Students will be able…rock the PSAT.
While my kiddos rocked/were rocked by the PSAT all morning, I hung out with 21 froshies who I think concluded that I was rather odd. I had grand plans to play murder and pictionary with them when we needed breaks, but it turns out breaks were unnecessary. They successfully made it through our little four hour writing “camp” aimed to increase their test scores and I think – I hope – gained something from it. I think they decided I was okay when I explained the meaning of the word “impede” (as in, “don’t let bad grammar impede the effectiveness of your writing”). I know they’ve been doing a lot with Greek roots in class so they recognized that it had something to do with “foot” but weren’t sure how…I described bad grammar being like a roundhouse kick to your high writing score. And then I performed my best roundhouse kick. I think I earned their approval for a 4 hour freshman writing camp. I know some of them gave a positive report to my sophomores who reported back to me. It’s nice having informers floating around the school.
Despite being totally mentally exhausted, my last two periods of the day worked quietly and well on their rough drafts of the research paper. Several students finished them so I could read them tonight, and while obviously my better writers finished sooner, they are not too bad. Low on in-text citations but that’s an easy fix. It’s nice to have a good day after a few rather exhausted, less encouraging ones. I’m not sure what these guys will do tomorrow or the day after while everyone else finishes. I might just bring in my copies of the local newspapers and have them read election coverage. Or do the revising and editing practice packets the freshmen worked on today. Or something they won’t want to do, but I can’t have them veg out for two days straight. Maybe I can send them to the library for a real book to read?
Leave a Reply