Welcome to working in Literature Circles

 

Baker (photo credit Bent)

Baker wants to welcome you to the Lit Circle Blog.  This is where you will be completing weekly assignments, in addition to working in and out of the classroom. 

This first day or two you will be:

Settling into your groups

Deciding on "jobs" - assigned weekly

Creating an uploadable calendar with reading assignments posted (this benefits both you and me). The calendars are to be uploaded to Google Classroom (only one person needs to upload the calendar)

Figuring out this "blog thing" we are doing

Settling back into being a student in school, post-vacation

Each week I will post your assignments HERE with directions on what I would like you to do.  YOU, in addition to working on the blog, will be reading, discussing, and working with your group in whatever capacity you are that week (discussion leader, real-world connector, or summarize.

Weekly Jobs and their Titles (rotate once a week):

• Discussion leader - collects questions from the group- runs the discussion. The discussion leader will publish the questions in his or her blog. This will be done once during the week. 
• Current event/alt connections - With the weekly reading, the current event person will connect the story with life/current events (something in the news). Find current events online and share links with group members (you will explain them). You will publish your findings in your blog. This will be done once during the week.
• Summarizer -  This person will verbally summarize the reading from each night and at the end of the week, he or she will write a short one to two-paragraph piece.  He or she will publish it in his or her blog. This is to be done at the end of the week.

Individual work each week:

• Reading questions (each night of reading - to be submitted to the discussion leader for the weekly discussion.)
•  Follow your reading schedule on the published calendar (see Google Classroom)
•  Four Blog entries and/or responses and two responses to others per week (this is in addition to a job you might have). TITLE EACH BLOG 
• Vocabulary Blog- identify 10 words per week that are unfamiliar to you (from the reading). Write the sentence, with the page number, highlighting the vocabulary word.  Find the correct definition of the word (we all know words have more than one definition) and write that definition. Then create an original sentence for that word making sure that it does make sense. Publish this work as VOCABULARY BLOG WEEK (you plug in the week number)
• Quote Blog - Choose one quote from the week's reading and copy it into your blog.  Remember to use MLA in-text citations, please.  Then analyze the importance of that quote to the story and to you. 
• Responses to others - For the third blog entry, you must respond to at least two other students.  These responses must be thoughtful and they must be in FULL sentences (yes more than two or three...think paragraph). What are you responding to? You can respond to their vocabulary choices, their quote, student response to my weekly post, or their responses if they had a job that week.  You must also keep track of who you responded to and the date you responded. You will need to cycle through the whole class at least once, if not twice (depending on the length of time for this unit.)  You will turn this in to me at the end of the Literature Circle Unit for credit.  
• Response to my weekly question or statement, posted on Mondays. - This will be in full sentences (not just one or two...think paragraph (mini) with connections, if appropriate, to the book you are reading. 

You will have time in and out of class for reading, discussions, and blog work.  I will sit with each group once a week for a discussion.  You will need to have your discussion days posted on your calendar so that I may choose who to "drop in" on each week.