February 13: B Day

1B

1. Focused freewrite. Students wrote a journal entry from the perspective of the protagonist at the end of the novel and then shared with their partner or group.

2. Theme in bildungsroman. Students worked on their own or in their Wikipedia groups to complete a brief annotation of a passage that illustrates a theme in their novel. Here’s the directions if you were gone: Theme in the Bildungsroman.

3. NPOV and RWP notes. Students received W14: Rules for Informational Writing. Students practiced recognizing neutral and real-world writing by sorting these cards: NPOV and RWP practice sorting. We discussed the importance of maintaining a neutral point of view. When it comes to neutrality, I’ve noticed many students try to “sell” the book in their plot summaries by making it sound extra interesting, as if they’re writing jacket copy (the summary on the flap of a book cover written to help sell it). To remind students not to write in this tone, I did several dramatic jacket copy readings which I have recorded for your home enjoyment here:

Your plot summary should not sound like this! It should just directly state the facts instead of enticing your reader like these do!

We also learned about writing in from a real-world perspective, which means you should write about characters as if they are fictional, not real. You should frequently use the words “fictional,” “character,” “in the novel,” “backstory,” “introduced,” and “described” in order to ensure your reader knows these are fictional characters and events. Also, you must write about plot in present tense. If you write about fiction in past tense, you make people believe it happened. Students then sorted 6 statements into piles of “in universe” and “real-world” perspective.

4. Practice revisions. Students then revised the statements on the back of W14 following the guidelines for NPOV, RWP, TONE, and NOR (no original research).

HW: None. Finish your book if you’re not done yet!

Absentees: Download W14 and get notes from a friend in class. Turn in Reading Log #4 to Ms. G. when you return.

2AB

1. Reflection on project. Students answered four questions about their song analysis project on a sheet of notebook paper:

1. What was the most difficult part of the analysis or writing process? Why?
2. How does this assignment compare to other English writing assignments you have done either this year or previous years? Were you more motivated? Did you feel your writing improved? Did you work harder on it? Or was it about the same? Why do you think that was?
3. What about your analysis process or writing product are you most proud of? Why?
4. For this essay, I didn’t give you a strict formula for organization. How did you like not having a clear structure? Did you enjoy the freedom? Did you feel you had to think harder about organization? Or did you feel like your writing suffered because you didn’t know how to organize yourself?

2. Students made an album cover for the song they chose to analyze. The album cover had to show binaries, hegemonic forces, or social norms/expectations. Here is the assignment: album art.

Before we got started, though, we looked at some artwork by Matisse to examples of how his work might show those same ideas. Here are the images we looked at: matisse cd covers. For each cover we examined how the image showed stereotypes of women, modern relationships, the difference between men and women, etc.

HW: Finish album art for tomorrow if not done in class.

Absentees: Complete the reflection on a sheet of notebook paper. Download the album art assignment. Look at the matisse cd covers PowerPoint for examples. Complete the album art assignment to turn in.

4B

1. Reflection on project. Students answered four questions about their song analysis project on a sheet of notebook paper:

1. What was the most difficult part of the analysis or writing process? Why?
2. How does this assignment compare to other English writing assignments you have done either this year or previous years? Were you more motivated? Did you feel your writing improved? Did you work harder on it? Or was it about the same? Why do you think that was?
3. What about your analysis process or writing product are you most proud of? Why?
4. For this essay, I didn’t give you a strict formula for organization. How did you like not having a clear structure? Did you enjoy the freedom? Did you feel you had to think harder about organization? Or did you feel like your writing suffered because you didn’t know how to organize yourself?

2. Students made an album cover for the song they chose to analyze. The album cover had to show binaries, hegemonic forces, or social norms/expectations. Here is the assignment: album art.

Before we got started, though, we looked at some artwork by Matisse to examples of how his work might show those same ideas. Here are the images we looked at: matisse cd covers. For each cover we examined how the image showed stereotypes of women, modern relationships, the difference between men and women, etc.

3. Shakespeare Through the Ages.

Today students learned that Romeo and Juliet is actually a much older story than you’d think. It originated with Ovid’s Metamorphoses in around 8 A.D. and continued to change in form until Shakespeare wrote his version in around 1591. We even have new versions today (Romiette and Julio, Letters to Juliet, “Love Story” by T-Swift, for example).

Each group read a different source text for Romeo and Juliet and then prepared a skit version of that story to present next class. Read all the stories here: Source Stories.

HW: None. Finish your album art and explanation if not done. Bring your RJ book/iPod/nook/etc. next class or I’ll issue you a textbook.