"Oh, that's right..."

This phrase echoed through the classroom when the students remembered that there was an exam on "The Most Dangerous Game." A majority of them failed even though I graded it on a curve. I asked what they thought about the exam after they finished. Most of them thought it was hard, but I reiterated that it took us nearly a week to read through it, and that I went over the plot and actually asked them questions directly from the exam during the review. I ended the discussion with, "I didn't give you homework, you knew there was an exam, I told you to study. If you read and studied, this test would have been cake." They have another story exam on Wednesday on an article, "Can Animals Think?" They appeared to understand adverbs, so I can move on to interjections and conjunctions. I ended class with a discussion on siblings and then related their frustrations with their little brothers and sisters to what teachers have to put up with sometimes in the classroom. I believe I saw several light bulbs flash on.

We read an information article in the 8th grade class and I gave them time to work together answering the reading questions. I assigned two big packets which include grammar and writing of a personal narrative. They were a little restless and it's funny to see the difference between them and the 9th graders. 8th graders complain A LOT!