Episode Notes Instructions

For each of the five episodes, you will be responsible for taking notes in a way that demonstrates your active viewing and critical thinking. There are two purposes to this task: 1) to engage your mind in a way that will make your experience with this text more meaningful and 2) to have a record of that experience that could be used for summative projects (a paper, your IO, etc.).

To complete this assignment, you may respond to the stimuli I have listed, keep your own set of reactions, or some combination of the two. If you choose not to use the list of stimuli, here are some suggestions for what you might record:

• What are the broad themes suggested or questions raised by the narrative?

• What do the characters’ choices and the actors’ depictions of those choices reveal about their values, conflicts, motivations, and identities?

• What literary techniques (symbolism, juxtaposition, irony, foreshadowing, allusion, etc.) are used and what is their effect on the viewer?

• How does the set design, lighting, framing, and cinematography contribute to the mood of the text?

• What is interesting or significant about the language of the dialogue?

• How does narrative time impact the viewer’s experience with the story?

• What questions does the episode raise for you? These could be questions of comprehension (what’s happening here? what does this mean?), questions of ethics, questions of significance, etc.

• What connections does this episode raise for you? You could make connections to other literary works, current or historical events, or your own life.