September 2011 -- Welcome

Hello students and parents of the 2011-2012 Creative Writing year!

You can email Mr. Zartler @ jzartler@pps.net

Assignments will generally be posted here the day they are assigned; occasionally this won't work out, but I'll do my best.

So far this year we've discussed Natalie Goldberg's (and my) advice for writing practice. She offered up some  rules; the following are the most vital:
 1) Keep your hand moving
 2) Lose Control
 3) Don't Think
and
 4) Be specific
 5) Don't worry about spelling, grammar, punctuation (during free writes only!)
 6) You are free to write the worst junk in the world
 7) Go for the jugular!

We experimented with various writing tools; everyone by now should have a dedicated writing journal.

We read and analyzed: "A Perfect Day for Bananafish"

Monday, 26 May - Friday 30 May

On Monday we had a book binding lesson see these web pages for help:

Wikipedia

Good Basic Instructions

Tuesday there will be a lesson on Freedom of Speech, Non-violent protest, etc.

Thursday will be a work day.

Not Quite Childrens' Books are due on Friday.

20 May, 2010

Remember important quiz on Friday, 21 May. This quiz can't be made up during class, so make sure to get to class on time.

Rough drafts of Not Quite Children's books are due on Monday, 24 May. Books are due o Friday, 28 May!

One Less Assignment -- Only two more Assignments Due

Thesis are due next Thursday, 13 May!

The only other major assignment that will be due is:

Not Quite Children' Book due:

Friday, May 28

The "choice piece" has been cut from the curriculum.

Thesis Due Thursday May 13!

Tuesday, 4 May.

Thesis are due Thursday, May 13th. This date is a change. If your rough draft was turned in late, you will have one week (seven days) from the time you get your rough draft with comments back to turn your final draft in.

Today in class there were lessons on how to edit and move photos. There were lessons on how to make a text box to caption and cite the source of images.

There was a lesson on using a text book to make a side bar so you can place your ghazal in your thesis.

Note: Thursday, 6 May Ms. Margolis will substitute in class.

How to Find an Article from the Gale Group Number

Here is how to find an article when you just have the Gale Group #

go to olis.org

choose "secondary student"

choose "Gale Powersearch"

choose "Student Research Gold"

enter document #

choose the "search" next to document number input box

viola!

Tuesday, 27 April 2010

Writers turned in their very short fiction pieces.

Writers wrote a self-evaluation based on the following questions:

Self Evaluation of Micro or Short, Short Fiction

State which form you wrote. State your word count.

State what you like about your story. Use an example or examples from your text if possible.

State what you think would make your story better (using a quote is nice).

What is your ironic twist. On a scale of 1-10 or other scale of your choosing how much of a twist is it?

State what grade you think you should earn. State reasons for this being an appropriate grade.

Writers will need to have turned in their story and self-evaluation for class on Thursday.

The class reviewed how to use Citation Maker on the oslis.org website.