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Hi, everyone!
Yesterday we did some impressive work on forming paraphrases and making inferences. They are important literary terms that help us understand the observations we make in our lives and how we often add meaning to them. We also use these tools every time we read a book or watch a movie and make sense of what is happening! We will do some further practice today (and all year long, actually!) to strengthen our knowledge of the paraphrase and inference. Part One Paraphrase and Inference Directions: Decide if each sentence sounds like a paraphrase or an inference based on how it is presented. We are taking these sentences out of context, which makes this assignment all the more difficult! But I have faith in you!! 1. The jazz club held one hundred customers on Thursday evening. Paraphrase Inference 2. The jazz club held one hundred customers who seemed excited to be hearing their favorite band. Paraphrase Inference 3. He is certainly the nicest person you will ever meet. Paraphrase Inference 4. She works hard at everything she does, and I think she can achieve just about anything! Paraphrase Inference 5. Steva worked as a Special Education teacher for twenty-five years. Paraphrase Inference 6. Christopher bought a new car on Thursday. Paraphrase Inference 7. Christopher seemed very happy with his new purchase. Paraphrase Inference 8. The RW3 Classes are filled with hardworking, dedicated individuals who are easily motivated to learn! Paraphrase Inference 9. I think the teacher enjoys working with her classes and hopes they will succeed. Paraphrase Inference 10. Today is going to be the best day of the week! Paraphrase Inference 11. It rained all day on Thursday. Paraphrase Inference 12. On Fridays, traffic is better for the morning commute because many people must work at home that day. Paraphrase Inference 13. Pam's class will join us for an activity this morning. Paraphrase Inference 14. The family was going on a vacation to Hawaii. Paraphrase Inference 15. Hawaii is one of the most beautiful places in the country. Paraphrase Inference 16. Don't forget to put a stamp on that envelope before you mail it. Paraphrase Inference 17. The coffee tasted great, and I thought it must be Colombian because of the rich taste. Paraphrase Inference 18. There were no tables available in the restaurant, so we had to wait in the lobby. Paraphrase Inference 19. This is the nineteenth sentence in this activity. Paraphrase Inference 20. The students understand paraphrase and Inference much better now. Paraphrase Inference Situation: Todd is the manager of a grocery store, and he deals with pleasant customers as well as angry ones. One day, a customer named Jani said, "This is the third time this week that you are out of the bread I need. If you don't order more next week, I'll be shopping somewhere else!" 1. How would you paraphrase this? 2. What inferences would you make? Note: When we make inferences, we often use our five senses to decide what is happening. When we form a paraphrase, we simply repeat the same idea using different words but without adding our OWN meaning to it. Part Two Writing Directions: Continue the story from the sentences that appear below. It was an especially dreary night, with thunder and lightning punctuating the silence in Tim's living room. He had been waiting patiently for his cousins to show up, but after almost two hours, he began to wonder where they could possibly be.
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Today's lesson will be an archived exercise from September of 2023. Simply click on the list to the right to retrieve this work!
A brand new activity will be listed for Friday's work, so please check back at that time! Until then, let's work on September of 2023 skills! Have a great day!! Hi, everyone!
I hope you all had a wonderful weekend and are looking forward to our week ahead! I know I am! Tonight's class will have the infamous Chapter One Vocabulary Quiz to look forward to (it's not that bad:)), as well as new pen pal letters to answer upon your arrival. Since we have so many people in our morning group, some of the evening class students may actually have two pen pals (lucky you--the more, the merrier!). This can only serve to help you in reading, writing, and ultimately, being clear in all forms of communication! I hope you enjoy the process! We will begin Chapter Two Vocabulary as soon as I am convinced everyone has a good understanding of Chapter One! This is why we give you assessments--to check on what you have retained, and to see what I may need to teach again! There is never a need to worry about any quiz or test we may have this year. It should always be your very best work, but if you have not mastered a skill, it is my job as your teacher to know this and to remedy it by approaching the subject in a different way! I would hope that no one in our classes would look for outside help during any assessments because you would only be cheating yourself out of an opportunity to learn it more thoroughly the second time around! With this in mind, let's add it to our list of agreements we will put in writing and display in our classroom: Each student's work will always be their own during any class assessments. Now, let's begin our new page of skills! Part One Idiom of the Day Directions: Read the following sentence twice, with the second time through meant for a deeper understanding of what is being said. Sal's wife kept asking him different questions about what he would do if he lost his job, but Sal chose to say that he would cross that bridge when he came to it. My Meaning of the Idiom: Have you ever had this experience before? Describe it in the space provided. Part Two Grammar Challenge Nouns! Directions: Since we were speaking about nouns and subjects of sentences last week, let's take a moment to review both skills. Please circle or highlight all nouns in the sentences that follow AND write the subject of each sentence on the line that follows. Example: Lia enjoyed playing tennis on the weekends at a YMCA court. Nouns you would circle or highlight would be: Lia, tennis, weekends, court (or YMCA court, if used as a two-part noun). The subject would be Lia because she is doing the main action in the sentence. 1. After class, students decided to read books more often to improve reading skills. _______________________ 2. Have you ever seen a more beautiful fall day? ____________________________________________________ 3. Do you celebrate any holidays in October? _______________________________________________________ 4. Did you think the Vocabulary Test was difficult? __________________________________________________ 5. My dog Abby enjoys the treats we give her every day. _____________________________________________ 6. Before deciding which college is for you, look into several different ones to see if they have courses you will enjoy! ________________________________________________________________________________________ 7. My sister Joan went to the Cape for a much-needed vacation. _______________________________________ 8. This website is a good place to find skills of every type! ___________________________________________ 9. My daughter Laura and her husband Andrew celebrated their sixth anniversary yesterday. _____________________________________________________________________________________________ 10. Soon we will be putting the heat on and drinking hot beverages to keep warm! ______________________ Part Three Writing Directions: Please select one of the sentences above, and use it to begin a creative writing piece. Find one that is most interesting to you, and continue to create a story around it. Please be sure your writing piece contains at least five sentences, and that after you have written it, you have edited it carefully! I can't wait to read your work! Note: Your writing can be in a notebook or passed in on a sheet of looseleaf paper. Please put your name and date on either one. Notebooks will be checked at a later date! Part Four Literary Terms Paraphrase and Inference Directions: To review, we paraphrase when we take someone else's words and simply say them a different way without adding meaning of any kind! An inference is made when we do add meaning to those words. Example: The doctor's office calls and tells you the following: "You have an appointment to see Dr. Brown on Friday, September 26, at 9AM sharp." Your Paraphrase: I have a doctor's visit on Friday at 9. Your Inference: I have a doctor's visit on Friday at 9; I wonder if they are checking to see if my leg sprain has improved. What is the difference between a paraphrase and an inference in the above example? Write your answer in the space that follows. Directions: Decide if the following sentences are paraphrases or inferences based on the language used. 1. Drake Maye is a quarterback who plays for the New England Patriots. Paraphrase Inference 2. Mike Vrabel is a great coach. Paraphrase Inference 3. The talk show hosts talked about the actor in an angry way. I bet they know him personally, and he's not the nicest person. Paraphrase Inference 4. Classes will start at 6PM this evening. Paraphrase Inference 5. Everyone will learn every single thing the teacher teaches tonight. Paraphrase Inference 6. The teacher will go over paraphrases and inferences in class. Paraphrase Inference 7. Swimming is a great activity. Paraphrase Inference 8. Shopping at the mall on the weekends can be a relaxing way to spend time. Paraphrase Inference 9. The director of the movie asked the actors to speak more clearly. Paraphrase Inference 10. There was a white mountain bike for sale at the store. Paraphrase Inference Now it's your turn!! Create four sentences below that could either sound like a paraphrased thought or an inference. Do not label your sentences. You will trade with a partner to see if they select the correct response! Hello, everyone!
Here is the next lesson for Wednesday and Thursday classes! Enjoy! Part One Idiom of the Day Instructions: Please read the idiom in the following sentence, and write what you think it means!! Be sure to look for context clues, which will help you make good inferences! Example: Ciara was tired of trying to get Sal to answer her; he continued to beat around the bush before finally getting in his car and going home! Idiom Meaning: Question: Which words in the sentence helped you to understand what this idiom means? Circle or highlight them now! Part Two Literary Terms Inference An inference is much more than a simple guess! You make an inference when you look at a situation (or read something in a story) and use your background knowledge to decide what the story does not tell you! This could be similar to a prediction while reading, but it could also be simply deciding whether someone is angry by the way she walked into the classroom! We make this guess, which is actually an opinion, because of what we have experienced already! If we see someone shouting with a frown on her face, we make an inference that the person is angry because this is what it has meant in our past experiences! Inferences are not always correct, just as we are not always correct when we form an opinion about someone or something! When reading a story, we make an inference, and if, as we read, we realize we may not be correct, we simply keep reading and create another inference!! If we make an inference about a person, but then we get to know them better, and they seem much nicer than we originally thought, we change our inference!! Can you make an inference about the following situations? 1. Syl speeds into the classroom, breathing hard, and sits down heavily in his seat. 2. Terri starts to raise her hand in class, but she then takes it down and looks back at her book. 3. Alonzo rolled his eyes when his aunt again asked him if he had gotten a new job. 4. Gina had a huge smile on her face when her brother's name was called to receive an award at the banquet. Your Turn! Directions: Create two or three sentences in which someone will have to make an inference about what exactly is going on! Be ready to share them with a partner!! Part Three Writing Directions: Since we are about to start Chapter One in our Vocabulary Lessons, today's writing piece will be to use four of the new words in sentences in the space below. Have fun! 1. 2. 3. 4. Hi, everyone! I'm so happy to have you all back in class! As you know, when we begin a new school year, we have to form a baseline to see exactly what our starting point is! This helps to ensure we are heading in the right direction in the form of growth in our skills as well as in ourselves. Every time we pick up a new piece of knowledge, we are adding to who we are, and as you can guess, this process should never end!
We will begin the year with some fun activities to help us learn a bit about each other in a comfortable way. Our goal is to feel safe and respected in our classroom so that we can make mistakes (which is, by the way, the best way to know that learning is taking place!). But first . . . we will start with what I am calling a review, even though some of you may not have been with our class in previous years! Don't worry and just answer questions as best you can! Part One Idioms of the Day Directions: Please read the following sentences in which an idiom (a twist of language) is shown in bold print. Write what you think the idiom means in the space that follows each one. 1. It is important to know that we are all in the same boat in this classroom, even if each of our plans is slightly different from the others! My Meaning for the Idiom: 2. Jana stopped worrying about getting everything done on time. She had worked as hard as she could, and now it was time for her to let the chips fall where they may. My Meaning for the Idiom: Your Turn: Please select one of the idioms above and use it to describe a situation you had in which this idiom fits! Write your sentence in the space below. My Use of the Idiom: Do you feel you understand what an idiom is now (if you hadn't already known what it was previously)? Yes No (I need more examples) Part Two Grammar Challenge Directions: Please circle or underline the mistakes in the following sentences. Errors could include spelling mistakes, lack of capital letters (or capitalization where it is not needed), punctuation problems, or the wrong form of a verb. The number in parenthesis tells how many errors each sentence has. Have fun! 1. can you beleve how fast Summer flu by. (5) 2. Jack and i gone swimming yesterday. (2) 3. Where is my gloves? (1) 4. It is wonderful, to have all of you in class today. (1) 5. What is your favrite fall activity? (1) 6. Tomas and Deon lead the way for others when they created a new device for students to use in the classroom. (1) 7. Mary enjoy her days at the beach she wished they would never end (3) Part Three Vocabulary and Literary Terms True or False Directions: Please select either True or False for each statement below. 1. An academy is a place of learning. (True False) 2. A protagonist is the villain/bad guy in the story. (True False) 3. The setting of a novel is where and when a story is taking place. (True False) 4. Fiction is another name for a true story. (True False) 5. The highest point of action in a story is called tone. (True False) 6. Something that is effective likely works well. (True False) 7. A selection can be a story or even part of a story. (True False) 8. Every fictional story must have a problem, which is known as a conflict. (True False) 9. Nonfiction books can include suspense novels and mysteries. (True False) 10. When you "close read" a story, you do not read for understanding. (True False) Part Four Question and Answer Directions: The following statement needs a question! What could someone ask that would allow this sentence to be used correctly? Fill in the Question section now! Answer: It will be the best school year ever! Question: Can you create your own? Try it now! Part Five Writing Directions: This is a story starter, which is meant to give you a jump start into writing a nice piece! I have given you three sentences, and it is up to you to continue the story in whichever way you would like. It is important, however, to maintain the same verb tenses and the same point of view! Have fun! I can't wait to see the stories you come up with! It was a quiet day in the middle of July. Manny stood outside his house and watched his new neighbors move into the house right next door. Everything seemed fine until Manny noticed something so unusual he couldn't believe his eyes! |
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