting narrators or unreliable ones, and in general make writing choices and decisions far away from what they normally would. The fact that a writer can go back every week and choose a new possibility is exciting, lending itself to portfolio or even story collection possibilities.

See the link to my store at Teachers Pay teachers at the top of this post. Happy writing, and happy teaching.