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Welcome to Caroline Howard Elston's website for Yearbook, AP Language and Composition, and Honors English 11. I am excited about all of the instruction and projects this year, and about learning alongside my classes. I expect all of my students to wholeheartedly embrace reading, writing, and thinking. So often, I hear, "Well, I like to read about things I'm interested in." That's fine, but building memory, honing critical thinking skills, challenging difficult texts, formulating opinions, and communicating our thoughts takes hard work. The brain is a muscle; use it or lose it! In fact, research shows us that if we are not tackling texts that are "harder" than we like, we will lose ground. This self-sifting happens most often in the leap to junior year. Juniors, especially, must build mental muscle so that you won't slip through the sieve. We are in this together, so let's have fun while we moan and groan!
2023-24 Schedule of Classes
Advanced Placement and Composition - 1st and 7th periods
English 11 Honors - 2nd, 3rd, 4th periods
Yearbook - 5th period 
Plan Period - 7th period
 

Posts

HONORS Thursday April 2

Remember that canva.com is a great site for posters, especially the templates under infographics. Here's the link again.
Thank you for the early Check-in Journals!
I hope you will take advantage of these ungraded opportunities for learning. I promise to read everything.

HONORS Wednesday April 1

Reminder to do your poster and Check-in Journal .
 
I hope you will take advantage of these ungraded opportunities for learning. I promise to read everything.

AP March 31

  • Download the short powerpoint below, The Rhetorical Situation, to assist with AP essay.
  • Work on your Check-in journal #1 (Due April 5 on turnitin.com)
  • Sign in to AP Classroom to access practice lessons. 
  • Watch for essay type April 3!

The Rhetorical Situation

This is a visual adaptation of the Rhetorical Triangle and Rhetorical Situation that we have studied all year. AP Classroom released something similar, but very detailed, in a webinar for teachers, and someone generously recreated it. (Slide 2). I have added some explanations on Slides 3 & 4 to show how our classroom discussions fit in. Please put this in your folder for our class.

HONORS Tuesday March 31

POSTERS, VIDEO CONFERENCING, & GRAPHICS
Here is the instruction sheet compiled by the district for you to use Zoom. Use CHROME for best results. Let me know if there are issues.
 
Here is the graphic design site that most like for posters. I like the templates under "infographics" for the survival posters. Of course, you may use any form you like!
 
Don't forget to do your Check-in Journal for turnitin.com. Ask date is April 5.
 
I hope you will take advantage of these ungraded opportunities for learning. I promise to read everything.

HONORS Monday March 30

SURVIVAL POSTERS
Thank you to those groups who let me know you are still in touch! It's great that many of you are using the video conferencing tool zoom and thanks also for the Marco Polo video chats. If you haven't installed Zoom or Marco Polo, try it today!
Sometime this week, I would like to be in touch with all groups about your posters on a group text that you set up, a group email, Zoom, Google Docs or however you are platforming. Let me know!
 
GRAPHICS SITE
Canva.com has lots of ideas for visual awesomeness. I like the section on infographics. 
 
ACT PRACTICE
Also, there are going to be some assignments for all juniors to help you score well on the ACT. These include sample ACT tests - the same for everyone and available soon. As you take these, I will answer any questions you have about answers, which will be provided. 
 
Check-in Journal #1
You will see this on turnitin.com with an ask date of April 5. Please write a journal entry about how you are surviving this challenging time. (Consider your poster information and whether it has information that helps you.) 
 
I hope you will take advantage of these ungraded opportunities for learning. I promise to read everything.

AP LANGUAGE - Monday March 30

On April 3, AP College Board will be releasing tools and practice lessons and videos that you must access through your own personal AP account. They will be in AP Classroom. At that time, we will be told which essay type you will write, and the instruction will target that. Please have your rubric handy and take notes either on a document in our folder or in your comp book. We are in this together! 
 
 
Also, I have put an entry on turnitin.com called Check-in Journal #1. I will place writing prompts in a variety of genre in these. The first has a turn-in date of April 5th.
 
Genre: letter.
 
Rhetorical Situation: Speaker - you, Audience - you during September 2019,  Subject -  learning in quarantine, Exigence - desire to prepare yourself then growing out of frustration now, Purpose - warning and advice covering a variety of areas (school, friends, family, health, etc.) with a goal of helping the September you cope Context - the current situation. Although personal writing, not academic, you should employ sophisticated sentence structure, elevated language where appropriate, a variety of tones, and a mixture of modes. The secondary reader (me) should detect reflection and deep thought/concern that you have about yourself and others. (500 words)
 
For an example (of a personal letter using formal, but not academic, writing), please see this link, which was the basis for an AP RA: https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/04-03-02-0207
Contact me with questions. Miss you all.

3/26 ALL CLASSES - INSTALL ZOOM w CHROME

Please read the instruction sheet to install Zoom, a video conferencing tool, from yesterday's post.