Who: All Ms. McMillan’s 7th grade Language Arts classes
What: A Writer’s notebook is a place to record your thoughts and your thinking.
When: Complete journal/notebook entries every day.
Where: Journal and notebook in a one subject spiral bound notebook.
Why: Your notebook is a place for you to practice writing. From this day forth you are a writer! The more you write the better at writing you will become. It is also a place where you will learn a lot about yourself. You will make discoveries, develop reflections, and tackle the 7th grade writing test.
RSVP: RSVP by completing your first notebook entry. Write the date in the upper right hand corner of the page, and write your first and last name at the first line of your notebook. Think about your name. Why is it significant? Were you named after someone, or did your parents just like the name? Do you like your name? Would you change it if you could? Write about your thinking that comes to mind about your name.
Read the following selection to see if it helps you to think about your name.
How I Got My Name
Whenever that song came on that goes
Come on, baby, do the Locomotion, Mama
Would make us dance with her.
We’d do this dance called the Locomotion
When we’d bend our elbows and move
Our arms in circles at our sides.
Like our arms were train wheels.
I can see us doing it now-in slow motion.
Mama grinning and singing along
Saying all proud “My kids got rhythm!”
Sometimes Lili got behind me and we’d
Do the Locomotion around our little living room. Till
The song ended.
And we fell out on the couch
Laughing. Mama would say
You see why I love that song so much, Lonnie?
See why I had to make it your name?
Lonnie Collins Motion, Mama would say.
Lo Co Motion.
Yeah.
By Jacqueline Woodson from Locomotion
People put a lot of thought into names-whether they are naming children or pets, or giving a friend a new nickname. Names often follow a person throughout life and can have positive and negative associations. The above poem talks about the care that is given to a name. The poem provides some insight into how names can affect t heir owners.