Subdue

Ferny

Tandem

Grandeur

Maimed

abjure

stirred

Entity

Monotonous

Destitute

remunerate

Periods 4 & 8 Word of the Week - scleroderma

This week, both period 4 and period 8 voted for scleroderma to be our word of the week.  This medical term means, "a group of rare diseases involving the hardening and tightening of the skin and connective tissue."

Our sentences to show our understanding of the word scleroderma are:
1. Susy has scleroderma in her hand, which hinders her ability to write.
2. Miley had scleroderma, so, thankfully, she could not twerk.

Period 6 Word of the Week - sonorous

This week, period 6 selected sonorous as our word of the week.  We were able to guess that the word sonorous has something to do with sound because of the root word "sono."  We looked up the dictionary definition, and here is what we found:

Sonorous means, "giving out a deep, resonant sound; loud, deep, or resonant in sound; or rich and full in sound."

Our sentence for this week was: Matthew does not want to sing and share his sonorous voice with the class.

Period 3 Word of the Week - hilarity

Period 3's word of the week is hilarity.  Most students understood that this word has something to do with humor, or, as one student said, "hilariousness."  We decided that enough students know the word that we did not need to look up the dictionary definition.  We said that the definition of this word is "the humor or humorousness" of a joke or situation.  We clarified hilarity is a noun, as opposed to the more common form of the word, hilarious, which is an adjective.

Our sentence to demonstrate our understanding of the word is: The hilarity of Lorenzo's fall made the whole class laugh.

Tenacious

Periods 4, 6, and 8 Word of the Week: botched

Periods 4, 6, and 8 voted for botched to be our word of the week.  The word botch, of which botched is the past tense, has several meanings:

1. to do or say in a bungling manner
2. to spoil by poor work
3. to mend or patch in a clumsy manner

Here are some of the sentences we created to demonstrate our understanding of botched:

1. Billy Cundiff botched the field goal to eliminate the Ravens from the playoffs.
2. Kriss distracted Lexi from her art project with all his compliments, so she botched it.
3. I botched the test; I got a 0.

Period 3 Word of the Week: caryatid

This week, period 3 selected caryatid as our word of the week.  A caryatid is a sculptured female figure used as a column (i.e. a column shaped like a lady).  We made up the following sentence to demonstrate our understanding of the word:

I went to Greece and saw a caryatid that resembled my mother.

Translucent

The Glass Castle Map

Follow this link to explore the many locations in the southwestern U.S. where Jeannette Walls and her family lived before moving to Welch, West Virginia.

https://maps.google.com/maps/ms?msid=212487313279371181520.0004b6eb3dd4b103f53f7&msa=0

All Classes - Word of the Week: exacerbate

This week, all of Ms. Bourque's English classes selected exacerbate as the word of the week.  Exacerbate means, "to increase the severity, bitterness, or violence of, to aggravate" or, "to embitter the feelings of, irritate, exasperate."  Here are some of the sentences we created to demonstrate our understanding of the word:

1. My mom knew the truth about me skipping class, so my lie only exacerbated the situation.
2. Jerome was in an argument with the police when he exacerbated the situation by pulling a gun.
3. Mayowa had a bad sunburn, and Sam exacerbated the pain when she smacked him.