Friday, 1/23/2009

Howdy, all!

AP ENGLISH

Reading Journal

• We starred our most thoughtful/insightful Reading Journal response for both the Nobokov reading and "Popular Mechanics".  I talked with about half the class, one at a time back at my desk.  I listened to their responses, and I made suggestions for "beefing up" responses with examples from the texts to support arguments made in the Journal.  I'll chat the the other half of the class on Monday.  
  

"Popular Mechanics"

• We had a lengthy discussion about this very short story.  :-)  People made lots of insightful observations.
  

Writing Assignment

• I read Barth's "Minimalism" essay aloud (page 9), and we talked a little about what minimalism as a writing style might be.  I handed out the essay assignment and the writing rubric, and we spent about thirty-five minutes on this timed essay.  Everyone saved his/her work on the Student Volume in the "AP English" folder so we can look at them on the Big Screen during writing workshop next week.
  

Homework

• Read the Perrine article, pages 10-14 in your book.  Annotate and/or highlight as you read.
  
• Respond to Reading Journal questions 1-4 (not 5).
  
• Pace your Frankenstein reading so that you can finish the book by classtime Wednesday, please.
  

CREATIVE WRITING

Homework Due

• Worksheet over pages 4-5 in your book.
  

Writing Lesson

• We reviewed why we want to avoid cliche's in our writing.
  
• We finished having each person in class share his/her strongest phrasing.
  
• We read the cliché's on pages 19-20, putting a check mark by the ones we'd heard before, and a question mark by ones we had not.  We discussed both lists.
  

Collaborative Writing

• We got into trios and work on the Trio Cliché Story (p. 21).  Most groups got a good start on their stories.  We'll have fifteen minutes on Monday to finish them up, and then we're going to share them aloud.
  

Housekeeping

• We got our folders and put our names on them.
  
• We got back Free Write #1 and logged it into our folder.
  

Homework

• Journal #1
  

ADVANCED CREATIVE WRITING

Writing Assignment

• We spent the first twenty minutes typing "Free from Grammar", p. 2 in your text.
  

Workshop

• We finished the "I Had the Weirdest Dream" poems, excepts Brit's, which we'll do Monday?
  

Writing Lesson

• Alternate Word Definitions--we went to page fourteen and had a giggle over these.  We'll come up with our own next week.  :-)
  

Homework

• "Still Life", p. 3
  
• Make sure it has a title, and make sure it's typed, and make sure it's ready to hand in when you walk in the door Monday, please.