Department Meeting Thursday AM

This Thursday morning we will be having a department meeting in the library at 7:40 am.

I hope to accomplish the following:

1. Create a subcommittee to design the marathon of reading portion of our program. This group would have two weeks to come up with a larger organizational program to help reward kids who want to read beyond the one book requirement.
2. Figure out what we're going to do about the choices students have for the mandatory book. Are we limiting choices? Are going to insert a public domain book? What are we going to do?

If you have any other concerns or ideas, throw them in the comments section and we'll talk Thursday.

Cheap Magazines

The other day, Brian showed me Slickdeals, a site where contributors report on good deals around the internet. Anyway, today you can pick up a year subscription of ESPN Magazine or Outside for $3, or US Weekly for $5. I picked up Outside because of my intense longing to grow a beard (something bushy), wear flannel and go rafting, but I also think that a kid or two might pick it up once in a while. In retrospect, ESPN may have been the better choice, but oh well. Anyhoo, pick up some indy reading material for cheap.

(On a side note, I also picked up a sweet English teacher shirt from SWoot.)

Practice Vocabulary and Feed the Hungry

Hello McKinley High School English teachers! I just discovered a wonderful website that I would like to share with you all. It is called freerice.com and it is set up as a vocabulary game that provides rice to the United Nations World Food Program at every correct answer. Here are the directions for how to play:


Click on the answer that best defines the word.
If you get it right, you get a harder word. If wrong, you get an easier word.
For each word you get right, we donate 20 grains of rice to the United Nations World Food Program.
WARNING: This game may make you smarter. It may improve your speaking, writing, thinking, grades, job performance... (more)

This looks like a fantastic website that provides its users with practice decoding and defining difficult vocabulary words as well as an opportunity to help others in need. Perhaps someone could use this in their classes! I'm really excited by this website - it must be inspiration from the vocabulary seminar I attended last Wednesday...
- Kate

Tomorrow's Professional Development Opportunities

Just a reminder, tomorrow we are to report to Hutch Tech for training. Mrs. Morrell put notification in our mailboxes, and individual assignments were given to teachers that missed any of the CORE training sessions (phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension). I'm not sure what the rest of us are doing. See you there. Additional parking is available at Herman Badillo.