E4 and H4: Independent Reading and Vocabulary for 4/6/15 Quiz

Independent Reading 

• The book must be at least 300 pages or approved by instructor. 
• The book needs to be appropriate to the level of a high school senior in content, context, and reading level. 
• This should NOT be a book you have read for another English class. Pick a book about something you actually want to read.

Essay #1: To be written after chapter four, but prior to the halfway point. It should be 500 words and answer one or more of the following questions––

• What’s the point of view and how well is it executed? Support and explain.
• Are the characters believable? Are they well-written? Support and explain.
• What themes are being set up? How do you know?
• What motifs and symbols seem to be important at this point? Support and explain.

Essay #2: To be written after the halfway point, but prior to the end. It should be 650 words and answer one or more of the following questions––

• How well does the author build the characters? Support and explain.
• Is the plot developed naturally and believably? Support and explain.
• Have the themes continued to be weaved into the narrative? Have new themes become apparent? Explain.
• Are there any significant changes to the motifs and or symbols? Have they been developed further? Support and explain.

Essay #3: To be written after you finish the book. It should be 800 words and answer one or more of the following questions (feel free to bring in and acknowledge other sources)––

• How does the book fit into the time which it was written? Support and explain.
• How did the author’s own experiences influence the themes, plot, and characterizations? Support and explain.
• Does the author do a good job writing an interesting story? What areas could use editing or improvement? Support and explain.

Vocabulary List for 4/6/15 Quiz

• Laconic: using few words; expressing much in few words (they may not say much, but they are worth listening to)
• Lamprophony: loudness and clarity of voice
• Liquisipidous: liquid minded (overly focused on the connections rather than the details); often able to wiggle through the smallest holes in instructions to do what they want, the way they want to
• Loquacious: talking or tending to talk much or freely; talkative; chattering; babbling (often they hide the truth in a tidal wave of words)
• Lugubrious: mournful, dismal, or gloomy, especially in an affected, exaggerated, or unrelieved manner (Eeyore plays at it)
• Lunarganic: grown on the moon without pesticides or chemicals (very expensive and only found in Russia since it's the only country with a known Moon base)
• Marriage: the long-term partnership of like-minded people for support and mutual economic, mental emotional, spiritual, and sexual benefit. (Up until 150 years ago, falling in love was a luxury and people made their marriages work because more than love was riding on them––some people still adopt that view)
• Machiavellian: characterized by subtle or unscrupulous cunning, deception, expediency, or dishonesty (the person who sets up the plan and never gets caught)
• Malaise: a condition of general bodily weakness or discomfort, often marking the onset of a disease

E2: Independent Reading and Vocabulary for 4/6/15

Independent Reading 

• The book must be at least 250 pages or approved by instructor. 
• The book needs to be appropriate to the level of a high school sophomore in content, context, and reading level. 
• This should NOT be a book you have read for another English class. Pick a book about something you actually want to read.

Essay #1: To be written after chapter four, but prior to the halfway point. It should be 500 words and answer one or more of the following questions––

• What’s the point of view and how well is it executed? Support and explain.
• Are the characters believable? Are they well-written? Support and explain.
• What themes are being set up? How do you know?
• What motifs and symbols seem to be important at this point? Support and explain.

Essay #2: To be written after the halfway point, but prior to the end. It should be 600 words and answer one or more of the following questions––

• How well does the author build the characters? Support and explain.
• Is the plot developed naturally and believably? Support and explain.
• Have the themes continued to be weaved into the narrative? Have new themes become apparent? Explain.
• Are there any significant changes to the motifs and or symbols? Have they been developed further? Support and explain.

Essay #3: To be written after you finish the book. It should be 750 words and answer one or more of the following questions (feel free to bring in and acknowledge other sources)––

• How does the book fit into the time which it was written? Support and explain.
• How did the author’s own experiences influence the themes, plot, and characterizations? Support and explain.
• Does the author do a good job writing an interesting story? What areas could use editing or improvement? Support and explain.

Vocabulary List for 4/6/15 Quiz

• Rhetoric: a type of discussion whose chief aim is to persuade the audience to think or act in a particular way; the art of debate (political debates)
• Satire: making a topic or lifestyle look ridiculous through presentation and hyperbole (the daily show, the colbert report, SNL while it was good)
• Shadow: represents the hidden qualities (inner demons) of the hero; represents the suppressed elements of the other characters – things that seem like weaknesses (can be the polar opposite or a doppleganger)
• Shapeshifter: can change form, but usually appears to change from good to evil, mean to kind, friend to lover, etc. (werewolves, some vampires, vessen, coyote)
• Soliloquy: the act of talking while or as if alone (when the character breaks the fourth wall and talks to the audience)
• Sonnet: 14-line poem (three quatrains, one couplet); means “little song” in Italian
• Style: how a speaker or writer uses words to convey a  point or message
• Stanza: a group of lines in a poem separated by an extra space from other groups of lines Subjective: the author incorporates personal experiences or ideas into the information or story (versus objective which is distant and without bias)
• Symbol: a word or phrase that signifies something or has a range of reference (black: death, darkness, long loneliness, all the colors ever)

Another Bibliography Example

Poetry: Human Nature (to be updated)

By 3/2 everyone should be at least four chapters into the handbooks.

• Assignments
• 2/13––turn in one analytical paragraph and one poem or paragraph inspired by the reading
• 2/20––turn in the analytical outline for the song of your choice; make sure your theme song paragraph is in also
• 2/27––turn in one analytical paragraph and one poem or paragraph inspired by the reading
• 3/6––turn in one analytical paragraph and one poem or paragraph inspired by the reading
• 3/13––turn in one analytical paragraph and one poem or paragraph inspired by the reading
• Poems from the Human Nature Packet (analytical poem for each)
• 2/23––"Stanzas for Music": what inspires you?
• 2/24––Emily Dickinson poems: what idea or feeling are you obsessed with?
• 2/25––"The Master": prose poems, allusions, loss
• 3/3––"If": what advice would you pass on to an eight-grader about high school?
• 3/4––Robert Frost: meter, rhythm, revisionist history, and what is the right way to read something? what is the right way to understand something?
• 3/5––"Morning Window": what should be the topics of poems? who says?
• 3/6––e.e. cummings: should we mess with people? why? why not?
• 3/10––"Theme for English B": have you ever flipped an assignment?
• 3/11––At the beach with cummings and Bly: what are your childhood memories? wat are your good memories?
• 3/12––"Poetry": what possesses you and turns you joyfully crazy?

Prepare for March 13: everyone will share a piece of writing (out loud).

English 4: IR Novels and vocabulary for 3/16 quiz

This week you should make it 1/3-1/2 of the way through your books which means all of you will be writing me the first essay this week.

Vocabulary for the March 16 quiz

• Impertinent: intrusive or presumptuous, as persons or their actions; insolently rude; uncivil
• Incognito: having one's identity concealed, as under an assumed name, especially to avoid notice
• Jealousy: resentment against a rival, a person enjoying success or advantage, etc., or against another's success or advantage itself
• Jobing: doing the best one can with the good and the bad that life throws down (references the story of the Judeo-Christian Job)
• Jovial: endowed with or characterized by a hearty, joyous humor or a spirit of good-fellowship
• Karma: the sum of a person’s behavior and intentions will return to him or her and help determine the quality of the next life 
• Kind: to show compassion toward another for no expectation of repayment
• Kitsch: something of tawdry design, appearance, or content created to appeal to popular or undiscriminating taste
• Laconic: using few words; expressing much in few words

E2: Final push on the novels and vocabulary for the 3/16 quiz

Finish 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Life of Pi this week. I'm hoping to start the book-related essays Wednesday.

Vocabulary for the March 16, 2015

• Irony: the meaning implied differs dramatically from the meaning expressed (literary term, figurative language)
• Metrical Verse: a structure of lines, rhythmic energy, and repetitive sound; meant to be read aloud (poetry, duh)
• Memoir: the mostly true story of what the author has learned through life (how is this different from an autobiography?)
• Mentor: teaches and protects the hero; Gives the hero magical gifts to help complete the quest; Often tied to nature or religion; could be a failed hero who is trying to help the next generation (another archetype)
• Myth: stories told in pre-literate cultures to explain the universe, mankind’s existence, and how to live in community; a culture's sacred stories
• Objective: the author presents the information or story with a detached tone (type of pov)
• Pathos: passions, sufferings, or feelings of an individual; in rhetoric it is the emotional manipulation used in an argument (related to ethos and logos in rhetoric)
• Plot: events and actions in a story and the order they are set to achieve a particular emotional or artistic effect (literary device)
• Point of View: the way a story gets told; the way an author presents characters, dialogue, action, setting, and events (literary device)