Welcome students and parents to my Schoolnotes.com page. You can use this website to access information about Freshman Seminar.

September 23rd: Meet Mrs. Brautman, review class expectations and then continue speech unit. Students will go to the Media Center to help them research a topic for their speech. Students will have a topic chosen, approved and research for tomorrow.

September 24th: Teacher gave notes on how to record information on bibliographic sources. Students worked on their outline for their speeches. Students read "I Have A Dream" aloud in class.

September 25th: Vocabulary Quiz on speech terms. Quiz was graded in class. Students listened to Dr Martin Luther King's Speech-"I Have A Dream". Students then began working on the discussion questions on Dr. King's speech-they will finish them at home if they didn't finish them in class.

September 28th: No School-Teacher Planning day

September 29th: Students worked in the computer lab to continue finding sources to back up their facts in their speeches. Students completed the outline worksheet.

September 30th: Students watched good and bad videos so they can learn how to deliver an effective speech. Students then worked in small groups to create lists of descriptive words and transitions. After they created their lists students worked on writing their speeches.

Oct. 1st: Students worked in the computer lab to perfect and type up their final copy of their speech.

Oct. 2nd: Students presented their speeches to the class individually while their classmates watched and wrote positive remarks down on a critique sheet. Students also received an interim to be signed and returned on Monday.

Oct. 5th: Students finished presenting their speeches to the class and then put together the following assignments to be turned in and graded: Speech Assignment Paper, Persuasion Worksheet/Sources, Rough Draft, Final Copy, Speech Critique. All of these assignments plus their presentation can total up to 100 points. We then started our next unit -The World Around Us by going over 10 new vocabulary words.**Please bring in newspapers for this unit.

October 6th: After the warm up, students were divided up into small groups and were given a specific article. Students answered 7 questions about their article such as what section of the newspaper it should be in, impact, importance and opinion, and 3 new vocabulary words to define.

October 7th: After the warmupand discussion of what is happening in the news, students presented their article to the class. From each presentation, students recorded the title of article, the category or section of the news it belongs to and why it's news or it's importance/impact.

Oct 8th: After the warmup, students finished their current event presentations and turned in their write ups of each presentation. Then we discussed advertising and watched a short 6 minute animated video clip of ways advertisers try to manipulate their target audience. Students were then asked to work with a partner or individually on an advertisement for a fictitious product using those manipulating tools. They can bring in art supplies for tomorrow.

Oct 9th: Students filled in the last warm up today on their worksheet and turned it in for the last two weeks. Then they reviewed their words and took a vocabulary quiz. After the quiz, the students worked individually or in pairs to design an advertisement using the manipulating tools that we discussed yesterday. Their final copy is due by Monday.

Oct. 10th: Students completed their advertisements and volunteers presented their advertisement to the class. Students had to discuss their target audience and how they were targeting them. Then periods 1 & 2 students copied down states, capitals and abbreviations. Quiz will be on Friday. Period 4 worked in small groups to create an alphabetical list of the states and their capitals-due tomorrow. Here is a link for the guidelines and examples for projects due next Monday:http://www.a66mitchell.com/class/communication/samples.htm 

also here is a link for writing a bibliography: http://teenlink.nypl.org/bibliography.html 

Some good sources for information:http://www.50states.com/tools/

October 23rd: Students worked on completing their state's projects in class. Student worked on their posters, books etc. State's projects are due on Monday. If students are doing a power point and don't have a flash drive -they must email it to me by Monday morning. wbrautman@wcpss.net

October 26th:  Students turned in and presented their state's projects to the class.

October 27th-Begin study skills unit.  Students watched a short video on study skills including: organizational skills, time management skills, active listening skills, note taking skills,and  test taking skills. Students then filled in  a time management handout and estimated the time it takes them to do things throughout the day. Homework: Find out the actual times it takes you to do things throughout the day.

October 28th- Students reviewed the actual times it took them to do their daily tasks and discussed ways to improve their time management skills. Students then cleaned out their book bags and organized their school things. We discussed using an all purpose folder and an agenda for writing down their assignments and responsibilities. Homework: Find out the actual times it takes you to do things on Day 2 of the handout.

October 29th: Periods 1 and 2 met with the Career Coordinator in the computer lab and analyzed their skills and interests which allowed them to see careers that they might be interested in pursuing. Students filled in a handout about the 3 careers that interested them. Period 4: Continued with time management skills and Day 3 of the handout. Students then participated in DEAR time and wrote a short summary of what they read.

October 30th: No School-Teacher Work day

Nov 2nd: Students learned what a resume is and the purpose of having one. Students then worked on compiling a list of their qualities and abilities to be used in making their resume by answering questions in groups about their daily activities what others tink about them.

Nov 3rd: Students went to computer lab to research their career and to collect information for their display board that they're going to work on in class tomorrow. Students used their rubric so they knew what information was necessary to find.