About the class and teacher

Magnet English  8

Welcome to our class and to our class website!

 

My name is Kelly Shapiro, and I am honored to serve as the 8th grade gifted magnet English teacher at Porter. I have a bachelor's degree in English literature (with a secondary focus on Adolescent Literature), a master's degree in English literature, and a California Professional Clear teaching credential in Secondary English. I am CLAD certified, and I attend conferences, workshops, and classes each year to remain updated in gifted pedagogy and differentiation. I am passionate about teaching and learning, and I strive to incite the same passion in my students, while encouraging personal, social, and academic responsibility and integrity. I have dedicated an extensive amount of thoughtful time, effort, and energy into planning and creating a class that will be stimulating, engaging, dynamic, interesting, challenging, and meaningful for the students. I am excited about this year and look forward to all of the wonderful things that we will experience, accomplish, and learn from one another.

Academics aside...I don't always have my nose in a book. In my "free" time (as infrequent as that is), I do volunteer work for various non-profit organizations that are close to my heart. I have completed three AIDS rides, which is a 7 day, 600 mile bicycle ride from San Francisco to Los Angeles, to raise money to help people with AIDS. I love animals and regularly volunteer at local animal sanctuaries. I feel most at peace in nature--surrounded by forests, mountains, and streams. I enjoy hiking, exploring art galleries/museums, concerts, and browsing book stores (okay...I can't stay away from books...even in my free time). You may also see me on the side of the freeway on the weekend, as I often volunteer with "Volunteers Cleaning Communities" to pick up litter and trash that is polluting our beautiful city of Los Angeles. I am a staunch social justice advocate and activist. Helping others--humans and animals--nourishes my soul, and I hope to help my students in as many ways as I can!

 

Note: This is excerpted from the course syllabus, which is on this website.

English 8 is a Common CORE standards- based course that explores the study of English -- focusing upon reading, writing, speaking, and listening. This course will expose the students to various components of literature, including novels, short stories, plays, essays, poetry, biographies/memoirs. Students will develop cognitive and meta-cognitive skills, research skills, grammar skills, vocabulary skills, analytical/critical thinking skills, and the fundamentals of various styles of writing. Class instruction to achieve our academic goals will include a variety of methods that will actively involve the students. Some of these methods include: teacher directed lessons- with guided practices in class and class/homework to reinforce skills or concepts taught, use of audio-visual materials- films, photos, presentations- to appeal to a variety of senses, journal writing, small group work, independent study, dramatic activities, class discussion, seminars, speeches, individual writing, quizzes, and tests. Please feel free to browse the "Preview into our class literature" link to read about our class units.

 

 

 

Parents/Guardians: If you do not have a parent portal account, here is the link to guide you through the process of creating one: https://achieve.lausd.net/cms/lib/CA01000043/Centricity/Domain/720/PLS%20Job%20Aid%20-%20Linking%20Parent%20Portal%20to%20Schoology.pdf