8 Donlon WIR Blog Post

Last Friday, the 1:1 Movement came back to Correia to pick up the bags, get stats about all of the trash that we collected, and sort out all of our junk. We also took our second WIR Art of Communication quiz, focusing mainly on what we had learned about the different colonies in Colonial America. There were a couple of questions that had already been on previous quizzes that people were still getting incorrect. Our class also finished the travel brochure for the American Colonies, made using the 6 by 6 rule (six bullets consisting of six words max. each).

On Monday, the first thing we did was look at other people’s essays (okay, we roasted them). Some of them were funny to listen to, because they either did not make sense, or were very redundant. Mrs. Clark made sure that her point came across to the students by playing songs that corresponded to the content of their essays. Many people were frantically fixing little issues in their own essays to make sure that, if they got roasted, they would not be as bad as their previous peers.

On Tuesday, we came into class, and there was a warm-up waiting for us. It was two different political cartoons: “Unite or Die” and “Paying the Excise Man”. Our task was to analyze them by using SOAP, and then answered some separate questions. To use SOAP, you must identify the following: The Speaker, Occasion, Audience, and Purpose. After we were done with the warm-up, Mr. Snedden took us to an assembly where we were informed on the “Turkey Trot” and all of its details.

On Wednesday, our plastic bag assignment was due. Over the weekend, we were assigned to do interviews of two adults on their thoughts of plastic bags, two summaries of news articles on the City of San Diego and its thoughts on the banning of plastic bags, and annotating on two articles that were given to us on Friday. We discussed all of that at our tables in class. (We used the Socratic Seminar method). After this was completed, we were assigned to write a formal business letter to our district’s council member. For me, it was to “The Honorable Kevin Faulconer”. The letter contained our thoughts on the possible banning and how it would affect our day to day lives.

On Thursday, we had to go through seven steps of work before we could make hand turkeys to support the Turkey Trot. That was our bribe to get through the day. Unfortunately, as a class, we were very hectic and did not take the class time seriously, so we were not allowed to make the turkeys. If not all of the seven steps were finished, they were assigned as homework.