Tag Archives: mentor sentences

4/6/2016

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The Big Grade: our first major writing grade!

Today, we started out by talking about obituaries in general. They are the written notices of death that usually include a brief biography of the person. Then we read the poem The Dash by Linda Ellis and talked about that poem supports this quote from the Blog of Death:

Some people view obituaries as morbid stories, but in truth only one line of an obit deals with death. The rest of the story focuses on the amazing lives people lead.

We also read the obituary that I wrote that I’ve been writing for the past ten years. Honestly, it has inspired me. Every time I read it, it’s a reminder of what I want to do. While you guys are finishing writing this tomorrow, I’ll be editing my own – I need to add my children! <3

We are going to write our OWN obituary in class. You need to focus on CARPE DIEM – how did you make your life extraordinary? You will need to be at least 75 years old (or older) – it’s hard to carpe diem a life when it’s short. Think about the Bucket List pre-writing and the Bucket List that we did this week – use those to find your focus. Is it family? Is it being successful? Is it helping other people? Use that focus to help you figure out details and events to your life.

Under Carpe Diem: Obituary, you can find instructions and examples, one of which being my own. Yes, I do every assignment that I ask you to do. The reason that I do this is so that I can share things that helped me when I did the assignment. The thing that helped ME the most when I wrote my obit was the Blog of Death. Seriously. I used it not for ideas, but for sentence structures and modeling. Use your Sentence Models that we did on Tuesday for help and inspiration!

For example, here is the first sentence of Demetius Newton’s obituary:

Rep. Demetrius C. Newton dedicated his life to improving the human condition, first as a civil rights attorney and later as a politician and public servant.

It’s a great sentence, but obviously, I’m not a civil rights attorney, politician, or a public servant. But it’s a great sentence.

So what I would do is this: I’d take out the specific information and leave blanks.

_____ dedicated her life to improving ____________, first as a ________ and later as a __________.

Now that it’s not specific, I can add in my own information.

Vanessa Riley dedicated her life to educating others, first as a teacher and later as the director of the at-risk high school that she founded.

If you look in BB, you can see the rubric that will be used to grade the obituary. You need to have a minimum of 500 words.

4/5/2016

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Then, we read Grandma Betty’s Obituary from the Blog of Death. What an amazing woman! Seriously, this is the legacy that I’d like to leave when I die! I love Grandma Betty!

Then, we looked at the Blog of Death in a little more detail. I skimmed through and showed you a few people that were of interest to me, and I showed you how to use the categories, even though I wish there was a place to actually see all of the categories!

The point of that was that we are searching for really good sentences that we can use as models or mentors when we start writing our major grade next week.

Mentor Sentences

You have to find FIVE great opening lines. That is the opening line(s) of an obituary, not the paragraph. You have to find five great endings for an obit, and you’ll need to find five good general lines from anywhere in an obituary.

DO NOT JUST CHOOSE THE FIRST FIVE OBITS THAT YOU FIND AND CHOOSE THREE LINES FROM EACH. That is not the point of this, and it won’t help you write your paper next week. Seriously. This is NOT busy work, so if you get done in five minutes, that’s a sign to me that you just chose random sentences without thought.

If you want extra credit, if you find a really interesting Obit, put the person’s name in the last column so I can share it with other students. :)

I also have a list of the people that I find fascinating if you are getting stuck stuck looking people. As of right now, it’s not in Blackboard, so let me know if you need it. :)

The reason we are doing this is for sentence modeling.

For example, here is the first sentence of Demetius Newton’s obituary:

Rep. Demetrius C. Newton dedicated his life to improving the human condition, first as a civil rights attorney and later as a politician and public servant.

It’s a great sentence, but obviously, I’m not a civil rights attorney, politician, or a public servant. But it’s a great sentence.

So what I would do is this: I’d take out the specific information and leave blanks.

_____ dedicated her life to improving ____________, first as a ________ and later as a __________.

Now that it’s not specific, I can add in my own information.

Vanessa Riley dedicated her life to educating other, first as a teacher and later as the director of the at-risk high school that she founded.

10/27/2015

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Eeek! My babies are six month old today! Time went by so quickly!

I gave you the rest of today to work on your mentor sentences. If you notice, I gave you this much time because I want you to actually READ the obituaries!

I don’t expect you to read all of them, but practice skimming. Read the first line or two and if it doesn’t interest you, SKIP it!

We will be using these mentor sentences for the next day or two, so don’t just fall asleep!

10/26/2015

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We started today talking about Death and the Devil Surprising Two Maidens. If you weren’t here today, there is a drop box assignment for this in the Carpe Diem folder in Obituary.

Death and the Devil Surprising Two Women

Then, we read Grandma Betty’s Obituary from the Blog of Death. What an amazing woman! Seriously, this is the legacy that I’d like to leave when I die! I love Grandma Betty!

Then, we looked at the Blog of Death in a little more detail. I skimmed through and showed you a few people that were of interest to me, and I showed you how to use the categories, even though I wish there was a place to actually see all of the categories!

The point of that was that we are searching for really good sentences that we can use as models or mentors when we start writing our major grade next week.

Mentor Sentences

You have to find FIVE great opening lines. That is the opening line(s) of an obituary, not the paragraph. You have to find five great endings for an obit, and you’ll need to find five good general lines from anywhere in an obituary.

DO NOT JUST CHOOSE THE FIRST FIVE OBITS THAT YOU FIND AND CHOOSE THREE LINES FROM EACH. That is not the point of this, and it won’t help you write your paper next week. Seriously. This is NOT busy work, so if you get done in five minutes, that’s a sign to me that you just chose random sentences without thought.

If you want extra credit, if you find a really interesting Obit, put the person’s name in the last column so I can share it with other students. :)

I also have a list of the people that I find fascinating if you are getting stuck stuck looking people. As of right now, it’s not in Blackboard, so let me know if you need it. :)

1/27/2015 – B

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We started out today with the most appropriate picture: Death and the Devil Surprising Two Maidens.

Death and the Devil Surprising Two Women

Then, we read Grandma Betty’s Obituary from the Blog of Death. What an amazing woman! Seriously, this is the legacy that I’d like to leave when I die! I love Grandma Betty!

Then, we looked at the Blog of Death in a little more detail. I skimmed through and showed you a few people that were of interest to me, and I showed you how to use the categories, even though I wish there was a place to actually see all of the categories!

The point of that was that we are searching for really good sentences that we can use as models or mentors when we start writing our major grade next week.

Mentor Sentences

You have to find FIVE great opening lines. That is the opening line(s) of an obituary, not the paragraph. You have to find five great endings for an obit, and you’ll need to find five good general lines from anywhere in an obituary.

DO NOT JUST CHOOSE THE FIRST FIVE OBITS THAT YOU FIND AND CHOOSE THREE LINES FROM EACH. That is not the point of this, and it won’t help you write your paper next week. Seriously. This is NOT busy work, so if you get done in five minutes, that’s a sign to me that you just chose random sentences without thought.

If you want extra credit, if you find a really interesting Obit, put the person’s name in the last column so I can share it with other students. 🙂

I also have a list of the people that I find fascinating if you are getting stuck stuck looking people. As of right now, it’s not in Blackboard, so let me know if you need it. 🙂

10/31/2014

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We started out today with the most appropriate picture: Death and the Devil Surprising Two Maidens.

Death and the Devil Surprising Two Women

Then, we read Grandma Betty’s Obituary from the Blog of Death. What an amazing woman! Seriously, this is the legacy that I’d like to leave when I die! I love Grandma Betty!

Then, we looked at the Blog of Death in a little more detail. I skimmed through and showed you a few people that were of interest to me, and I showed you how to use the categories, even though I wish there was a place to actually see all of the categories!

The point of that was that we are searching for really good sentences that we can use as models or mentors when we start writing our major grade next week.

Mentor SentencesYou have to find FIVE great opening lines. That is the opening line(s) of an obituary, not the paragraph. You have to find five great endings for an obit, and you’ll need to find five good general lines from anywhere in an obituary.

DO NOT JUST CHOOSE THE FIRST FIVE OBITS THAT YOU FIND AND CHOOSE THREE LINES FROM EACH. That is not the point of this, and it won’t help you write your paper next week. Seriously. This is NOT busy work, so if you get done in five minutes, that’s a sign to me that you just chose random sentences without thought.

Then, if you have time, start the Future Timeline.

FT1

So, you’ll start out here. All you need to do here is add your name and the title Future Timeline. and then hit start.

FT2Here, you’ll add your first item. Click on the timeline to see this screen. All you need focus on are the label and the picture. Don’t worry about adding the short or the long description – this is just a pre-writing activity for ideas. You’ll do the writing about it next week.

FT3

When you are done, it should look something like this, except yours will be real items. 🙂FT4

If you have to quit BEFORE you are done, you’ll hit SAVE at the top and save it as a RWT file. This is a rough draft. You can’t turn this in.FT5

When you are done, you’ll hit finish and see this screen. Then, you’ll hit SAVE FINAL.

FT6Save this as a PDF and turn this bad boy in.