Standard 02-04-2014

Items we hit today:

*Do your homework.  I don't give a ton of homework so be sure you complete what is assigned so that class can run smoothly.  

*Summaries are important.   Be sure to highlight the important ideas of the story and avoid excessive details.

*Even though we are switching our focus from nonfiction texts to fiction books, evidence is needed.  You need to support your characterizations.  You need to support your themes.  You need to support your analysis of the text.  Just finding a quote is not enough.  Does the quote support what you are trying to say? If so, then it is a good quote to use.  Be careful when selecting your support.

*We need to hunker down and get through our "Lemon Brown" discussion.  Be ready to hit the ground running on that tomorrow.  

*To the IMC tomorrow!  You will be finding a fiction book.  Be ready to read!

See you soon.  

Honors 02-04-2014

Four things tonight.

1) Be sure you are thinking about and working on that irony assignment.  Find a picture and offer a thorough explanation as to why it is irony.  No repeats allowed.  First come, first serve.  Due by Monday, February 10th.

2) Read "The Story of an Hour".  Be sure to annotate it carefully as you read.  We will be discussing it tomorrow in class with an emphasis on theme.  An annotated copy will be your ticket in.

3) Speaking of theme, remember that a theme is a general statement about life that tries to convey the point/ message/moral the author is presenting in one sentence.  What message is Kate Chopin trying to convey in her short story?    

4) IMC tomorrow for a fiction book and an assessment that goes with it.

See you soon.

Standard 02-03-2014

SRI testing today gave many of you a second chance to complete the "Lemon Brown" homework.  Don't blow this opportunity.  Be sure to read pages 170-178 in the text book and then complete a good chart on the characterizations of Greg, Father and Lemon Brown.

Tomorrow we will discuss the characters from the story, examine Walter Dean Myers' use of figurative language, and nail down a theme.  We'll also take a good look at how Myers establishes the setting.

Some of you also have a second chance at the parallel structure example assignment.  If you received a question mark over 10 than take the time to read and understand the notes on the paper and make the appropriate corrections.  10/10 is still within reach for some of you.

See you soon.

Honors 02-03-2014

It's time for TIPP.  Okay, it's time for TIPP to be handed in.  Can't wait to read about all these influential people.  Be sure you have your typed final copy, your works cited, and any drafts you've written all stapled together.  No printing during class so come in early or during lunch to get it finished before class begins.

You complete one assignment, so it's time for another one.  This one will be on the lighter side. It deals with irony.  I'll fill you in on it tomorrow.

The fiction unit can officially start tomorrow as well.  I have several stories lined up, and we'll jump right in on one tomorrow.  You will also be going to the IMC on Wednesday to select a book.  But it isn't just any book.  Yes, it has to be fictional (sorry all you nonfiction lovers), but there is more to it.  I'll fill you in on that soon as well.

Some things we will be looking at during the next few weeks include:

-how authors build themes into their stories
-how similar themes appear in extremely different works
-how to identify themes
-the relevance of the stories of the Bible and Greek mythology today
-the power of good characterizations
-the importance of well written dialogue
-point-of-view
       and of course
-irony in stories

Get ready to read! A lot!

See you soon.

Standard 01-30-2014

Remember that the parallel structure assignment is due tomorrow.  You need to have the proper heading along with a good example of parallel structure.  The source should be clearly identified.  You also need to clearly explain why the example you share is indeed parallel structure.  Do not just say that it is items in a series.  Instead, explain why its structure makes it a good example of parallel structure.

We continued our theme study by finalizing themes from "Gil's Furniture" and the "Friendship" poem: Items with sentimental value can be priceless. We discussed how the theme in the poem was constructed through comparison and the theme from the short story was demonstrated through actions and dialogue.  We are picking up the idea again in "The Treasure of Lemon Brown".   We'll look at characterizations, figurative language, setting and, of course, theme.  I'll demonstrate what I expect initially but then I'll set you off into groups.  It's a good story.  I hope you like it.

See you soon.

 

Honors 01-30-2014

A little irony review followed by a lot of peer editing.  Fills up the class time quickly.  Hopefully the time with the peer was well spent and your paper will be stronger because of it.  For additional help, I'm sharing a slide show I produced to help you edit yourself.  Can you answer all these questions in a way that shows your paper is strong?  If not, what do you need to change?  Fix those little things.  Make this your strongest paper yet.

As we discussed in class, our due date for TIPP has been pushed back.  While you can turn in the paper anytime starting tomorrow, the written in stone deadline will be Tuesday, February 4.  Any paper received after that date will be considered late.  Don't give points away.

Tomorrow we will be asking some questions on the paper before shifting over to a more enhanced look at irony.  Can you identify the three types?  Can you define each one?  Can you offer original examples of each one? I hope so.  On top of that you better be ready to write!  What can you say in 55 words?  Have those creative juices flowing.  

See you soon.

Standard and Honors 01-26-2014

Another blast of arctic air, another snow day.  I'm not complaining--are you?--but I don't want to be sitting in the classroom in July.

As far as class goes, we will pick up with our Friday plans.  For the standard classes that means identifying a unifying theme for "Gil's Furnitiure" and the "Friendship" poem followed by an examination of the short story "The Treasure of Lemon Brown"by Walter Dean Myers.  We will of course look at its theme but also be analyzing the characters, setting and the description.  There are sure to be some similarities between the two short stories.  Can you identify them?

For the honors classes that means looking at our complete, typed rough drafts of TIPP.  With a couple extra days I'm sure you were able to scrub them up a little more.  remember that the better they are when you have your peers read them, the better they will be by the time the final copy comes around.  At this point, the final copy due date is looking to be Wednesday-Thursday.  One thing I can tell you is that after our peer edit day, we will be putting the finishing touches on the paper on our own at home.  In class we will start diving into some prime classic fiction tales.  Time to get a fiction novel from the IMC too.  We'll come up with something to do with that.  Oh, that goes for all of you in the standard class as well.   Be thinking of fiction novels you want to read.

Hopefully we'll all be able to brave the cold and snow and see each other tomorrow.

Honors 01-23-2014

Seemed like we didn't have a lot of time today.  Well, I guess that's because we didn't.  But anyway, time did fly.  In the time we did have we looked at several TIPP examples today and here are the major takeaways:

-works cited needs to be in alphabetical order
-in works cited entries titles of articles, books, and websites all need to be either in quotation marks,      
     underlined or italicized; if you are not sure which one to use, ask someone who knows or look it up on  
     OWL
-if you are quoting something that is opinion based then you need to identify the source so the reader can
     make a judgement on his or her credibility
-be sure that your body paragraphs offer convincing arguments on influence
-a variety of sources is best
-close each argumentative paragraph by returning to the claim (emphasizing the influence)
-use topic sentences and transitional topic sentences

Tomorrow is peer edit day.  Be sure to bring a clean updated copy into class.  We can either pair up and edit or I can run the class through a step-by-step examination of the paper.  Your choice.

The better the paper you bring in tomorrow, the more helpful tomorrow will be.  Work hard tonight so that tomorrow will be beneficial.

We had to drop irony from our discussion today due to the shortened schedule but I still want you thinking about it daily.  You will be having an assignment over it soon and I think it would be a good idea to quiz you over it as well.  We'll talk about it a bit more first but it's coming. Hi, Renee.

Quick:

offer a definition of irony
identify the three types
define each type and offer an original example of each

Can you do the above?  Great!  If not...

See you soon.

Standard 01-23-2014

It was a quick day but it was a good day.  We decided on a good theme for "Gil's Used Furniture Bought and Sold" and ten had a chance to read a friendship poem by Helen Steiner Rice.  You quickly noticed that the theme of the poem was similar to that of the short story.  They both dealt with things that are priceless.  Ah...but then the challenge came.  I needed to to write a one sentence theme that captures the main idea of both the short story and the poem.  We went through some in period three but will revisit them tomorrow.  I look forward to seeing what period four produced.

Regardless, this is the type of question we will be looking at this quarter.  We need to be able to see connections between the materials we read and discuss.  Two pieces often share a similar theme but they arrive at that theme in completely different ways.  Gil's music box and a true friend are two very different things, but they are both priceless.  We'll do more of that in the coming weeks.

We gave parallel structure the short shrift today due to our 2 hour delay, but we will hopefully revisit it tomorrow.  Don't forget to complete the parallel structure assignment by Wednesday the 29th.  Type up an example, the source, an explanation and a heading.  Make it neat and grammatically correct.  Ten points.

See you for a full class tomorrow...hopefully.  

Honors 1-22-2014

Irony became a little confusing today.  I thought it would be fun and educational to check out the Is It Ironic?  website, but it became headache-inducing and confusing as we tried to explain why we felt an idea or situation was or was not ironic and then tried to mesh our interpretation with the vote on the website. Let's take a step back.

What is irony?   It is when what is said is not what is actually meant.  It is when what is expected to happen does not fit with what actually happens.  So when Fast and Furious actor Paul Walker dies in a fiery car crash it is sad but it is not ironic.  People die in car crashes daily.  People driving at high speeds die in fiery crashes.  Paul was in a car going at a high rate of speed.  The car crashed.  He died. It is sad.  It is unfortunate.  Yes, he was much too young to die.  But it was not ironic.  Yes he played a skilled driver in the movies, but that does not mean he was a skilled driver.  Again, it's not ironic.  Now let's say he was a professional race car driver, a man with proven technical driving skills, a man practiced in the art of weaving in and out of high speed, congested traffic, a man who puts his life on the line every time he gets on the track. Let's say this highly skilled driver was in his Honda mini-van driving to the grocery store when he got in a car accident and died.  Would that be ironic?  Yes. Here's a highly skilled driver who defies death on the race track only to die on a basic two lane road where all should be safe, driving at a quarter the speed he is used to traveling.

Should you be able to correctly identify what irony is 95% of the time?  Yes.  Will there be times or examples that confuzzle you?  Sure.  I'm not 100% positive all the time either.  Make it your goal to have the best understanding possible of the term and be able to apply it to what you read and what you view, as well as situations you encounter on a daily basis.  Hope this helps.

TIPP is taking shape.  It should be in complete shape by Friday with a new, clean, complete rough copy in your hands as you enter the class.  Now the shape will probably be malleable, but that is what the peer edit draft day Friday is all about: molding that paper into the best shape it can be in.

As we read a variety of paragraphs today, we were reminded of the need to do the following:

Have a refutation
Make a counter-argument not a counter-statement
Use quotes from a variety of sources to support my arguments
If Wikipedia is my primary source, I'm in trouble
Identify my sources to enhance their credibility
Have a claim that mentions the person's name, uses a form of the word influence and hints at the arguments coming up

We'll play with irony some more tomorrow and have some time to look at some TIPP paragraphs on the big screen.

See you soon.