English I Honors students began Romeo and Juliet proper, looking at the prologue, which to their surprise, turned out to be a sonnet.

Two households, both alike in dignity,
In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,
From ancient grudge break to new mutiny,
Where civil blood makes civil hands unclean.
From forth the fatal loins of these two foes
A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life;
Whose misadventured piteous overthrows
Do with their death bury their parents’ strife.
The fearful passage of their death-mark’d love,
And the continuance of their parents’ rage,
Which, but their children’s end, nought could remove,
Is now the two hours’ traffic of our stage;
The which if you with patient ears attend,
What here shall miss, our toil shall strive to mend.

We spent the whole period working on it, reading it a multitude of ways, each of which uncovered a bit more of the meaning. The stomping of course was particularly fun.

Sixth period at work

English 8 Strategies students had their in-lab writing day today.

First period students at work

Students began trying to apply the cause-effect models we looked at earlier in the week, making their own cause-effect paragraphs based on two topics:

• Choose a class you did well in: write a cause-effect paragraph explaining why you did well in the class.
• Choose a class you didn’t do as well in as you would have liked: write a second cause-effect paragraph explaining why you didn’t do as well in that class as you were hoping.

Students had a chance to work on it in class, but not many finished it. The assignment will need to be completed by next week so we can continue with unit and remain on pace, so anyone who didn’t finish it will need to do it for homework (see below).

Homework

• English I Honors: reread the prologue from Romeo and Juliet, marking the text as you would any other poem. Pay especially close attention to the pronouns (in particular “both,” “which,” “that,” and “our”) and determine their antecedents. In addition, please remember that “traffic of our stage” is critical to understanding the poem. Finally, highlight any word in the prologue that has anything at all to do with the number two.