Friday, October 12, 2018

Death of a Salesman and Tragedy Resources II

for Review:
-Character Diagram (activity)
Death of a Salesman movie trailer
Death of a Salesman (full length film)
"Death of a Salesman in 60 Seconds" (commentary)

for Sharpening Your Focus:
on Tragedy, Fate, Fatal Flaw, Hubris . . . 

You will be writing an expository essay.  For help with Essay Format:
Purdue Owl:  Expository Essay
" . . . Expository Essay vs. Persuasive Essay" (Pen and Pad)

Organization Patterns for a Compare/Contrast Essay from SJSU
How to Write a Comparative Analysis from Harvard College Writing Center


--What is Literature?  Handout & Assignment

--Selected videos
--Kahoot
--Discuss Character Diagrams 




Wednesday, October 03, 2018

Assignment for Tuesday, Oct. 9

--Read to page 110 and complete 3 sticky note responses.

--Complete any revisions on TFA Essay. (To be eligible for a higher grade, revised draft must be turned in with original draft and scoring rubric.)


Tuesday, October 02, 2018

Assignment for Wednesday, Oct. 3:

Read Death of a Salesman to page 50.
Identify 4 passages from the play that contain imagery or dramatic irony and that enhance the sense of tragedy.  A prompt on Google Classroom has been created for your response.


Tuesday, Oct. 2 -- Day 22 of 87
Death of a Salesman Resources  

Death of a Salesman online (pdf format)

Death of a Salesman Notes & Terms

Death of a Salesman video w/ Dustin Hoffman & John Malkovich

Death of a Salesman:  analysis of the play
     --for more analysis, see also Arthur Miller commentary in Bedford text, pp. 1986 -1989.

Storyboard That (includes themes, motifs, and sample storyboards)

Towards the Examined Life --- Notes for Reading

Tragedy & the Common Man -- Arthur Miller

Oedipus & Willy Comparison Chart



Monday, October 01, 2018

Assignment for Tuesday, Oct. 2

--Read Death of a Salesman, to page 25.
--Write a "found poem" of 6 - 12 lines, using lines from the first 25 pages of the reading.  (The purpose is to look back over this section of the play, to find lines that have symbolic relevance, and to explore what may be potential themes of the play.)  An example is below:

Goin' Off the Road  (a found poem based on lines from Death of a Salesman)
The peonies would come out, and the daffodils
And then all of a sudden I'm goin' off the road

Bricks and windows, windows and bricks
You can't raise a carrot in the back yard

Life is a casting off
The mind is what counts
I see everything
I can't seem to -- keep my mind to it

Friday, September 28, 2018

Assignment for Monday, Oct. 1

Complete Reading Oedipus Rex, pp. 84 - 91.  (Oedipus Rex, Robert Fagles translation, Part 2 (begin on page 82))

Use Kami to create 5 annotations for the pages above.

Monday, September 24, 2018

Things Fall Apart Essay Due Thursday, Sept. 27.

We will set aside some time tomorrow for peer editing and final teacher feedback.


Thursday, September 20, 2018

Oedipus Rex Resources

The Riddle of the Sphinx:
The Sphinx stopped travelers on the road to Thebes and posed them a riddle. If they answered wrong, they died. The hero Oedipus was asked the following question: "What walks on four legs in the morning, two legs at noon and three at close of day?"  Click here for the answer.

Oedipus Rex, Robert Fagles, translation Part 1
Oedipus Rex, Robert Fagles translation, Part 2 
(begin on page 82)

Oedipus Tyrannus, modern translation

Greek Theatre (slideshow)

The Theater of Ancient Greece -- An Intro. to Oedipus Rex (slideshow)

The Story of Oedipus (Animated cartoon)

Tragedy Unit Overview & Expectations

Wednesday, September 19, 2018

TFA Interpretive Essay: Getting Started and Timetable for Completion

Write a draft introductory paragraph and a body paragraph for your Things Fall Apart Interpretive Essay.
  • Your thesis should appear as the last sentence of your first paragraph.  
  • The lead sentences of your first paragraph should introduce your topic in a general way.
  • The next few sentences should gradually narrow toward the thesis.
  • Your first body paragraph should consist of:
    • a topic sentence that includes key words from your thesis.
    • one or more quotes 
    • specific detail as evidence
    • analysis of the quotes and evidence
    • transitions that help link the above
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

During Class:  Open the Google Classroom TFA Essay Template.  Personalize the header information and remove the works cited section at the end.  Paste in what you have written so  far.  Then continue drafting your essay.

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Things Fall Apart  Interpretive Essay Timetable
--prior to Wednesday:  read and collect quotes
--Thursday
  • Create outline
  • Revise working thesis (if needed)
  • Check, reflect on, and revise first 2 paragraphs
  • Draft additional body paragraphs 2, 3, 4
--Friday
  • Draft additional body paragraphs (if needed)
  • Write closing paragraph
  • Self-evaluation
--Monday
  • Revise essay
  • Peer conferences
  • Further revisions & teacher conferences
--Tuesday, Sept. 25
  • Outside of class teacher conferences as needed.
--Thursday, Sept. 26 -- TFA Interpretive Essay Due
  • quotes/double-entry journal
  • rough draft including evidence of peer conference
  • final draft

Thursday, September 13, 2018

TFA Interpretive Essay Resources

Essay Guidelines

Writing an Interpretive Essay / Literary Analysis -- General Resources
Purdue Owl, Writing a Literary Analysis (slideshow)
Roane State Owl, Literary Analysis
Bucks.edu, How to Write an Analysis

Assignment for Friday, Sept. 14
Choose a topic for your essay.  Identify and label at least 3 d-e quotes that fit your topic.

Assignment:for Tuesday, Sept. 18
-Complete reading Things Fall Apart.
--Add 6 more entries to your double-entry journal.  Ideally, most or all with fit with your focus.

Wednesday, September 12, 2018

--Pretest yourself on basic AP English vocabulary by practicing the Vocabulary.com activity here.  A second list is here.
--First reading of the Yeats poem, "Second Coming"
--More on Things Fall Apart Interpretive Essay.
--Discussion based on D-E Journals.
--Mini-Research:  West African food, music, and culture.

Assignment:
1. Complete TFA, Part 1 (to page 125) for Thursday.
2. Complete 3 more double-entries.  (Total of 11 double-entries)

Things Fall Apart Resources

Things Fall Apart online

Chinua Achebe biography

Chinua Achebe on Nigeria & Africa 50 years later (video)

Premium Times Nigeria (Nigerian newspaper online)
The Guardian (Nigerian newspaper online)

William Butler Yeats, "The Second Coming"  (poem)

Gender Role Test (Take the test once for yourself.  If you have time, take it again for Okonkwo).
-------------------------------------------------------

"Turning and turning in the widening gyre   
The falcon cannot hear the falconer; 
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; 
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world . . . "
                        --from Yeats, "The Second Coming"

Tuesday, September 04, 2018

Anthem Resources












Anthem (online version)

Online lectures about Anthem

Interpretive Strategies
Another briefer explanation of interpretive strategies is here.

Online children's stories for practice with interpretive strategies:
World's Shortest Political Quiz
Are You a Capitalist or Socialist Quiz

Assignment for Thursday, Sept. 6:
--Complete reading Anthem for Thursday's class.
To be completed in-class on Thursday:
--Write a one-paragraph interpretation of Anthem using the interpretive strategy of your choice.  Begin your paragraph with a one-sentence statement about the meaning of Anthem.  Then support your statement with evidence from the text and/or from outside research. (Biographical and historical strategies often require outside research).  Include at least one page number as a parenthetical reference.  (If you use an outside source, also provide an informal reference [author and title] for that.)  Be sure to select evidence appropriate to the interpretative strategy you have chosen.




















Welcome to Advanced Placement English Literature & Composition

About AP and About the Course:

The College Board:  Advanced Placement English Literature & Composition



Friday, May 18, 2018

References! References! References!

You are going over your draft and need to check or add a reference to a source.  Should you refer to the author, the page title, the URL or something else?  The Purdue OWL provides a clear answer:
  • Any source information that you provide in-text must correspond to the source information on the Works Cited page. More specifically, whatever signal word or phrase you provide to your readers in the text, must be the first thing that appears in the corresponding entry in the Works Cited List.

For example if your bibliography entry looks like this:  

Lundman, Susan. "How to Make Vegetarian Chili." eHow, www.ehow.com/how_10727_make-vegetarian-chili.html.*

You are required to state the last name of the author, "Lundman," in your reference, since the name of the author is what comes first in your bib. entry.  The last name of the author is then your "signal word."

If there is no author last name in your bibliography, then you will refer to the first thing provided in your correctly formatted MLA bib. entry.  In order of preference, these would typically be:

  1. Author.
  2. If no author:  use the title of the source. (Title of article or web page or abbreviated title)
  3. If no title of source:  use the title of the "container" (Title of web site or abbreviated title.  Note this is NOT a URL)
Which brings us to another rule:


In-text citations for sources with no known author

When a source has no known author, use a shortened title of the work instead of an author name. Place the title in quotation marks if it's a short work (such as an article) or italicize it if it's a longer work (e.g. plays, books, television shows, entire Web sites).
We see so many global warming hotspots in North America likely because this region has "more readily accessible climatic data and more comprehensive programs to monitor and study environmental change" ("Impact of Global Warming").
In this example, since the reader does not know the author of the article, an abbreviated title of the article appears in the parenthetical citation which corresponds to the full name of the article which appears first at the left-hand margin of its respective entry in the Works Cited. Thus, the writer includes the title in quotation marks as the signal phrase in the parenthetical citation in order to lead the reader directly to the source on the Works Cited page. The Works Cited entry appears as follows:

"The Impact of Global Warming in North America." Global Warming: Early Signs. 1999. Web. 23 Mar. 2009.

Wednesday, May 09, 2018

May 9, 2018 -- English 101

--Read the opinion piece, "Rap Lyrics on Trial"  Underline one sentence from each paragraph and label each as logos, pathos, or ethos.

--Write three versions of a brief letter to your parents, asking if you can swap cars for the weekend.  (Your car is not very trustworthy; the car belonging to your parents is much nicer).  Demonstrate the use of logos, pathos, or ethos in each of the three versions.

--After reviewing your responses in the  Developing Your Argument and Audience Analysis planning sheets (see Google Classroom), after reflecting on what you have learned about logos, pathos, and ethos, and after reflecting on what you have learned about appeals, write the introductory paragraph to your persuasive essay.  Be sure to target wording, subject matter, and approach to your specific audience.  End the introductory paragraph with a specific thesis statement.

--Again reviewing your responses in Developing Your Argument , construct a n informal outline that states your thesis and identifies your arguments and counter-arguments.  Temporarily place your outline just above your introduction (see document on Google Classroom).

--Begin writing your body paragraphs and doing additional research as needed.  Be sure to use authoritative sources and to use academic databases as much as possible.  A rough draft of your entire essay (Works Cited page included) is due Thursday of next week.