I hope that everyone had a lovely long weekend, and shana tova, if you were celebrating!

Today we eased back into our routine with a vocabulary quiz and a look at the graphic novel version of The Odyssey. Homework for tonight is Book 9 (5 – Book 9 and Book 9 Reading Guide). We’ll chat about the cyclops tomorrow!

Happy weekend!

Some important reminders for what’s coming up:

Monday by Midnight:

• finish Vocabulary.com for Odyssey List 2
• submit 15 vocabulary sentences from List 2 to Turnitin.com

Tuesday in Class:

• we will take our vocabulary quiz (all words from List 2 and some review words from List 1 will be on it)

Tuesday at Midnight:

• your nonfiction summer reading essay is due

In class today, we took a quiz over the syllabus, and we finished discussing vocabulary. Then we listened to Suzanne Vega’s “Calypso” and wrote a paragraph in response to it (PIE Paragraph 1 v2).

After yearbook pictures today, we talked about Books 6, 7, and 8 of the Odyssey and began discussing our second vocabulary list. You don’t have any reading homework for tonight! You can, however, begin working on your 15 vocabulary sentences (due via Turnitin.com) and your vocabulary.com, both of which are due by Monday at midnight.

We began today with a conversation about Odysseus and Calypso, and then we spent the remainder of the period completing the district-mandated Renaissance Learning Universal Screener. Homework for tonight is Books 6, 7, and 8 (Books 6, 7, and 8 Reading Guide     4 – Books 6, 7, and 8).

Two important reminders:

1. Yearbook pictures are tomorrow!
2. We’re watching the first part of the film version of The Odyssey on Friday after school (for 10 points of extra credit on next vocab quiz).

Happy second-week-of-school!

You will take yearbook pictures a the very beginning of class on Thursday, so please come wearing what you would like to be remembered in.

I also gave you a paper copy of the rubric for your nonfiction summer reading essay (Nonfiction Summer Reading Essay Rubric), which will be due a week from today, Tuesday, September 11, via Turnitin.com.

After we took our vocabulary quiz, students began working on the next section of the Odyssey. Book 5 (3 – Book 5 and Book 5 Reading Guide) is due tomorrow.

Thank you all for a wonderful first week! I have really enjoyed getting to know you and learn with you.

Today in class, we discussed Books 2, 3, and 4 of the Odyssey. With the second half of our time together, we listened to this podcast and answered these questions (The Odyssey and Color Podcast).

Please remember:

1. Vocab.com needs to be complete and your 10 vocabulary sentences need to be submitted to Turnitin.com by midnight on Monday.
2. Your Hero’s Journey diagram is due on Tuesday.
3. You will have a vocabulary quiz on Tuesday.

Enjoy your weekend!

We began today with a discussion about Book 1 of the Odyssey; homework for tonight will be Books 2, 3, and 4 (which are abridged, so it’s not that much reading!) and the reading guide (2 – Books 2, 3, and 4  Books 2, 3, and 4 Reading Guide), which will be due tomorrow.

We also finished discussing our vocabulary words for the Odyssey List 1; you need to compose 10 sentences (each with a vocabulary word of your choice) and submit them to Turnitin.com by Monday at midnight. Please remember that you will have a quiz over that list on Tuesday!

Today we went over the most important points on the syllabus; please make sure to read this in its entirety, as you will have a pop quiz at some point on the class rules and procedures.

We worked on setting up your Turnitin.com and Vocabulary.com accounts; if you are still having trouble, please come see me during lunch on Thursday or Friday and I’ll help you get that resolved. Note that you must complete your Odyssey Vocab List 1 Vocab.com practice session by Monday at midnight (it is for a grade!).

We also went over the first half of that vocabulary list; we’ll finish the rest tomorrow.

Finally, homework for tonight was to read Book 1 of the Odyssey (1 – Book 1) and complete the reading guide (Book 1 Reading Guide). We will go over the reading guide tomorrow in class; please note that your answers need to be entirely your own.

1. Go to Turnitin.com and create an account. You must use your real first and last name, and it must be correctly capitalized.
2. Join the appropriate class.

Period 3 Class ID: 18900719

Period 4 Class ID: 18900789

Period 6 Class ID: 18900806

Period 7 Class ID: 18900839

Enrollment Key for All Classes: chapman

3. You should see your first assignment, which is a way for you to see how Turnitin.com’s plagiarism detection works. Search for your summer reading novel on the internet. Find some text about your book, copy it, and paste it into your submission. Then I’ll show you what I see when you have submitted something that is not your original work.

Welcome back!

Today in class, we will begin with a short video called “Everything You Need to Know to Read Homer’s Odyssey.”

Since the Odyssey is a sequel, we need to talk about what happened before, during the Trojan War, so we’ll do that with a bit of story time (The Odyssey Schema Guide).

For homework tonight, you should do two things:

1. Please be working on your Hero’s Journey Diagram for your fiction summer reading (due on Tuesday, September 4, and worth three grades!).
2. Please complete this self-reflection using the Hero’s Journey.

A few other important things to keep in mind:

1. Please make sure that you bring your charged laptop to class tomorrow (and every day from here on out).
2. We are having an extra credit movie (worth 10 points on your quiz on Monday) Friday, after school — it will be an edited version of Troy. This should be a great way to make new friends, learn some background for the Odyssey, earn some extra credit, and relax after a long week! 🙂 There will be drinks and snacks for sale, benefiting Cardinals Take Flight.
3. We will go over the syllabus later this week — I will give you a list of supplies before the weekend (but there’s nothing too strange or extravagant!).