Tuesday, October 14, 2014

Welcome: What's ELA to You?



 You walk into the room, dreading what leers before you. The wooden floors of the room creak with your every step. You sit down at your desk, crunched into your seat as though you’re a can of sardines. “When will we get new desks?” you wonder. Last year you fit perfectly fine; but since your recent summer sprout, your knees now touch the gum under the desk when you sit. 

You quickly move your leg and see a fresh wad of strawberry Bubbalicious stuck to your brand new indigo jeans. The teacher finally walks up front and says “Welcome class to English Language Arts.” His voice is nasal. Spit flies from his mouth with every syllable. And what’s worse, you have the honor of sitting in the front row of the room! “This is going to be a LONG year,” you think.
        
           Yes my lovely students-- I know. This is the scene that some of you may have in your minds when you think of English Language Arts. But have no fear! That will certainly not be this year! 

English Language Arts is all about the hip vibes and smooth rhymes of poetry; the simply human verses of Shakespeare; the imaginative, yet SO REAL language of John Steinbeck; the shocking realities of the most difficult period of life for Melba Patillo Beals; the heated debates and intellectual discussions. Come with me as we explore the adventures, curiosities, and thought provoking world of literature. Awaken your minds and put your thoughts and imaginations to paper. THIS is what ELA is all about to me. 

So, what's ELA to you? Share your thoughts! Welcome to our class blog and welcome to English Language Arts! 


Signing Off, 

~ Ms. McKain

29 comments:

  1. I think ELA is a form of communication. It helps communicate someone's ideas in the form of writing. It is good for people who are shy and don't like to talk. This is what ELA is to me.
    Eduardo M.U
    #WriteMyCommunity

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  2. To me ela is a form of writing and English. It can help introduce anyone who doesn't know English very well or can help improve English. Ela can help someone with writing to apply into college, a resume for a job, etc. That is what ela is me and how it can help
    Christopher M.
    #WriteMyCommunity

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  3. What ela is the writing that makes the reader feel. The thrilling of a novel or a chill relaxing poem. When i think about ela i think about reading and annotating and analyzing chapters. i also think about the tone of the passage and how it makes me feel. It also makes me think about school in a way. It makes me think about learning grammer and new things about writing that i hadnt known before. This is what ela means to me. Alexia D

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  4. To me Ela is a type of subject that teaches us to read and wire and do spelling and grammar perhaps. I feel like it teaches us about what books and pieces of writting really are(authors thoughts and feelings). With out Ela there would be no writting and the authors wouldn't have known anything like they do now.... Thank you

    Sincerely,
    Sebastian B.

    #WriteMyCommunity

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  5. Ela stands for English Language Arts. Ela is a subject that many kids take in school. To me, Ela is a type of writting that informs/entertains a reader . It can also persuade the reader or express the writers feeling onto the text. Ela is important because it helps the teacher know what the student needs help on improving. Without Ela, we wouldn't be smart and intellectual people. We wouldn't know how to have a conversation to one another. Ela gives us Education and Knowledge and that makes us successful in life.
    #Writemycommunity
    Devna.L

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  6. When I think about ELA, I think about reading and writing. I think about analyzing a text and thinking and saying to myself, "What does this really mean?". I think about reading passages and stories and books and excerpts and thinking what does the author mean by this or what is the author trying to say or what the lesson the author is trying to teach. I think that ELA is a way people can connect through literature.
    Sal C.

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  7. ELA means different things to different people. To me, ELA is the way we communicate. Whether you're reading, writing, texting, or just talking with friends you are using the skills that ELA has taught you. ELA is important to me because it is the way we can communicate with the world around us. Without the skills of ELA we would know nothing on how to communicate with each other and spread our ideas and thoughts with the world around us. Through stories, music, poems, etc. ELA plays in an important role. ELA is a very important part of our day to day lives which is why to me, ELA is important.
    Emily D.

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  8. What ELA means to me is the chance to express your thoughts and feelings. If you have a diary and you've had a tough day you can just right it out. ELA also helps you connect to yourself or learn something new about yourself. You could read a poem or a article that touches you and inspires you to do something great. You can also help make other people feel better with the power of ELA. You can write a letter to someone to cheer them up if they are sad. That is what ELA means to me.
    Madeline L.
    #WriteMyCommunity

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  9. Ela to me means reading and writing. Ela also means writing long essays. Nevertheless Ela also means telling stories such as poems,folktales,adventures, scary and mysterious stories. Ela is a form in reading where the reader and the story/writer connect. It is where the reader experiences the story come to life. It is also where the writer expresses himself to others.
    Delvis L

    #WriteMyCommunity

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  10. ELA is a subject that hones your skill to speak, read, and write. Without ELA, it would be much harder to work in businesses, such as being a businessman, or a teacher. It helps us with our future careers and and stuff beforehand (job applications). It also is good for public speaking. Maybe someone wants to be mayor, he/she has all but ELA sharpened to a point, so he/she says statements wrong and gets words mixed up, ultimately ruining his/her chance at being a mayor.
    -Durwin W.
    #WriteMyCommunity

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  11. There are many thoughts that come to mind when I think about E.L.A. When I think about E.L.A I think about reading and writing. When I think about reading I think about having to read chapters then annotating the chapters. Then when it comes to writing I think about writing paragraphs and essays. Also when I think about E.L.A I think about communication. When I think about communication I think about having conversations and understanding the person speaking. Even though there is more to E.L.A It doesn't come to me when I think about E.L.A. This may not be what everyone thinks about when they think about E.L.A but this is what I think about.
    #writemycommunity
    - Jenna W

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  12. Ela is all about taking away the shy in people and bringing out their hidden personality. Through ela I get to know the real person in someone, the feelings they have that are hidden far beyond what I can see, and most of all the true of all their thoughts and perspectives. This is presented through many forms of writing like poems, novels, sometimes even writing on a blog. Many different parts of ela goes into all my writing whether it's figurative language, parts of speech,or even capitalizing the first letter of the first word in a sentence. I remember when students in my class would say," Oh know we have ela next period",and I start to laugh ,because that is what I use to say it all the time. I thought it was just a class were read and annotated, found the tone and mood ,and then went to lunch. I see it being an interesting subject because it sometimes leads you to making connections from a book your reading to your own life and learning lessons to help you in the long run.This is what ela means to me. Morad C

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  13. I think ela is a form of communicating and writing. When someone isn't to good at English, understanding passages, comprehending things, etc they use lea to help them. When people annotate passages it helps them learn about the tone,characterization, figurative language,elements of fiction, etc that helps them read things and break things down. It helps with communicating because if someone isn't good at explaining things out loud they can express themselves in the form of writing they like to use.
    Wayne C.

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  14. ELA to me is the subject that teaches you how to read and write and understand when to use grammar. I think that the more you write or read you get better at it. Reading books can get you being better and it can also give you knowledge and with knowledge you have a better chance to succeed in life.
    Berken S
    #WriteMyCommunity

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  15. To me ELA is a class where i can go learn more how to read different types of stories . With me learning this i can get advance to grammer and by reading books it will also give me knowledge and with the intelligence.
    Jorge R P

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  16. Ela is a subject about reading and writing. To me it helps me write proper. Sentences and annotate stories. I find it one of the most important subjects in school. To me right now it seems like another class. Later in life it will help me a lot such as getting a job. HunterC

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  17. When I think about ela I think about, reading and writing essays that helps us with our vocabulary and knowledge. Ela is one of the most important subjects because if we didn't have ela we wouldn't know how speak proper English or write properly. If it wasn't for ela I wouldn't be writing this comment to you.

    Eva R.

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  18. ELA to me is an essential subject in school. It's our base for reading and writing. When I think about ELA, I think of analyzing an excerpt or text, and figuring out what it means. I also think about writing because we all do plenty of that in class, and it's a way to express your opinion on a subject or show someone your understanding about a topic. Without ELA, I'd be completely lost on comprehending books. ELA will help me succeed in life.
    - Jannel M

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  19. Ela is a form of writing that helps you around the world. It is very important in life because you would know the grammer of your language and would be able to talk about it fluently. Ela stands for English language arts which you would learn the basics of it and also ela is a form of communication. Ela helps people for example shy people to communicate their personality to the world. This shows that ela is very important in life. This is what ela means to me. Cristian m

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  20. To me ELA means that you read and write stories and discuss them. Through the stories you can learn about people, their ideas and opinions, by discussing them. this what ELA means to me. Catherine W.

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  21. To me, ELA is all sorts of things, it teachers comprehensive reading and writing, literature, and strategy to your everyday subjects. That is because if somebody does not know how to read very well, ELA reading practices can help you understand, communicate, and read better in all other subjects, especially history, and science. ELA can also take you on some adventures traveling in your mind, and help you create imagery in your head as you read and write. Lastly if you are for example giving a writing assignment, or an essay, it is a chance to really write down what you know, how you feel, and your emotions on a piece of paper, without ELA a lot of people would be lost in their writing, and write incorrect grammar on an assignment, even in texting to! That is why ELA is a necessary part of our daily lives, and can generally help us throughout all of the actions we do.

    - Farah S.

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  22. When i think of ela, i think that it's how we express or show our thoughts,feelings or opinions toward a text. Ela can actually help us get through life by teaching us in the beginning how to read and write because we use thoses skills on a daily basis; without it, we probably would not make it this far. Ela makes us think even more to really understand what's happening in the text or other.Ela is just something that is simple ,yet so effective in our lives
    -Jennifer P

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  23. ELA to me is a way to better communicate yourself in the world. When your reading a book your expanding your knowledge to another level. Through ELA, you come across new vocabulary that you never knew before and you get a whole new meaning of things. As we get older having a great vocabulary is all that matters. You can't just walk into a big meeting saying small words like "nice, cool, bad, mean." This also applies to writers. You need a large vocabulary to write a book, essay, paper or letter. In ELA when we write essays, we can see what type of writer someone is. We can tell by the vocabulary that they use and their creativity.

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  24. To me, ELA is the most important subject in school. Without ela, people would not know how to read and they would not have proper grammar. If people can not read, they would not understand what they are being taught in subjects such as history and science. Also, stories that you read in ela class can make you imagine what it would be like to be the protagonist or the antagonist of that story.

    -Denys U.

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  25. When I think of ELA I think of a form of communication. ELA expresses how you feel through writing. Many students take ELA for granted but it really is a priority you need to have in life because you encounter it in your everyday life. If your one of those people who prefers to write than verbally communicate ELA is really helpful. ELA is one of my favorite subjects because I express myself better through writing than talking. ELA can take you on adventures when your reading or writing.
    -Jasmin M.

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  26. What ela means to me is a sublect that teaches you to have good people skills. If you dont speak very well or read very well, your friends will not like you that much. Literacy allows you to make good friends who will like your speaking skills. David L.

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  27. ELA is an essential tool all humans should know here on planet Earth. I'm not trying to kiss up to anyone here either. everyday we need to know how to read,speak, and write our way through our daily lives. Reading takes us on adventures that you just can't have in your house, but anywhere in the universe. correct Grammar is everything, from a job interview to a normal casual talk. you can't do Math, Science, and History without knowing how to read. ELA is very important to me.

    ~Christopher Gavidia

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  28. When i think of Ela its writing and reading, there things that can makes us understand things like the world. Writing helps us express ourselves, without talking or looking at the person the paper is for. Its also something you have to do for a job. writing is something you do on your life. Reading can be relaxing or just something to do in your spare time. reading is something you do in your daily life.
    Ela is something that you will certainly need in your life.
    ~Alex p.

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  29. Ela to me is how to read,write,and speak properly. All of these things help you in life. If you did not how to read then what job would you have. Even if you work at a fast food restaurant you have to know how to read. When you go to an interview and you sound like you never spoke a word in your life then you will not get the job. This is why ela is so important in life.
    Meaghan G

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