Writing Unit

1. Writing Unit

2. Why Write? • Why is it important to know how to write well? • What are the benefits of good writing? • What are the consequences of bad writing?

3. Talk Show • If you could be on televison, the radio, a talk show, etc. and voice your opinion, would you? Why or why not? • How can this apply to writing?

4. Attention! • How do you capture someone’s attention? How do you keep their attention? • How can you convince someone of your position in writing?

5. Case Building • How do you convince your parents or guardians to let you do something or let you have something? What works? What definitely does not work? • How can you build your case in an essay?

6. Lasting Impression • How do people make a lasting impression on you? What can you do to make a lasting impression on someone else? • How can you make your writing make a « lasting impression »?

7. Distracting Behaviors • What are annoying or distracting behaviors that make you avoid people or impact your ability to listen to what they are saying? • What are some distracting behaviors in writing?

8. Visual Appeal • What makes an outfit look good? Be specific. • OR • What makes a car/truck look good? Be specific. • What makes writing look good?

9. True Writing • Ernest Hemingway said, « Good Writing is True Writing… » • What does this mean? Do you agree or disagree?

10. My Writing • What is your greatest strength in writing? • What is your greatest weakness? • Specifically, how can you improve your writing?

11. Soul Writing • « Writing is the soul on paper… » • Do you agree with this quote? Why or why not?

12. Make a FAT-P for this prompt and jot down observations, readings, and examples that you could use. • Write a speech for rising freshman on the meaning of perseverance. • “Perseverance is failing nineteen times and succeeding the twentieth” Julie Andrews • “Life is not easy for any of us. But what of that? We must have perseverance and above all confidence in ourselves. We must believe that we are gifted for something, and that this thing, at whatever cost, must be attained” Marie Curie • “Perseverance is not a long race; it is many short races one after the other.” Walter Elliot • “Perseverance is the hard work you do after you get tired of doing the hard work you already did.” Newt Gingrich • “Just remember, you can do anything you set your mind to, but it takes actions, perseverance, and facing your fears.” Gillian Anderson • Using the information presented, your experiences, observations, and/or readings, write a speech for rising freshman on the meaning of perseverance.

13. Synonyms for Common Writing • Look at your Synonyms for Common Writing Handout. Find 5 words out of the list that you often use. Circle/highlight 3 of the synonyms you could use in place of the common word. Record information on Global introduction sheet.

14. Cause and Effect Event = Student fails a course for the 9 week period What are possible causes for this event? What are possible effects?

15. Cause and Effect Event = Student has a minor car wreck What are possible causes for this event? What are possible effects?

16. Powerful Verbs Look at your 100+ Power Verbs Handout. Find and highlight/circle 5 words that appeal to you. Create a sentence using each word.

17. Make a FAT-P for this prompt and jot down observations, readings, and examples that you could use. Write a speech to present to your school board in which you examine the causes behind academic cheating at the high school level. • Recently the Educational Testing Service published an advertisement titled, “Cheating is a Personal Foul.” The following information was presented in the advertisement.Academic Cheating Fact Sheet· • Academic cheating is defined as representing someone else's work as your own. It can take many forms, including sharing another's work, purchasing a term paper or test questions in advance, paying another to do the work for you. · • Statistics show that cheating among high school students has risen dramatically during the past 50 years. • In the past it was the struggling student who was more likely to cheat just to get by. Today it is also the above-average college bound students who are cheating. • Grades, rather than education, have become the major focus of many students. • Math and Science are the courses in which cheating most often occurs. · Computers can make cheating easier than ever before. For example, students can download term papers from the world wide web. · • According to the 1998 poll of Who's Who Among American High School Students, 80% of the country's best students cheated to get to the top of their class. More than half the students surveyed said they don't think cheating is a big deal – and most did not get caught. ·

18. Make a FAT-P for this prompt and jot down observations, readings, and examples that you could use. Read the following quotations: • “Artistic creativity is a whirlpool of imagination that swirls in the depths of the mind.”-Anonymous • “Art does not reproduce what we see; it makes us see.” –Klee • “Do not quench your inspiration and your imagination; do not become the slave of your model.” –Vincent van Gogh • “We are told never to cross a bridge until we come to it, but this world is owned by men who have ‘crossed bridges’ in their imagination far ahead of the crowd.” –Anonymous • “The man who has no imagination has no wings.” –Muhammad Ali • “The process of imagining, or of forming mental images or concepts of what is not actually present.”- Webster’s Using the opinions presented in the quotations above, as well as your own experiences, observations and/or readings, write a college application essay to an art school in which you discuss the definition of imagination.

19. Make a FAT-P for this prompt and jot down observations, readings, and examples that you could use. Read the following quotations: • “I know how men in exile feed on dreams of hope.” –Aeschylus • “Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: You don’t give up.” –Anne Lamott • “While there’s life, there’s hope.” -Cicero“Never deprive someone of hope; it might be all they have.” –H. Jackson Brown Jr. • “Young people have an almost biological destiny to be hopeful.” –Marshall Ganz • “Hope is necessary in every condition.” –Samuel Johnson Using the opinions presented in the quotations above, as well as your own experiences, observations and/or readings, write a letter to senior citizens in which you discuss the definition of hope.

20. Powerful Verbs Look at your 100+ Power Verbs Handout. Find and highlight/circle 5 words that appeal to you. Create a sentence using each word.

21. Create a FAT-P for this prompt and list any observations, readings, and/or experiences that you could use Read the following quotations: • “Where there is love, there is pain” –Spanish Proverb • “Love is patient, Love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking. It is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.” -1st Corinthians 13:4-8 The Bible • “All love that has not friendship for its base, it like a mansion built upon the sand.” –Ella Wheeler Wilcox • “Love is everything it’s cracked up to be…It really is worth fighting for, being brave for, risking everything for.” -Erica Jong • Using the opinions presented in the quotations above, as well as your own experiences, observations and/or readings, write a Valentine’s Day editorial to a magazine or newspaper in which you discuss the definition of love.

22. Make a FAT-P for this prompt and jot down observations, readings, and examples that you could use. On August 20th, 1999, CNN published an article titled, “Television’s Effects on Kids: It can be harmful,” by Daphne Miller. • The article stated that the “average child in the United States spends about 25 hours a week in front of the television (including the use of VCR), according to the latest annual Media in the Home survey, conducted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center-a number significantly exceeding the maximum limit suggested by the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP).” • “Over the past several decades a number of studies have shown that there are several ways that television can be harmful to the mental and physical health of children. That’s not to say that all television is bad for kids. In fact, a number of quality children’s shows…engage kids in positive ways. However, when children watch television frequently and indiscriminately, the effects can be detrimental.” • For example:“The Media in the Home survey found that 28 percent of all children’s shows contained four or more incidents of violence per show-a number that media experts consider high.” • “There appears to be a strong relationship between time spent in front of the television and being overweight.”“TV watching (especially late-night and violent shows) has been connected with poor sleep patterns in children.” • Using the information presented, your experiences, observations, and/or readings, write a speech to present to your community’s elementary and middle school Parent/Guardian Associations in which you examine the harmful effects of children watching too much television.

23. Make a FAT-P for this prompt and jot down observations, readings, and examples that you could use. Read the following quotations: • “Opinions founded on prejudice are always sustained with the greatest of violence.”-Francis Jeffrey • “Prejudice is the child of ignorance.” –Hazlitt • “There are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, “When will you be satisfied?” We can never be satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro’s basic mobility is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a mighty stream.” –from “I Have a Dream” by Martin Luther King, Jr. • “Like an unchecked cancer, hate corrodes the personality and eats away its vital unity. Hate destroys a man’s sense of values and his objectivity. It causes him to describe the beautiful as ugly and the ugly as beautiful, and to confuse the true with the false and the false with the true.” Martin Luther King, Jr. • “Prejudice-Irrational suspicion or hatred of a particular group, race, or religion.” –American Heritage Dictionary Using the opinions presented in the quotations above, as well as your own experiences, observations and/or readings, write an editorial to your local newspaper in which you discuss the meaning of the word prejudice.

24. Powerful Verbs Look at your 100+ Power Verbs Handout. Find and highlight/circle 5 words that appeal to you. Create a sentence using each word.

25. Make a FAT-P for this prompt and jot down observations, readings, and examples that you could use. Read the following information: The excerpts listed below originally appeared in a 2000 article published by Focus Adolescent Services titled “Youth Who Drop Out: One-Third of Those Who Enter High Schools Don’t Graduate.” • More than half the students who drop out leave by the tenth grade, 20% quit by the eighth grade, and 3% drop out by the fourth grade. • Nearly 25% changed schools two or more times, with some changing for disciplinary reasons. • Almost 20% were held back a grade, and almost half failed a course. • Almost one-half missed at least 10 days of school, one-third cut class at least 10 times, and one-quarter were late at least 10 times. • 8% spent time in a juvenile home or shelter • One-third were put on in-school suspension, suspended, or put on probation, and more than 15% were expelled. • 12% of dropouts ran away from home • Reasons Why Youth Drop Out • Didn’t like school in general or the school they were attending. • Were failing, getting poor grades, or couldn’t keep up with school work. • Didn’t get along with teachers and/or students. • Had disciplinary problems, were suspended, or expelled. • Didn’t feel safe in school • Got a job, had a family to support, or had trouble managing both school and work. • Got married, got pregnant, or became a parent. • Had a drug or alcohol problem Using the information presented, your experiences, observations, and/or readings, write a speech to present to your classmates in which you examine the causes, influences, and reasons behind why high school students drop-out.

26. Powerful Verbs Look at your 100+ Power Verbs Handout. Find and highlight/circle 5 words that appeal to you. Create a sentence using each word.

27. Support and Elaboration Statement: The administration has the right to examine the contents of a student’s cell phone. Agree or Disagree and Give Specific Reasons/Support for your Position!

28. Support and Elaboration Statement: Schools need to have a dress code to create a healthy learning environment. Agree or Disagree and Give Specific Reasons/Support for your Position!

29. Support and Elaboration Statement:The Legal Dropout Rate should be raised to 18. Agree or Disagree and Give Specific Reasons/Support for your Position!

30. Support and Elaboration Statement:Texting while driving should result in a $500 fine. Agree or Disagree and Give Specific Reasons/Support for your Position!

31. Support and Elaboration Statement:End of Course Tests (EOCs) should be eliminated. Agree or Disagree and Give Specific Reasons/Support for your Position!

32. Support and Elaboration Statement:Student Athletes should be tested for Drugs Agree or Disagree and Give Specific Reasons/Support for your Position!

33. Support and Elaboration Statement: The Supernatural (ghosts, aliens, angels, etc.) exists. Agree or Disagree and Give Specific Reasons/Support for your Position!