First week of January, 2016

A little freezing rain changed our plans for this week. We did start our unit on Huckleberry Finn.

The following statements were agreed/ disagreed by students, and we discussed most of them in class.

Stongly Disagree Disagree Agree Strongly Agree
If something is wrong to everyone else, it should be wrong to you.
Anyone who believed slavery was an acceptable way of life was a bad person.
Society has little effect on your morality.
It is wrong to steal, even when you are starving.
People who are not formally educated are ignorant.
Society’s decisions on what is right and wrong are correct MOST OF THE TIME.
What is right and wrong in our time period should be right and wrong in all time periods.
Members of a society are morally obligated to follow what is socially right and wrong.
If a friend breaks the law, you have the obligation to turn him or her in.
People need to believe in hell because without it they would have no reason to do good and avoid evil.
You can tell when people come from a good family or the right neighborhood, or have gone to the right schools because they tend to behave with a lot of class.


Some lively discussion ensued.

We read an article about Mark Twain. Some material here will appear on our final test.

Click here to see video and read about Twain.

Some students checked books out; others decided to use their phones, kindles, or computers to follow the story. Loudlit.org will be used in class. We used loudlit.org to go through chapters one through three. Be prepared for quizzes over these chapters.

Students were given the following definition of satire: To ridicule a subject with the intention of inspiring reform.  Learn this definition.

"The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" is notable for its use of the n-word. We discussed this in class. Students were made aware that this was not their word to use in class. When the text uses it, we will understand the context of the word. We watched one or more of the following:







See a review of all chapters of the book, click here

In class we use Loudlit.com to read and listen to the book. Click here