Anti-social Writing Skills

Today we're starting to work on our dialogue skill. 

After watching this video try to use the anti-social skills to write a passage of dialogue into your novel. 

Happy Halloween!

Today is the last day before NaNoWriMo! I'm excited, are you?

Today we took time to get some ideas going. We worked on our story plans, and we watched a story starter by Bruce Coville, which you can find the video of here. If you want to work from this story you can cut and paste the text from here.

Have a great night tonight, and get ready for that clock to strike midnight and your story to get started!

Calling All (Near)-Future Novelists!

This week we'll be embarking on the epic adventure that is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). NaNoWriMo is a national movement of writers who attempt the arduous task of writing the rough draft of an ENTIRE NOVEL IN 30 DAYS!!!!!!!!

Luckily for you, our English class will devote the entire month of November to this task, and we will have tons of noveling time worked into our days! This will be an intense, but incredibly rewarding month. 

Today you have three assignments:

1. Visit the YWP website, set up an account and set a word count goal (use the word count calculator or the bands on our handout).
1. a. ONCE YOU CREATE AN ACCOUNT YOU WILL RECEIVE AN EMAIL WITH A ONE TIME ONLY PASSWORD. FOLLOW THIS LINK TO CHANGE YOUR PASSWORD.
2. Sign up your YWP username and word count goal on the class roster.
3. Use one of the story planning websites to generate some ideas for starting your novel (or Thursday at midnight if you're feeling motivated)!

• Circle plot map: http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/interactives/circle-plot/

•  Complete plot outline: http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/interactives/plot-diagram/

• Use this one to develop your protagonist, conflict, and setting: http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/interactives/storymap/

Plot Elements Video

This week we'll be building up our knowledge of one specific story element, plot. Plot is extremely important. Without it you don't have a story! Today we'll work on the parts of the plot.

We'll start with the Flocabulary video, then move on to applying the terms to a shared story, and finally start outlining the plot for our own Nanowrimo stories! It will be a busy week...

5 Narrative Elements Video

We have a quiz on the 5 basic narrative elements tomorrow.

Here's the video if you need a quick refresher:

Figurative Language Video

Today we're doing a vocabulary review of figurative language terms that we might encounter in poetry and fiction.

Here's a link to the Flocabulary video.

Tonight, be sure to finish any entries in your vocabulary flip books as well as read for 30 minutes.

Reading Reflection: It's Monday. What Are You Reading?

I just finished The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness.  This dystopian novel is set on a planet very similar to ours with one notable difference. Every man's inner thoughts, no matter how ugly, can be heard by everyone in their Noise. But when 13 year old Todd Hewett discovers a noiseless place and a noiseless person, a girl named Viola, they must run for their lives and to save their planet.

Frankly, I have never been so conflicted by a book. I really enjoyed this book, but I also hated it! As a concept I was intrigued by the idea of a land where everyone's thoughts are public knowledge. The Noise interested me, and I especially liked the parts where Todd was walking through towns and could hear everything. The words would appear as a giant jumble on the page which helped me really feel how chaotic Todd's world can be. I also really liked a few of the characters, though Todd was not necessarily one of them.

However, this book was too intense and far too violent for me. Some of the violence made sense, but in at least on scene it was gratuitous and very upsetting. The author created a lot of action, but sometimes he just kept piling on the bad stuff in a way that made it unbelievable. Overall, I am glad that I made it through this book, but I doubt I'll read the rest of the trilogy. I definitely think that there are some readers who will really love this book though. 

(Mazerunner fans,  I'm looking at you!)

What do you think? Does this sound like a book you'd enjoy? Do you have any questions about this book? Feel free to leave a comment below.

Reading Workshop and Book Share

Today we started sharing some of our favorite books and reading memories. All week long we will continue to share these stories.

Tomorrow we will have our first reading workshop. In addition to bringing your "special book" make sure you have a book for reading time as well.