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Hi there and welcome!
Please make sure to read the syllabus for this course, ahead of time.
https://sites.google.com/mail.ccsf.edu/zarubin
At the bottom of the syllabus, you can see the homework schdule.
Yes, it's an English class, so there are lots of words in the syllabus, but please read it all so you can set yourself up for success.
You might not realize courses for summer have to be dropped BEFORE the first day of class in order to not receive a "W" on your transcript. Students should always check out summer syllabi before the start of class to avoid a ding on transcripts.
I look forward to getting to know you a little through your work, soon!
Will this class be time consuming and require challenging work? Yes! But here are a few English 1B student takeaways:
I feel I have grown tremendously, and this course is proof of me doing so. Last semester was my first time taking a college level English course, and it allowed me to sharpen and grow a lot of my skills I have used to do well in this class. Mastering these skills and giving my work the best I could with God’s grace has allowed me to see that I have grown as not just a reader, but as a writer as well. The class was hard work, but I am grateful that hard worked pushed me to my maximum, which allowed me to give my best work. In my final reflection last semester, I was really disappointed in myself, for I knew I was capable of producing better work, but did not really understand how that looked or where to start. Wanting a better life for me and my children, having self-awareness and really reflecting on how I can be better, and God allowed me to produce better work. These reasons made me realize that it is me stopping myself from getting the things I want in life, and something just as simple as sharpening up on annotating and interacting with passages on a deeper level consists of that. This semester has also sparked new interests for me: I want to start writing poetry. Before, poetry was very difficult for me to understand, I did not have the reading and comprehension skills that I have now, and I would give up on reading them. Being able to engage over and over with the poem I chose to write about and finding other texts to relate to the poem allowed me to create a system that helps me with understanding poetry. This has made me want to create my own poetry about my past experiences. I want to perfect this skill and maybe write poetry well enough to connect with other people on an emotional level. Literature has also made me more confident in writing, as it has made me realize that writing is not difficult or daunting when you do the necessary steps—annotating, outlining, brainstorming—writing can seem like a breeze. It may seem intimidating at first, but consistent practice of these skills, will start to feel like instinct, which will make writing a paper (no matter the length) feel like instinct.
My reading process has changed a little bit this semester. I have started slowing down and paying closer attention, writing a lot of footnotes. If I don’t understand something, this class has taught me to isolate the difficult passage that and analyze it sentence by sentence. Especially when reading Othello, I had to reread certain passages multiple times and slowly try to interpret what Shakespeare was saying. It was so critically crucial for me to look at punctuation in Shakespeare because that helped me so much in understanding meaning. Even something as small as the placement of a comma, can shift the entire meaning of a line. When reading Othello, I started by looking up words that I didn’t know, defining them and then I saw how each sentence built the next to form a cohesive idea. My engagement as a reader has gone from being a passive reader to an active one. I now write down my questions as I read. I found it interesting that when I had a question about a certain passage in a text, and other students had that question there were a plethora of people with completely different interpretations in discussions. This experience helped me realize that my voice is important and there is not only one “correct” way understand a text. I am so used to analytical stuff, where someone is either right or wrong, that I developed a shyness about giving my own interpretation for fear of looking dumb. This class helped me realize that everyone brings something important to the table. It’s not about being right or wrong, it’s about contribution. Sometimes, somebody’s interpretation of a text could closely align with my own and be more beneficial to MY understanding as a reader.
I worked pretty hard writing the papers in this class, and it actually made me realize that, in a weird way, I kind of enjoy writing essays. Its strange to say because I am not sure if I would just keep writing essays for fun, but I noticed that when the writing is flowing and I am able to explain what I am thinking, it makes me feel really good. I noticed that when I unlock new ideas and the paragraphs start to flow, I get a rush and this makes me feel like I am contributing something to the text. What I hope I keep most from this class is the habit of steadily reading. I searched in Google, “How to become a better writer,” and it actually gave me some pretty good results! It first told me if I want to write the pros, I have to get a subscription to “The New Yorker.” That sounds like a good idea because I am curious about how professionals in their field write. Google also recommended a book on grammar called, “The Elements of Style” by W. Strunk. I downloaded the book and have read little bits here and there, but I look forward to reading it more of it in the next few weeks, before the fall semester starts. Overall, I want to take away the idea that my interpretation of a text is important; not because I am saying something brilliant, but because I am saying something that is my own. In this world of copy-paste answers, it is important to feel good about oneself. Nothing can take away the accomplishment of finishing something and knowing that its mine, even if it is not as polished or relevant as professional analysis.
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