Retakes

If you need to take (or retake) your R4 Assessment, you may come in:

Friday 9/14 at 7:00 am
Monday the 17th between 2-3:30
Tuesday the 18th at lunch
Wednesday the 19th during Per 1 (late start: 8:55-9:35)
Thursday the 20th during lunch

Welcome to a new school year! I am excited to see familiar faces and welcome new students. Please check out the links on the right to view a list of classroom resources.

Click here to view my course syllabus for English 10

Click here to view my course syllabus for Achieve

If you are interested in getting  text message reminders from me, I will be using the Remind app.

To be added to the Remind list, follow the instructions below.

-English 10: Text the code @e23g96 to 81010
-Achieve: Text the code @achieveel to 81010

All cell phone numbers are kept private by Remind. Text messaging rates may apply.

Independent Reading

Quarter three independent reading assignments should be finished up this week in order to stay on schedule! After you have finished reading and annotating, start on your Review/Analysis. If you're stuck, here is a sample of a written analysis and here is a sample of a podcast. Both were completed by students this semester and are good examples of what I would like you to do.

After grades for Q3 are submitted, I will be putting in "Missing" for all unfinished reading assignments.

You can still turn them in for full credit, but I am putting them in as missing to encourage you to finish so you have ample time to select and read your Q4 book!

Need some inspiration?

Check out these lists!*

Most Anticipated YA Books 2017

YA Novels of 2018

Best Teen Books About Real Problems

YA Novels 2016

DCPL's Teen Humor Booklist

and this list, with a very creative title. 

If you need ideas or book suggestions, see me! I am loving the podcasts and reviews I've received so far!

*Disclaimer: I have NOT read all of the books on these lists. I encourage you to do your own research before choosing a title to make sure it is the right fit for you. I am a huge believer in the idea that finding the RIGHT book is what creates a lifelong thirst for reading. Good luck!

Book Review: Isaac's Storm

"This is the story of Isaac and his time in America, the last turning of the centuries, when the hubris of men led them to believe they could disregard even nature itself."
-Erik Larson, Isaac's Storm

I have to start by saying that I absolutely adore Erik Larson. He writes non-fiction that is gripping, page-turning delight. His book The Devil in the White City is one of my all-time favorites, and it is he (along with Jon Krakauer) who taught me to love non-fiction.

Larson's books tend to follow a pattern; he chooses an interesting, but forgotten event/era and brings it to life. He does so by focusing on the intimate details of a few lives (who become the main characters) and weaving those details in and among "big picture" descriptions of the event/era.

In Isaac's Storm the event is a devastating hurricane which nearly wiped the city of Galveston, TX off the map in 1900. Even now, 117 years later, it remains the deadliest natural disaster to have occurred on American soil.

Larson's sweeping descriptions of the storm and its aftermath are haunting. But it is in the details that Isaac's Storm doesn't quite land. Larson chooses to focus on meteorologist Isaac Cline, his brother Jacob, and a few fatuous men from the fledgling U.S. National Weather Service. He makes their stories as interesting as he possibly can, constructing the drama from old letters and telegraphs, but the story just didn't catch me. 

I think part of the problem is that Isaac Cline, as a person, seems kind of cold and reserved, and so as the sympathetic center of the book, he just didn't quite work. 

Still, the magical way that Erik Larson makes history come alive is always such a treat, and I fully enjoyed looking for further information and old pictures of the Galveston Hurricane. Any book that fires up my imagination in that way deserves at least 4 stars.