HUMANI T IES


MIDDLE SCHOOL


Humanities classes. The essence of Humanities is engagement with ideas, and students use the writing skills they have developed to organize and communicate their thoughts. In Lower School they have written about books and stories they have read, but in Middle School they delve into literary analysis, writing critical essays about the novels they read. “We stress critical thinking and


I


creating an argument that has tension in it,” said Humanities teacher Ann Sulzer. “If you are writing about Fahrenheit 451, you are not proving that fire is hot, because that is obvious. You are going to have to work to provide evidence and support to convince the reader of the validity of your position.” They continue to use the structure


of the five-paragraph essay, but the compositions are more sophisticated, using formal conventions and closely examining the validity of theses. “By Eighth Grade they are looking at


more abstract ideas and incorporating quotations to support their arguments,” Ann said. “We are teaching them how to do that in the proper formatting. They cite their sources in the MLA (Modern Language Association) format. “We may only do four essays in the


entire year, but we do a lot of work with revision. The instinct for a lot of students is, ‘I wrote it and I’m done. That’s it.’ But it’s unlikely that your first draft will be the best that you can do. It’s important to be able to look at your work with fresh eyes so you can


WWW.OES.EDU


n the Sixth through Ninth Grades, writing is taught as part of the


So the poets don’t write about it.


Poets tell you that they take normal things,


And make you care about them. Really, they take


the things you love,


And only notice every once in a while,


And write up a storm,


About how much they’re taken for granted.


They don’t care about the fake potted plant. No one does.


see the best way to express what you are saying. A lot of the comments we write ask why is this, how is this, or how did you get to this conclusion. Initially we are more focused on the ideas.” In the Eighth Grade, students do an


oral history project in which they go out in the community and interview “global citizens,” defined as people they believe are making some type of positive change in the world. They write about their subjects and, after several revisions, all of the students’ works are published in a book. The book becomes a keepsake both for the students and for the people they wrote about. Several times a year, Sixth Grade


Humanities classes take a week away from expository writing and do free writing—stories, songs, poems, memoirs, and journals. They share their writing with each other and sometimes “publish” their writing. Here’s an excerpt from a poem about poetry by


ROSALIND S. ’15:


A fake potted plant. Who cares? No one does.


Grammar is explicitly taught in


a quarter-year language skills class in the Sixth and Seventh Grades, but Humanities teachers also teach specific writing mechanics such as capitalization, quotations, commas, and sentence fragments. They then work individually with students all year on problems they encounter. “I work one on one with each student,” said Humanities teacher Becky Tooley. “Writing is developmental and they will progress from wherever they are. If they are not getting quotations, then I require them to come work on them with me.” In recent years the Middle School


teachers have been striving to make the transitions between divisions more seamless. They consult with the Fifth Grade teachers on their expectations for incoming sixth-graders, and they work with Upper School Humanities teachers to pass on students who are prepared for the Ninth Grade coursework. The newly appointed grade 6-12 English and Humanities department chairs, Rick Rees and John Holloran, also are working to make these transitions smoother.


SUMMER 2010 OES MAGAZINE 11 11


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40