Students at SJHS Learn About Famous Author

Students at SJHS in Mrs. Mary Rice’s English class are learning about Edgar Allan Poe.  Some things that the students are learning about are his life and his works like “The Raven,” “The Telltale Heart,” and “The Masque of the Red Death.”

Students learned that Poe was an American author and poet. They also learned that Poe was a very brilliant man, and that his writing shows it. Students also learned that Poe was very good at describing things and that he was a very unique kind of writer and person, and that the way he wrote showed his personality.

Courtney O’Halloran, eighth-grade student at SJHS, said, “I think that his writing is really good. My favorite thing out of all that we read was the ‘Raven’ I liked it because Poe used excellent details describing the bird. And I love how the bird talked to people and only used one word the whole time.”   

Mrs. Rice said, “I teach about Edgar Allen Poe’s work because of the word choice in meeting academic literacy goals.” She also said, “studying the words and dissecting them helps students build the kind of vocabulary knowledge that helps them learn.”

After students read Poe’s stories, they had a trial to see if the narrator that Edgar Allan Poe constructed in The Black Cat was sane or insane. After the trial, the students talked about the verdict. Students had fun doing this trial, and they understood more about good writing because they were able to read some good writing and discuss it