The Tipping point

1. The Tipping point

2. List • Create a list of your top 20 friends. • Use the information on pages 37-39 to explore your circle of friends (not including family and co-workers). • In each case work backward until you can identify the person who is ultimately responsible for setting in motion the series of connections that led to that friendship.

3. Connectors in Your Life • Which person did you discover is responsible for your “Circle” of friends? • Do you believe they are a connector. Use one quotation from the book to support your belief.

4. Connector Name Game • Turn to page 38 in The Tipping Point. Reread the Connector Name Game Rules. • Simply estimate how many friends and acquaintances you have on the list. Write your final number. • Analyze what that number says about you. Does this mean you are a connector? Why or why not? Do you agree? Why or why not?

5. Compose a Letter • Write to the principal. You will write and explain the central idea in the Law of the Few. • In the letter: • Explain what a connector is. • Be specific and cite your information to support your claims. (Use at least two quotations!) • Analyze what is said about connectors. (Analytical statements naturally begin with “Digging deeper one can see that” or “Based on this information scholars can tell,” “Upon further examination,” “In other studies,” “one could argue that,” etc.) • Correctly use a comma and a semicolon.

6. How to correctly use a comma: • Use a comma to separate the elements in a series (three or more things), including the last two. "He hit the ball, dropped the bat, and ran to first base." • Use a comma + a little conjunction (and, but, for, nor, yet, or, so) to connect two independent clauses, as in "He hit the ball well, but he ran toward third base." • If there is ever any doubt, however, use the comma, as it is always correct in this situation. • One of the most frequent errors in comma usage is the placement of a comma after a coordinating conjunction. • How to correctly use a semicolon: The most common way to use a semicolon is to connect two independent clauses. For example: “The ice cream truck man drove by my house today. He had big hairy knuckles.

7. The two statements are separated by a period. If read aloud, it would go something like this: • “The ice cream truck man drove by my house today. “take a breath” He had hairy knuckles.” • With a semicolon, however, it would sound like this: “The ice cream truck man drove by the house today; he had big hairy knuckles.” • Basically what we did was eliminate the pause between the two statements without using words such as and, but, nor, or yet. • Make sure to circle each sentence where you have done this appropriately.

8. Delivery • Now that you have your letter. You will need to determine the six degrees of separation you will use to get this letter to the given person. • To whom will you send the letter first?

9. On the Letter • Instruct each person to write his or her name on the worksheet and send it on to a friend or acquaintance whom he or she thought would get the packet closer to the principal. The idea is that the worksheet finally arrives at the correct location by the end of the day. We will be able to look at the list of all those whose hands it went through to get there and establish how closely connected someone chosen at random is to you. • This sheet will serve as a tracker of how many degrees of separation it will take your letter to get the correct person. When the said person receives the letter they will return the initial sheet to a folder that Ms. Hughes has given them. I will collect the folders and track how the worksheet ended up there. • Beware! Only give this letter to people that you trust will make the handoff in a timely manner. If they lose it, your grade is lost as well. • List of Hands that Connect to Assigned Higley Employee.