1.1 Course Introduction

Wednesday August 13

Welcome to our exploration of literature! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Examine and discuss how literary practice can influence our lives.

• Access online course materials including Google Classroom.

• Create your writing portfolio folder in Google Drive and share it with me.

Agenda Items

• Greetings & Introductions - M&M Game

• Intro to Literary Practice - read, annotate, reflect, discuss

  • What words and phrases stand out to you? Why?

  • What does it make you wonder? 

  • What are your key takeaways? What are you excited to try in your own literary practice? 

  • What conversations do you hope to inspire through your writing?

• Online Materials

  • Google Classroom

• Google Drive Writing Portfolios (see video)

• Syllabus Review & Discussion

Assignments

• Share your Writing Portfolio folder in Google Drive to Ms. Ntoso

1.2 Intro to Journal Writing & Mentor Texts

Thursday August 14

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Explore and discuss ideas for your journal writing.

• Use a mentor text to help you experiment in your journal writing.

• Practice freewriting as a critical first step in the creative writing process.

• Share your writing and give specific positive feedback on a classmate's writing.

Agenda Items

• Overview of the Creative Writing Process

• Intro to Journal Writing

  • Read & Annotate: ‘Messy attics of the mind’: what’s inside a writer’s notebook

  • Reflection & Discussion

  • Mentor Texts: Journal Writing 

  • Vocabulary: digress, reflexive writing, extensive writing

•  Journal Writing: Freewriting

• Sharing & Feedback

Assignments

• Journal Writing: Freewriting using a mentor text to experiment with writing style

1.3 Narrator & POV

Friday August 15

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Narrator

• Define first person, second person and third person point of view (POV). 

• Use a mentor text to help you experiment with POV in your writing.

• Write at least one paragraph reflecting on your work in English class this week.

Agenda Items

• Mentor Texts - annotate & examine POV & literary techniques

•  Journal Writing: POV

• Sharing & Feedback

Assignments

• Journal Writing: Freewriting using a mentor text to experiment with POV and literary techniques

1.4 Author Bio

Monday August 18

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Write a one paragraph author bio, including your personal background, strengths, personality, preferences, literary influences, and dreams.

• Proofread your writing to correct errors in capitalization, punctuation, grammar, and spelling.

• Suggest names for our literary magazine.

• Reflect on your work in English class this week.

Agenda Items

• Author Bio

• Suggest a Name for Our Literary Blog

• Reflection

Assignments

• 1.4 Author Bio: graded based on specific details, capitalization, punctuation, spelling and grammar, and explaining your thinking with specific details - submit in Google Classroom

1.5 Details & Imagery

Tuesday August 19

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Write for at least 10 minutes, incorporating imagery and specific concrete details, using a mentor text as a guide.

• Share your writing and give specific positive feedback on a classmate's writing.

Agenda Items

• Notes on Imagery & Specific Details:

  • Concrete vs. Abstract -The Making of a Story by Alice LaPlante, pg 109

  • Start with the particulars -The Making of a Story by Alice LaPlante, pg 113-116

  • Sensory language & how emotions are experienced -From Where You Dream by Robert Olen Butler

  • Imagery works on two levels -The Making of a Story by Alice LaPlante, pg 111-112

• Mentor Text: "One Day Tiff Was Sad Because It Was the Tenth Anniversary of Her Mother's Death & She Just Really Wanted to Go See Michael Jackson" by Khadijah Queen

• Journal Writing: Imagery & Specific Details

• Small Group Sharing & Feedback

Assignments

• Journal Writing: specific concrete details & imagery

1.6 Purpose, Context & Audience

Wednesday August 21

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Name the elements of the rhetorical situation: exigence, author, purpose, audience, context, and message.

• Analyze and critique authors' explanations of the relationship between poetry, politics, and social consciousness.  

• Discuss what makes a poem "work."

• Collaborate to develop a definition and rubric for critiquing poetry.

Agenda Items

• Rhetorical Situation Overview

• Relationship between literature, politics and social consciousness 

  • • “The Hour of Poetry” (excerpt) in And Our Faces, My Heart, Brief as Photos by John Berger

    • What Is Found There by Adrienne Rich (excerpt/quotes)

    • “The Writer’s Commitment” by Claribel Alegria (excerpt/quotes)

    • Why Poetry by Matthew Zapruder (excerpts/quotes)

    • "The Voice of Authority" (excerpt) from Poetry as Persuasion by Carl Dennis

• Small Group Discussion

  • What makes poetry unique as a form of language?

  • What does it mean for a poem to be authentic?

  • What is the "labor" of a poem? What work does a poem do?

  • How does putting something into words become a form of hope?

  • What is "politics"? What is "political"? Where does politics show up in our personal lives and our social relationships? Is there a such thing as "apolitical"? How can "apolitical" poetry still be a form of caring? Does the caring make it political?

  • What makes a poem "work"? Come up with your own definition or guidelines for what makes a poem "work."

• Whole Group Discussion - Co-Creating a Poetry Rubric

  • What makes a poem "work"?

  • What questions can we ask of ourselves when we are revising and critiquing our own poems?

Assignments

• Poetry Rubric - due Monday 8/25 on whiteboard & shared Google Doc

1.7 Exploring Social Issues through Poetry

Wednesday August 21 - Thursday August 22

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Read and annotate a poem, identifying craft choices that influence meaning. 

• Identify and discuss examples of imagery, metaphor, and text evidence that reflect the theme of the poem of a poem.

• Write a one-sentence statement of the theme of a poem.

• Research and take notes on the historical, geographical, social, and biographical context for a literary work.

• Generate questions for discussing context, craft, ideas, meaning, and connections inspired by the text.

• Analyze and discuss observations and insights related to context, craft, ideas, meaning, and connections inspired by a poem. 

• Reflect and respond in writing or audio recording with your thoughts inspired by the reading and discussion.

Agenda Items

• Read & take notes on your mentor text

  • Read & take notes on your mentor text

    •  “We Lived Happily During the War” by Ilya Kaminsky

    • Night by Ennio Moltedo, translated by Marguerite Feitlowitz (excerpt)

    •  [...] by Fady Joudah (selected poem)

  • structure and style of the opening sentence & opening paragraphs

  • examples of imagery and specific concrete details

  • commentary on significance & meaning

  • your questions

• Researching Rhetorical Situation for your mentor text

• Discussion Questions

  • Review our poetry rubric. Does this poem work? Use text evidence to explain.

• Small Group Discussion

Assignments

• Online Discussion - Exploring Social Issues through Poetry - Literary Reflection & Comments to consider in revising our rubric - due Thursday 8/22, respond in Google Classroom

• Poetry Rubric - due Monday 8/25 on whiteboard & shared Google Doc

1.8 Writing a First Draft

Friday August 23

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Write a first draft of a poem, essay, story, or play that includes imagery and specific concrete details.

Agenda Items

• Mentor text reading & response

• Write your first draft

  • Identify words, phrases and sentences from your journal writing that you want to incorporate in your draft

  • What POV will you try using?

  • What mentor text(s) do you want to use? What technique do you want to start off with?

• 
  

Assignments

• 1.8 First Draft w/ Imagery & Concrete Details - due Sunday August 25 by 11:59pm, submit scanned notes & typed draft in Google Classroom

• Poetry Rubric - due Monday 8/25 on whiteboard & shared Google Doc

1.9 Writing Workshop: Second Draft

Monday August 25

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

Agenda Items

• Terminology: "triggering" subject, "real" subject, center of gravity

• Structure

• Word Choice

• Details & Concrete Imagery

Assignments

• Poetry Rubric - due Monday 8/25 on whiteboard & shared Google Doc

1.10 Exploring Identity as a Writer

Tuesday August 26

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Read and annotate a literary nonfiction text, commenting on ideas and craft choices that influence meaning. 

Agenda Items

• Choose one of the following texts to read & annotate: 

  • James Baldwin essay

  • A Life of Meaning by James Hollis (excerpt)

  • Borderlands | La Frontera by Gloria Anzaldua (excerpt) 

  • Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl (excerpt)

• 
  

Assignments

1.11 Complexity & Nuance Questions

Wednesday August 27

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

Agenda Items

• 
  

• Individual Conferences re: complexity & nuance questions

• Discussion Board posts with Complexity & Nuance Questions

Assignments

• 1.11 Complexity & Nuance Questions Discussion Board Post due Thursday 8/28, respond in Google Classroom

1.12 Epistolary Writing

 Thursday August 28 

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

Agenda Items

• 
  

• Individual Conferences re: complexity & nuance questions

• Discussion Board posts with Complexity & Nuance Questions

Assignments

• 1.13 Deep Conversation Letter to an Author due Friday 9/5

1.13 Embedding Quotes

Tuesday September 3

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Embed quotes from the text using appropriate signal phrase verbs, punctuation and transitions

• Proofread and correct errors in capitalization, punctuation, spelling and grammar.

• Draft your letter.

Agenda Items

• Review Signal Phrases

Assignments

• 1.14 Deep Conversation Letter to an Author due Monday 9/8

1.14 Deep Conversation Letter to an Author

Friday September 5

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

Agenda Items

• Type up your letter

• 
  

Assignments

• 1.14 Deep Conversation Letter to an Author due Monday 9/8

1.15 Socratic Seminar / Literary Discussion & Synthesis

Monday September 8

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Write at least one paragraph responding to ideas in the text.

• Discuss and explain your understanding of a topic using text evidence and commentary to support and explain your ideas.

• Discuss and evaluate the quality and productivity of your group's discussion.

Agenda Items

• Synthesis

  • Review and reflect on the texts we have read:

    • 
      

  • Write your reading reflection - consider creating a mind map or list

    • 
      

• Overview of group discussion notes & evaluation

• Small group discussion

  • 
    

Assignments

• Practice: Small Group Discussion Notes & Evaluation

• Literary Discussion & Synthesis Notes 

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1.16 Writing Workshop: Revision 

Wednesday September 10 

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Write a poem that incorporates imagery and concrete details.

Agenda Items

• Revise second draft or complexity & nuance reflection or letter

• Universal & Profound -- seeing the general in the particular (laPlante 113-116)

• Details -- depth charging, getting more specific

• Mentor Text: Shift

• Write Your Poem 

Assignments

• 1.17 Author's Commentary - due Friday 9/12

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1.17 Author's Commentary with Complexity & Nuance Questions

Thursday September 11

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Write at least 3 paragraphs of author’s commentary. Be sure to: 

  • Explain how highly specific details reflect and imagery reflect themes and ideas explored in the text

  • Use accurate literary terminology in explaining craft choices

  • Use appropriate capitalization, punctuation, spelling, and grammar

Agenda Items

• Journal Writing - Freewriting

• Mentor Text - Imagery & Shift

• Write Your Poem 

Assignments

• 1.17 Author's Commentary - due Friday 9/12

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1.18 Feedback Letter

Friday September 12

Welcome back! My plan for today is to guide you to:

• Write a literary interpretation paragraph that includes text evidence and commentary to support and explain your claim.

  • Write a one sentence thesis statement that presents a defensible claim about your interpretation of the literary piece.

  • Discuss the theme of a story and the author’s use of literary techniques (characterization, imagery/sensory details, context details) to achieve meaning.

• Write a paragraph using appropriate capitalization, punctuation, spelling, and grammar.

• Use text evidence to generate thoughtful observations and questions inspired by a text. 

Agenda Items

• Journal Writing: experiment with POV, voice, structure, pacing, psychic distance

• Literature as mirror/window/door

• Read & annotate

• Claim, evidence, commentary, question

• Online Discussion Posts

Assignments

• 1.16 Feedback Letter due Sunday September 14 by 11:59pm in Google Classroom