A Lesson Before Dying

Students will begin reading A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest J. Gaines. I highly recommend if you have the means to get your own personal copy. This is for annotation purposes. If you can not get your own copy, I can check one out to you, and you may use sticky notes for annotations. Amazon has several used copies for reduced prices. We will begin reading in the next few weeks!!

College Board & The ACT

Most, if not all, of the Pre-AP sophomores in my English classes should be registered with College Board. Signing up will benefit you because, after you take the PSAT, you'll begin to receive PSAT help that is tailored specifically for your needs.

You will need an email account to register. If you do not have an email account, please see me and I'll set you up one with Gaggle.

All sophomores will be taking the ACT through the school this year. We will do that on Tuesday, October 19th. The school will register all students. For ACT question of the day and more information about the test visit www.actstudent.org .  Students will be registering with this site eventually, so if you'd like to go ahead and do that, you'd be ahead of the game.

Join Twitter

In order to take part in this class's Easter eggs (a.k.a. extra credit opportunities), you must sign up for Twitter.

Pre-AP: follow the bibliomaniacs.

General: follow the jones_scholars.

First Assignment

Your first assignment of the year is to sign and turn in the parent acknowledgment form found in your syllabus. It is due for a daily grade Tuesday, August 25th. (That's tomorrow!!)

Extra credit:

For +10 points added to this grade –

• Have your parent or guardian email me with his or her contact information.  They need to make sure they put your name and class period in the subject line.  This can be a chance for him or her to directly communicate any questions or concerns to me, especially regarding the technology component of my class.  If neither parent has an email address, then one or both can access any one of various websites to create a free account. (yahoo.com; google.com; etc.)  Sterling Municipal Library allows the public to use computers and have Internet access for free.  I will reply to verify that I received it.  If I do not reply within a few days, then let me know because I probably did not get it.  It may have gone into the spam folder and I’ll have to retrieve it.

For +5 points added to this grade –

·         Comment on this post and tell me if you are in any clubs, if you plan on trying to find a club to join, if you participate in extra-curricular activities, and whether or not you have a part-time job.  You also need to tell me about any questions or concerns you have, particularly concerning the technology component of my class.  You must become a follower of this blog to complete this task. All students will be followers eventually, so this is a good way to get ahead.