9th Grade Lit and Comp AND 10th Grade World Lit: Friday, April 24, 2020

Good morning!

Harry and the rest of the first years have just arrived at Hogwarts. As Hagrid leads the way to the magical castle, the new students are brimming with excitement and nerves over the house they will be sorted into for the next seven years of their lives while they are in school at Hogwarts.

Today, as you read Chapter 7, we're going to see some of the emotions Harry is feeling and the thoughts that are going through his mind during the Sorting Ceremony. As you read, you're going to return back to the Reader Response lens from last week and think about how you would feel in the same situation.

TO DO FOR FRIDAY, APRIL 24:

1. Read Chapter 7
• This is a link to the ebook
• This is a link to the audiobook (you do not need an account to listen)
• Note: The audiobook is for the British version of the book, so the title is different and some words might be different if you are following along on the PDF. However, Stephen Fry (the narrator) is an amazing reader, and I highly recommend listening to the audiobook.
2. Complete the Reader Response Lens Form for Chapter 7
• Read the chapter slowly and deliberately and think about the questions above while reading.
• You will need to log into your Office365 account in order to complete the form. Email me or send me a Remind if you have problems logging in. (This seemed to work for people yesterday.)

As always, I am available via email and through Remind. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need me. 😊

9th Grade Lit and Comp AND 10th Grade World Lit: Thursday, April 23, 2020

Good morning!

In Tuesday's chapter, Harry got his supplies for school, and in today's chapter, he's on his way to his brand new school, Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry! As he gets ready to board the Hogwarts Express, Harry is crossing over the threshold from what he knows to a world completely new and unknown to him just like Odysseus in The Odyssey (for my 9th graders) and Gilgamesh and Beowulf (for my 10th graders), so it's about time that he starts meeting some friends (or sidekicks) who are going to help him through his journey.

Today, we're going to continue working on the Psychological lens for Chapter 6 to gain a deeper insight and understanding into the characters and their personalities. (More information about the Psychological Lens is on yesterday's blog post if you missed it.)

TO DO FOR THURSDAY, APRIL 23:

1. Read Chapter 6
• This is a link to the ebook
• This is a link to the audiobook (you do not need an account to listen)
• Note: The audiobook is for the British version of the book, so the title is different and some words might be different if you are following along on the PDF. However, Stephen Fry (the narrator) is an amazing reader, and I highly recommend listening to the audiobook.
2. Complete the Psychological Lens Form for Chapter 6
• Read the chapter slowly and deliberately and think about the questions above while reading.
• You will need to log into your Office365 account in order to complete the form. Email me or send me a Remind if you have problems logging in. (This seemed to work for people yesterday.)

As always, I am available via email and through Remind. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need me. 😊

9th Grade Lit and Comp AND 10th Grade World Lit: Tuesday, April 21, 2020

Good morning!

As a reminder, my internet provider is working on updating their network today, and I might have trouble connecting to the internet today. I will respond to emails and Reminds as soon as I can, but please remember that I do not respond to emails after 4 PM.

In our chapter from yesterday, Harry finally got his letter and one of the biggest surprises. Today, he's going to get an even bigger surprise by stepping into the Wizarding World for the first time. We're going to continue working on the Psychological lens, but for Chapter 5, we're going to zoom in on Harry to try to get a better understanding of what he's feeling about and how he's reacting to all of the new things around him. (More information about the Psychological Lens is on yesterday's blog post if you missed it.)

TO DO FOR TUESDAY, APRIL 21:

1. Read Chapter 5
• This is a link to the ebook
• This is a link to the audiobook (you do not need an account to listen)
• Note: The audiobook is for the British version of the book, so the title is different and some words might be different if you are following along on the PDF. However, Stephen Fry (the narrator) is an amazing reader, and I highly recommend listening to the audiobook.
2. Complete the Psychological Lens Form for Chapter 5
• Read the chapter slowly and deliberately and think about the questions above while reading.
• You will need to log into your Office365 account in order to complete the form. Email me or send me a Remind if you have problems logging in. (This seemed to work for people yesterday.)

As always, I am available via email and through Remind. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need me. 😊

9th Grade Lit and Comp AND 10th Grade World Lit: Monday, April 20, 2020

Good morning!

Last week, as you began reading Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, you learned a little about the characters and began making connections to them, but we're left with some questions: Who keeps sending all these letters to Harry? Why do they want to contact him so badly? What do these letters say? Why are the Dursleys reacting to the letters in this way? And, maybe most importantly, who the heck is knocking at the door?!

Well... today, we're going to start getting the answers to some of those questions. We're also going to learn about our next literary lens that we'll be using while reading the next few chapters: the Psychological lens.

With the Reader Response lens we used last week, we made connections with characters and/or events in the chapters and saw how our lives related to what was going on in the novel. With the Psychological lens, we're going to take a step back from making connections and relating to characters/events and take a close look at the emotions that characters are feeling throughout the chapter.

TO DO FOR MONDAY, APRIL 20:

1. Read Chapter 4
• This is a link to the ebook
• This is a link to the audiobook (you do not need an account to listen)
• Note: The audiobook is for the British version of the book, so the title is different and some words might be different if you are following along on the PDF. However, Stephen Fry (the narrator) is an amazing reader, and I highly recommend listening to the audiobook.
2. Complete the Psychological Lens Form for Chapter 4
• Read the chapter slowly and deliberately and think about the questions above while reading.
• You will need to log into your Office365 account in order to complete the form. Email me or send me a Remind if you have problems logging in. (This seemed to work for people yesterday.)

As always, I am available via email and through Remind. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need me. 😊

Finally, I would like to apologize for not replying back to emails on Friday. The internet was out at my house for most of the day and did not come back until late in the evening. I will be replying back to emails in the order that I received them while also trying to get a few more assignments from before Spring Break added into the gradebook. As a heads-up, I was notified that my internet provider is going to be working on network updates during the day again on Tuesday. A blog post is still scheduled to go live tomorrow morning, but I might not have access to the internet throughout the day again on Tuesday. I just wanted to let y'all know just in case I am unable to respond back right away. :)

9th Grade Lit and Comp AND 10th Grade World Lit: Friday, April 17, 2020

Happy Friday!

Since today is Friday, I'm not going to introduce a new literary lens for the chapters I am asking you to read today. In the next two chapters of the novel, the exposition is continuing to build as we learn more about the baby that was left on the Dursleys' doorstep. We are going to continue looking at Chapter 2 and Chapter 3 through the Reader Response lens because the personal connections that we make with the text right now are going to help us think more critically about later chapters and, hopefully, they will also add to our enjoyment of this story as we continue reading! (More information about the Readers Response Lens is on yesterday's blog post if you missed it.)

TO DO FOR FRIDAY, APRIL 17:

1. Read Chapter 2 and Chapter 3
• This is a link to the ebook
• This is a link to the audiobook (you do not need an account to listen)
• Note: The audiobook is for the British version of the book, so the title is different and some words might be different if you are following along on the PDF. However, Stephen Fry (the narrator) is an amazing reader, and I highly recommend listening to the audiobook.
2. Complete the Reader Response Form for Chapters 2 and 3
• Read the chapter slowly and deliberately and think about the questions above & your reaction and connection to the work.
• You will need to log into your Office365 account in order to complete the form. Email me or send me a Remind if you have problems logging in. (This seemed to work for people yesterday.)

As always, I am available via email and through Remind. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need me. 😊

9th Grade Lit and Comp AND 10th Grade World Lit: Thursday, April 16, 2020

Good morning!

Today we are going to be entering into the world of Harry Potter through a quiet little road called Privet Drive. As we read, we're going to be looking at the novel from different perspectives through things called "literary lenses" to guide us through our critical reading of the text.

In the video from Monday, John Green discussed Critical Reading, and the next few images build on that idea and set up how we're going to approach our novel study for Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.

If this sounds complicated, I promise it's not! Basically: we're just going to take a look some different ways to read. The first lens that we're going to be pulling out of our toolbox is the reader response lens. This lens, like many of the other lenses, has a pretty simple definition.

TO DO FOR THURSDAY, APRIL 16:

1. Read Chapter 1
• This is a link to the ebook
• This is a link to the audiobook (you do not need an account to listen)
• Note: The audiobook is for the British version of the book, so the title is different and some words might be different if you are following along on the PDF. However, Stephen Fry (the narrator) is an amazing reader, and I highly recommend listening to the audiobook.
2. Complete the Reader Response Form for Chapter 1
• Read the chapter slowly and deliberately and think about the questions above & your reaction and connection to the work.
• You will need to log into your Office365 account in order to complete the form. Email me or send me a Remind if you have problems logging in. (I'm crossing my fingers and hoping that this will work the way I want it to. 🤞🤞)

Finally, I wanted to share an update on grades. I added some assignments to the gradebook over the past few days. Here are the assignments I've graded and the ones that are still on my to do list. I'm hoping to have all of the assignments from before Spring Break in the gradebook by next week Wednesday, but thank you again for your patience!

As always, I am available via email and through Remind. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need me. 😊

9th Grade Lit and Comp AND 10th Grade World Lit: Tuesday, April 14, 2020

Good morning!

It was so good to hear from everyone who filled out the form yesterday, and I was excited to see the breakdown of everyone's experience with Harry Potter. As you can see from the graph below, we're split about half way between people who have read some of the Harry Potter books and people who have not read them. Whether you're rereading the book again for the billionth time or picking it up for the first, I am so excited to share this adventure with you all!

We will begin reading the novel on Thursday (remember: I will not be posting anything on the blog tomorrow), but today we're going to do an intro activity to set the stage, which reminds me... some owls delivered this to my house over Spring Break 😉:

TO DO FOR TUESDAY, APRIL 14:

1. Complete the Pre-Reading Stations on this form. There are 4 stations and each station should take you 5-10 minutes to complete. Make sure you read the prompts and write your answers in complete sentences!

As always, I am available via email and through Remind. Please do not hesitate to reach out if you need me. 😊