+Agenda
Take Roll
Activity 1: Read Chapter 8 of A Distance Between Us.
Free write
Pairs Discussion
Pre-thinking for Activity 2
Activity 2: Read “First, Help Today’s Struggling Youth.”
Drafting an Author’s Thesis or Controlling Idea
Mapping an Article
Activity 3: In-class writing: using words from class
Homework and End Class
+Five Minute Free write!
In your opinion, what does the building of the house on Abuela Evila’s property represent for the family? Is it a vision for their future or a “foolish dream?”
+Think
Take a minute to first silently and independently think about your own answer to the question
Now, take a moment to think and write about how this material relates to your own life.
+Pair and Share
Pair: Partner with a person sitting near you
Share: Turn and face your partner so you can discuss your answers face-to-face—or, so you can share your reflections.
Explain clearly to your partner your own answer to the question.
Listen carefully to your partner’s answer, and pay attention to similarities and differences in your answers.
Ask your partner to explain more if you don’t understand or agree with his or her answer.
+Discussion
What does the building of the house on Abuela Evila’s property represent for the family? Is it a vision for their future or a “foolish dream?”
Why do you think so?
Connections: How can you connect this text to your own life?
You
+Discuss this question for one minute
with your partner
There is a growing consensusthat it is harder to move up the economic ladder in the United States than in many other places, like Canada. Should more Americans
consider leaving the U.S. to get ahead?
Or can the U.S. make changes to be more of a “land of opportunity”?
+Discussion
Should more Americans consider leaving the U.S. to get ahead?
Or can the U.S. make changes to be more of a “land of opportunity”?
You
+Read Aloud: “First, Help Today’s
Struggling Youth”
• Everybody
reads
• Start with the
tallest and
move to the
shortest!
+Work in Groups
Find the thesis of this essay
Use the template that is on page 20 of your student packet.
+Template for Drafting an Author’s Thesis or Controlling Idea
In “____________________________________________________________________,”
(article title)
the author, ,
argues, disputes, contends, maintains, claims, makes a case, reports, reasons, says, writes, finds, realizes, discovers, determines, notices, ascertains, discerns, finds
(circle one)
that _____________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
____________________________________________________
(thesis)
Research tells us that only 2 percent of individuals who finish high school, work
full time, and have stable families before having children end up poor, while 72
percent of individuals who do none of these things end up poor.
If we care about equality of opportunity, we should invest in proven programs
that keep young people in school and out of prison.
Yet every year in America more than 1 million youth drop out of high
school, crippling their chance at the American dream. Nearly one in six 16- to
24-year-olds is disconnected from the two structures that offer hope for their
future – school and work. Promoting opportunity means opening multiple
pathways for young people to connect to education, job training, employment
and community service.
John M. Bridgeland, a former director of the White House Domestic Policy Council, is president and C.E.O. of the public policy firm Civic Enterprises. He wrote about the Opportunity Nation initiative in November.
+Mapping an Article
Still in your groups, use agraphic organizer to make a map to show the thesis statement and how three major points support it.
+Discussion
What is the topic of this
essay?
What is the thesis statement?
What are three main points
the author makes to support
his thesis?
You
+Generate a paragraph (topic of your choice) using
10 of our class words:
Cacophony, serendipity, mundane, ruminate, implacabl
e, poignant, foraging, voracious, staccato, anecdotes, u
biquity, prose, decoder, ideogram, terse, aphorism, rhet
oric, malleable, impoverished, terabyte, algorithms, uti
litarian, sedition, prescient, doomsayers, myriad, skept
icism, digital native, digital
etiquette, conundrum, irksome
+Story Starters
1. The harder she scratched away at her forearm the quicker the flesh fell away. From outside the containment unit, Dr. Elena Miles and Dr. Mark Rustenburg watched on dismay as the...
2. I sat in the taxi fidgeting with my clothes and thinking I'd rather be at home in my flannel pajamas instead of going to...
3. I really wanted to see you again," said Rebecca. She repeatedly twirled a strand of her long auburn hair tightly around her right forefinger until the tip blushed then released it. "I was afraid you didn't want to see me because of…
4. He was lying face down on the raft. At first we thought he was sleeping with his head using the inflated side as a pillow and one hand hanging over grazing the water's edge but then the...
5. It’s hard to describe the sound of ripping fleshing. Even more difficult is the sound the flesh makes when a vampire makes first bite.
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