ELA Update

Welcome UVM Intern Mr. Callison and Narrative Writing Unit Wrap-Up

Hello, Sterling families and students, I am Mr. Callison!

I am an intern with Ms. Peterson in the ELA classroom for the rest of the year! Earlier in the year, I was an intern with Ms. Troxell, so I have been able to get to know the Sterling students and teachers very well already.

A little bit about myself, I grew up in Columbus, Ohio and am now a senior at UVM. I have been a member of the men’s ultimate frisbee team for all four years at UVM, and enjoy being active, playing sports, and being outside! I have worked as a bike technician for a camp program called iCan Bike, which is for individuals with disabilities, and have been lucky enough to be able to travel all over the country through that opportunity as a summer job.

I am looking forward to continuing to learn, and building relationships with all of the students on Sterling!

This week we are wrapping up our Narrative Writing Unit.  Students have worked on the five parts of Narrative Plot, including exposition, rising action, climax, falling action, and resolution.  In addition, students have used IXL, a Language Arts (and other curriculum) learning site, to work on comma skills instruction and practice.  The Learning Targets and Activity Checklist for this unit can be found here. Narrative Writing Learning Targets

Next week, we will be starting a three week unit on reading comprehension strategies.  We follow the outline of a program called "Notice and Note," which identifies signposts as strategies for close reading.  Close reading strategies help students identify and strengthen reading habits such as questioning, responding, analyzing, and engaging with text.  Our focus will be on strategies for fiction reading.  Throughout the unit students will be examining short pieces of fiction, and learning the different signposts that alert the reader to stop, ask questions, and better understand what they are reading.