Domenic+T-Sum+Read

Home Summer Reading Assignment Student Posts

Given the nature of the 2011 summer reading program, you had significant autonomy in selecting the books you would read. While you were responsible for completing a proposal, you were not given other assignments to complete over the summer. As indicated on your proposal form, you are required to write a letter to your 2011-12 Language Arts teacher that demonstrates your thoughtful reading of your book. We have chosen to break this down further into three focused "Power Paragraphs" for two reasons, one, to introduce you to the idea of a power paragraph, and two, to assist you in covering all aspects of the assignment.

__ Prompt for Paragraph One - A Reflection of Your Choice __ ** click edit and paste your response here ** I read //Summer Ball// by Mike Lupica, I was recommended to this book by my tutor because its very exciting and the action never stops, its about Dan who is going into his freshman year and he's on a travel basketball team with his two best friends Will and Ty. They go to several basketball camps over the summer to improve for the upcoming year but many fights break out with their rivals from last year. For example when when Dan gets teamed up with his biggest rival, Rasheed, who is still mad about losing to Dan in the finals last year makes Dan look horrible on the court (Lupica). I thought this book was great because I like basketball and the book had a lot of conflicts which built up and kept everything exciting, this book definitely met my expectations I heard about it.
 * *Must be posted to the WIKI by midnight on Wednesday, 8/24 **

Lupica, Mike. //Summer Ball//. New York, NY: Philomel, 2007. Print. What do you think about Lupica's style of writing? It is interesting that he started out as a sports writer and moved on to fiction. __ Prompt for Paragraph Two - A Discussion of What You Gained by Reading Your Book __ ** click edit and paste your response here ** When reading //Summer Ball// I learned a lesson on doing things that you love even if you aren't made for them and practicing to get better. For example, Dan is the smallest kid in the entire league and has always been told that he can't be good because of his height but he practices hard from the start and becomes one of the best (Lupica). This changed me by making me realize that no matter what, you can do what you love as long as you work hard keep a good work routine. This made me question the work ethic of people who are born with nature gifts, such as someone who grows up to be 6'6'' tall can easily be good at basketball without work but Dan on the other hand had to work for his skills which really shows the person that he is.
 * *Must be posted to the WIKI by midnight on Thursday, 8/25 **

Lupica, Mike. //Summer Ball//. New York, NY: Philomel, 2007. Print. __ Prompt for Paragraph Three - What to do With it... __ ** click edit and paste your response here ** I decided to read //Summer Ball// because its a topic that I love, basketball is very fun to read about because its action packed but yet still has conflicts and solutions to top it off. Also I feel like I can relate to the players in the book because I've played basketball from 6th grade to 9th grade, which is the same age group of Dan and his friends. For example when they are practicing and Ty is the only one that messes up but the entire team has to run a lot because he cant get it right (Lupica). I would recommend this book to most ages groups and both genders that know even the slightest bit about basketball, even though its all about basketball there is still a lot of drama and action that keeps you reading.
 * *Must be posted to the WIKI by midnight on Sunday, 8/28 **


 * Scoring: Your three paragraphs will be given one overall grade, and the timeliness of your posts will be reflected in your "timeliness" grade. **

// An outstanding response to the prompts will include the following: //
 * A strong topic sentence that clearly establishes the focus on the prompt Good job with prompt focus in the first two paragraphs, take a look at the third paragraph to see if you can determine how you might change it.
 * Evidence that clearly supports the topic sentence Great use of personal connections in support of your ideas.
 * Correct use of internal citations and a properly formatted MLA citation for your book (put this citation at the end of paragraph one)
 * Strict adherence to the Power Paragraph format
 * Mechanics are clean and do not detract from meaning Be sure to give yourself time to edit and polish your work, better yet, have someone read it over for you.