-Rivendell Academy-
Survival Summer
Language Arts
Follow along with our class reading and our work with the Writer's Express program.
Day01
Jumping Off
Students will create a writing sample. This piece will be compared with their final writing sample at the end of the month. Students are expected to show growth in focus, showing details, strong verbs, sensory details, and various grammar skills.
Students view two videos introducing the Hollocaust and WWII in preparation for our class reading of "Night" by Elie Wiesel.
Day02
Day03
Day04
Day05
Day06
Day07
Day08
Focus
Students examine the importance of focus in writing. Their writing zooms in on one specific moment in time. Revisions are made to day one writing.
Skill Builders
Students work on correcting sentence fragments and run on sentences.
The class reads Elie Wiesel's "Night".
First Blog
The class begins by reading "Night" and follows along as the Eliezer and the Jews of his town are evacuated into Ghettos.
Students create their first blog post focusing on their time in the woods. Writing should show an improvement in run on sentences and fragments.
Students explore Google Drive as a means to writing, saving, and sharing work.
Taking Our Writing Public
Students take the period to update and edit their class blog. As this will be a public blog, all writing should be free from errors of spelling, grammar, punctuation, and capitalization.
Recording the Process
The class continues reading "Night" and follows along as the Eliezer and the Jews of his town arrive in Auchwitz. We parallel the hope the Jews needed to survive with the positive mental attitude needed by people surviving the wilderness.
Students create a blog post about erecting survival structures in the woods. Work is read and commented on by an instructor.
Into the Night
The class continues reading "Night". We note Elizer's shift from hope to disbelief as he struggles to survive in Auschwitz.
Students create a blog post about our compass scavenger hunt or about the water collection systems.
Surviving Auschwitz
The class views the oral history of Leo Schneiderman, a survivor of Auschwitz as he discusses his arrival in the camp.
Images from The United State Holocaust Memorial Museum are used to supplement Eliezer's story.
Students update blog posts and edit each other's work.
Day09
Day10
Day11
Day12
Day13
Day14
Day15
Day16
Day17
Team Fiction
Students work together to develop a class work of fiction with a survival theme. Students developed a plot where a young boy witnesses a murder committed by a natorious drug lord and his crew. The boy must survive being chased by the dangerous men.
The class views the first 15 minutes of "Factories of Death" from the PBS program "Aushwitz: Inside the Nazi State" www.pbs.org/auschwitz We continue reading "Night" and discuss the lengths to which Eliezer will go to help his father survive.
Surviving the Night
Students focused today on the atrocities survived by the Jews in "Night". Eliezer suffers a terrible beating and many begin to question the existence of God as executions become especially brutal.
The class views the second 15 minutes of "Factories of Death" from the PBS program "Aushwitz: Inside the Nazi State" www.pbs.org/auschwitz
Team Fiction Continued
Students pool their ideas and develop the plot for their team survival fiction. Decisions are made about a first or third person narrator and the main characters are developed.
The class continues to read "Night" and we discuss survival despite the horrors of Auschwitz.
The Plot Thickens
Today students focused on fiction writing and developing plot. We began with a warm up and then launched into our team fiction. The main character has now witnessed a murder and must survive being chased by the town's three most notorious criminals, Walter the Walrus, Charles, and Akhmed the Knife.
We continued our reading of Night and watched a portion of "Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State"
Reading and Writing
Students continued our reading of Night as Eliezer survives a painful injury and prepares for evacuation from the Death Camp.
Student blogs are updated to coincide with recent survival activities.
The Start of an Ending
Students read our Team Fiction together and then individually developed an ending for the story. Endings will be combined to complete the Team Fiction.
We watched a portion of "Auschwitz: Inside the Nazi State"www.pbs.org/auschwitz" and continued our reading of Night. Eliezer survives the death march into Germany.
Coming to Conclusions
Students completed their individual endings for our Team Fiction.
We read "Night" as Eliezer and his father complete their final travels into central Germany. In a train of 100 souls, only 12 are left at the end.
The End
Students add the completed Team Fiction to their eportfolios.
We reach the end of "Night" and prepare for our class
discussion of the tragic true story.
Write about it
Students create a log of major events and their significance from Night. This log is then converted into a one page essay about survival skills in the book and in their own lives. The work satisfies the school's summer reading assignments.
Day18
Final Blog
Students complete their final blog enty- What does it take to survive in the wilderness, in school, and in life?
© 2013 Tracy Nathan