Today we continued the vocabulary program and discussed Annie Dillard’s “The Giant Water Bug.”
- WordSkills 1.6-1.10. Absent students need to get notes from a classmate.
- Discussion of “The Giant Water Bug” (from Pilgrim at Tinker Creek). Annie Dillard writes about the experience of walking along a creek, watching and listening to the frogs jump into the water. Then, a mere everyday experience turns into a moment of epiphany. The speaker sees a frog that doesn’t jump and sees it die before her eyes, killed by the stealthy Giant Water Bug. Watching carefully, she loses her breath, terrified by the fragility of life displayed before her very eyes.
HW: Write a one page “Slice of Life” memoir piece about a time that you were doing something routine that led you to some sort of inner realization or epiphany. Write this on a right-hand page of your Writer’s Notebook.
For example, when I was standing in front of my closet picking out what pair of shoes to wear (something I do daily), I realized that I actually have become what I once dreaded as an adolescent––a girly girl.
Or, maybe one time you realized that you were actually turning into your parents. This should be an internal realization, not an external oddity.
ALEXA GARVOILLE 