"Who does that woman think she is?"

A couple of activities took center stage in class today, but all in all, a pretty chill Monday.

First of all, I came around to check students' HW. As I warned my classes on Friday, completing the annotations and filling out the outline were due for a grade.

Following a tour of students' desks, I invited classes to respond to (i.e., "vent about") Ruth Graham's main idea. Many, many criticisms were shared. Some were better than others:

• I-Can't-Believe-How-Good-This-Criticism-Is: 4th period: "She says Twilight is trash, but apparently loved Tuck Everlasting. Don't both books feature a romance complicated by immortality? Jeez, what's up with this? Doesn't seem fair. She could have been more clear about what makes Tuck Everlasting so great."
• Excellent Criticism: MaKayla's (2nd p) unflinching and focused remarks concerning the 2012 survey Graham cited. Specifically, alternate ways to interpret the survey results ("books purchased does not necessarily mean books read", "that age demographic has jobs, so of course they're buying books!", "what if these people are buying these books for their kids, or young family members?")
• Not-Excellent Criticism: Aidan (4th p) deciding to look up the author on his phone, creeping thoroughly through her online presence, and roasting her mercilessly. Amusing, to be sure, but ultimately unacceptable in an actual written TNReady Essay response.

Then, I gave students their scores back on last year's TCAP Writing Assessment, individually. This took a minute or two to accomplish. Students should bring this back to class tomorrow, for an analysis of the TNReady rubrics, in which we will ask (and answer) the great question: What do my scores mean?

HW:

• Bring TCAP writing scores back to class tomorrow.
• Do your Membean.
• Get Mythology (scroll down for handy links)