Sept 17, (11)

Discussions of the hour

Students started with Kate Chopin's "The Story of an hour" and after reading they were given some multiple choice questions on the short story. We treated this like a test. In discussing the questions it lead to a quick lesson on irony, and then some small discussion on the short story. Some understandings were had so students were asked to write down tone and theme.

Next Class: more elements of fiction and writing prep.

Sept 16, (10)

Discussions on Wall Paper

Today, we shuffled the groups and spoke on four big ideas about "The Yellow Wallpaper". The ideas were; 

What does “The Yellow Wallpaper” say about each of the following topics: 

• The Gender Hierarchy of Marriage

• The Dangers of the Private Sphere 

• The Need for Creative Self-Expression 

• Desire to Control One’s Own Life 

Finally, we spoke about what tomorrow will be, as I will give a short story and then give time to answer multiple choice questions. We will also look at more elements of fiction if we have time. 

Next Class: Students try their hand at multiple choice questions and we look at more elements of fiction.

Sept 15 (9)

Discussion for Emily

Students split into groups and dug into "A Rose for Emily" we then started discussing it as a class. Structure, Language, Character, Symbols and Setting  were all discussed and a theme was arrived at with a level of confidence. 

Next Class: We look at "The Yellow Wallpaper"

Sept 12 (8)

"The Hills Like White Elephants" and we talked about the elephant

We moved on to the Ernest Hemingway's "Hills like White Elephants". Students had a good sense of what this story was about. We spent time discussing it, looking at character, and a lot at setting and what it reveals, including the characters movements and position in that setting. We ended with trying to think of thematic ideas for this one too. 

Next Class: We dig into Faulkner's "A Rose for Emily."

Sept 11 (7)

"Girl" an examination

We started out with the Jamaica Kincaid's "Girl" and made sense of the story. We structured our discussion today with some assistance. Students had the opportunity to self select groups for comfort today, and I gave a focus of the literary element to focus on. It was structure. From there we deepened it and focused on even more specific aspects like punctuation, and the significance of the instructions. Students would discuss and then I would interrupt with some focus and then back they would go. Overall we covered topics like structure, tone, technique and character. We attempted to come up with some thematic ideas. 

Next Class: "The Hills Like White Elephants" discussed

Sept 5 (3)

Annotation to Explanation - Part I

I asked students if they are not lambs right now? We then looked at William Blake's "The Lamb" and made some observations about it.  Then, we continued with our exploration of "First Sight". Students were asked to summarize in one sentence. We then looked at imagery, and briefly spoke of mood, and word choice, and then worked up to tone. This was practice to how we analyze.

Today was part one of the lesson of annotation to explanation/ interpretation. We will continue next class. I will post the power point on next class's entry. 

Next Class: Tone Shared, Theme explored, Topic Sentences written.