Pre-AP English Students: Reading Assignments

English I: You need to have read through Chapter 19 of Percy Jackson: Lightning Thief. Better yet, finish the novel!

English II: You need to have finished all five staves (chapters) of A Christmas Carol. (You also have an IWA deadline and a Socratic Seminar to prepare for.)

You've got one week left of break. Plenty of time to enjoy yourself and complete your assignments.

Pre-AP English II: Pearl & Christmas Carol Socratic Seminar Questions

When we return from break, we'll have a Socratic Seminar for Pearl & Christmas Carol. If you were absent on the 21st (or didn't finish the assignment in class) please email me two examples of each of the following question types (answers not needed this time). Whenever possible, ask questions that could be answered with evidence from either book.:

WORLD CONNECTION QUESTIONS
How do you treat people who approach you to give to charity?

Do you believe in ghosts? Explain.


CLOSE-ENDED QUESTIONS
How are Juana and Juan Tomas related?

According to Marley, how did he obtain the chain he carries?


OPEN-ENDED QUESTIONS
Why does Kino see the things he sees in the pearl?

Why does the Ghost of Christmas Past show Scrooge scenes from his youth?


UNIVERSAL THEME / CORE QUESTIONS
What does holding a grudge against others do to a person?

How does Marley’s ghost’s statement “humanity should [be our] business” apply to The Pearl and real life?


LITERARY ANALYSIS QUESTIONS
How might Dickens have written The Pearl if the purpose was to convince the doctor to change his ways?

In Stave One, why does Dickens repeat that Marley is actually dead.

Pre-AP English II: IWA #2 (Better Late Than Never)

[Wasn't aware I hadn't posted this....]

Write a response to the following prompt:

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “Money often costs too much.” Both The Pearl and A Christmas Carol explore the paradox that wealth can carry a great cost to an individual, a family, and/or a community. In a well-developed essay explore the literary strategies Steinbeck or Dickens uses throughout his novella to communicate this idea to the reader.

Tips to success:

Focus on only one of the novellas. Focusing on both The Pearl and A Christmas Carol will immediately result in a REDO grade (no points). If you want to use A Christmas Carol, you must complete reading it in time to proceed through the IWA process.

Do not simply recount the plot or attributes of the characters. Extensive lack of focus on literary devices/technique will result in a REDO grade (no points), not a REWRITE (70 points).

The earlier you turn in a draft that you expect to earn an 85 (only revision is needed) the more likely you are to eventually receive an 85 (your idea of what is revision-only and my idea of what is revision-only may differ) or 100 (because you’ve made the necessary revision, or you refined your essay on your own before you turned it in).

This will be the last time a 70-point grade will be given on an IWA. Last year many students who had never bothered to rewrite an essay during the first semester had a very difficult time during the second semester when an 85 was required to avoid P.A. and/or IWA n.1.

This is also the last time IWAs may be turned in handwritten. Please see the note on the bonus in the next paragraph.

Paper should be about two-pages long, handwritten, or one-page long, typed, double spaced, 12-point Times New Roman (or Garamond, if you’re fancy). Five bonus points will be awarded to properly typed essays.


Daily P.A. for submitters not having achieved a 70 begins Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Drop-Dead (“For Reals”) Deadline: Tuesday, January 8, 2013.

IWA 2.1 and Daily P.A. will be assigned on to students who do not successfully complete this assignment begins Wednesday, January 9, 2013.

English I (Pre-AP): TPCASTT / "Theme for English B"

In class we began exploring Langston Hughes' "Theme for English B" using the TPCASTT method of poetry analysis. Although I took up your papers before you left class, please continue working on your analysis.

Find an explanation of the TPCASTT method, here.

Find a copy of Hughes' poem, here.

English I (Pre-AP): Poem about Brueghel's "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus"

In class we discussed William Carlos Williams' poem "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus," an ekphrastic poem (a poem written about another work of art) about Pieter Brueghel's painting of the same name.

Look at the painting below, and then write a poem about it. (It doesn't have to rhyme; it can be a haiku as long as it follows the 5-7-5 syllable rule.)

Click image for larger version

English I (Pre-AP): Punctuate "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus"

Please punctuate William Carlos Williams' poem "Landscape with the Fall of Icarus." There are a total of five sentences, so please add capital letters(4) and periods (5), where appropriate. Adding commas may help you make better sense of the poem, too.

If you lost the copy you received in class, copy or print out the poem here.

Due: Monday, December 17, 2012.

Pre-AP English II: Pearl Chapter 4-6 Test Preview

Tomorrow, you will have a test on Chapters 4-6 of John Steinbeck's The Pearl. Be prepared.

If you do not already know what the following literary terms, mood/tone words, and vocabulary words mean, please take this opportunity to (re)familiarize yourself with them.

Literary devices/techniques

• Anaphora
• Antithesis
• Foreshadowing
• Hyperbole
• Irony
• Oxymoron
• Paradox
• Personification
• Symbolism

Mood/Tone words

• Apprehensive
• Desperate
• Disdainful
• Jovial
• Mournful
• Ominous
• Reflective
• Resigned
• Reverent

Vocabulary words

• Condemnation
• Cunning
• Livelihood
• Persevere
• Prevalent
• Swindled

Pre-AP English II: Symbolism Presentation and Assignment

If you missed class today or just want to revisit the fun, check out the presentation below.

Assignment: Complete the grid below (click to enlarge). You need to only do one of the three (dog, rifle, canoe), but you must do "the pearl." Running through the "how do I determine what symbol may mean" slides in the presentation to help you think through the process.

Due date: Monday, December 10.

English I (Pre-AP): Test Preview

Due to circumstances beyond my control, there will not be a test tomorrow. I know you were all eagerly anticipating the opportunity to demonstrate your knowledge and mastery of the material, but the test will have to wait until Monday.

Please do your best to contain your disappointment.

Pre-AP English II: Pearl Vocabulary

I've created a set of vocabulary flashcards over at quizlet.com. Load them onto your digital device and show me by Friday for extra credit. (Or go old-school and copy onto 3x5 cards.)

You can also view the flashcards below and play vocabulary-based games (no extra credit, but it's fun).

English I (Pre-AP): Lightning Thief Vocabulary

I've created a set of vocabulary flashcards over at quizlet.com. Load them onto your digital device and show me by Friday for extra credit. (Or go old-school and copy onto 3x5 cards.)

You can also view the flashcards below and play vocabulary-based games (no extra credit, but it's fun).

Pre-AP English II: EOC Reading Retest Tips

Remember: for the Short-Answer responses, your answer (idea) must be expressed differently than what text evidence you use to support it. If you repeat the information in the supporting text, you run the risk (likelihood) of scoring a zero (0) rather than a one or two (1 or 2).

Your text evidence needs to be embedded in your own words. At least start off with a citation from the text: As Clarence says in paragraph 14, "blah blah blah."

Better yet, follow up the quote with analysis that clarifies an explanation of your original answer: When the author says "yadda yadda yadda," it makes it clear that .... (Your clarification should be expressed in different words than your original answer and the supporting text.)

Crossover: For a graphic organizer to help you with the crossover (or "multiple selection" short-answer), click the graphic, above. Essentially, it's two single-selection responses with an "umbrella" response covering both.

Multiple Choice tips
On questions asking for definitions, make sure that the definition you pick fits the context of the sentence/paragraph where it is being used. It is likely that multiple answers will match definitions given in the dictionary.

On questions that ask "what word/phrase helps you understand the meaning of" a phrase in the text, what they're looking for is what word is a synonym for the word/phrase in question or which answer best matches the definition of the word/phrase in question. Again, it is likely that all the answers appear in the portion of the text being looke at.