Course Recap for Thursday, May 7th, 2015

Final Blog Post Topic
Thank you all for a wonderful semester.  I want you all to answer the following questions for your final (required) blog post.

1. What was your favorite project this semester and why?
2. What was your least favorite and why?
3. What have you learned?
4. What do you wish you had learned?

For those of you who need to make up blog posts, here are a list of the topics that were previously assigned and a few extras (because I'm nosy).

1.  What  is a story? What makes a good story?
2.  What is a piece of writing you enjoyed reading in high school and why? What is a piece of writing you hated reading and why?
3.  Review of a movie you saw recently
4.  What is your guilty pleasure?
5.  What is a word you personally find offensive that others may use casually? Why don't you like it? OR What is a word that you use casually that another person found offensive?  Do you still use it? Why?
6.  What are your summer break plans?
7.  Where were you when a national/international tragedy and triumph occurred (think the Mad Men episode)?
8.  What TV shows are you obsessed with?
9.  What is your major and why?
10. Are you a creative person?  If yes, how so? If not, why not?
11.  Chocolate or vanilla? Why?
12.  If you're a reader, what was the last good book you read? Why did you like it?
13.  Besides social media sites (Twitter, Facebook, etc), what other websites do you frequently visit?
14.  Team Android or Team iPhone? Why?
15.  How much did you love me and the class?  (I'm kidding.  Don't write about this.)

Homework

• Final Draft of Historical Narrative and I-Search Paper (Fri, May 8th by midnight)
• Revision Project including your revision and you Letter to the Reader (Mon. May 11th)
• Have a wonderful, wonderful summer!!!!!!!!! (ongoing until September 2015)

Course Recap for Thursday, April 30, 2015

ANNOUNCEMENT: We will not be holding class on Tuesday, May 5th.  Instead, I will be holding open conferences in The Bridge.  I will be there all day Tuesday from 9am until 8pm.  Please come to discuss any concerns you may have about your papers, your current grade in the class, etc.  We will be holding class Thursday, May 7th.

Tips for Your I-Search Paper: View this paper as a defense of your narrative and your research process.  You are writing this paper to prove the amount of effort you put in to learn all you could about your time period and to let me know that your narrative is based on real factual information.

• Review the sample paper.
• Make sure each section flows and are connected to one another.  It should read like one paper not 3 different papers.
• The first section should give us a really good idea of what you knew about your time period prior to research.  Your last section should reveal how much more you've learned.  We should see a progression.  If you haven't learned anything, you didn't do this project correctly.
• The second section is where you can air your grievances.  What did you like about the process?  What didn't you like?  What did you find easy?  What did you find hard?  How was the group process?
• The last section's goal is to show me the ways in which you managed to use the information you learned from 10 different sources in your narrative.  Discuss similar sources in the same paragraph.  For instance, if you used two different sources to learn about what the Gulf War was like, talk about those two sources in the same paragraph, and then talk about the sources that provided you with information on popular culture in the same paragraph, etc.
• Be sure to provide specific information from each source and to properly cite them in your piece.
• Don't just give me the information you learned.  Explain how it influenced what you wrote in your narrative. 
• INCLUDE A WORKS CITED PAGE.  I need to know which sources you specifically used in your narrative.  If you used most of the sources your group collected, all you'll have to do is copy and paste from your annotated bib (citation only/don't copy the description).

Plans for Next Week

Check the Revision Project Assignment Sheet for instructions on your final project.  You will be revising and expanding a previously written paper for your final project.  If you choose to revise a paper from the first or second project, you could potentially earn a higher score than your original.  If you like the scores you received on your first two projects, I would advise you to revise and expand your last project.  If you missed class and are confused, you should come see me Tuesday in the Bridge.  If you're not sure where to go with your revision, you should see me Tuesday in the Bridge. If you're worried about where your grade is, you should see me Tuesday in The Bridge.

Extra Credit Opportunity

If you review the historical narrative assignment sheet, you will remember there was an extra credit project offered.  You must have that completed by Thursday, May 7th.  You will be informally presenting this to the class.  You're just going to show us what you created and explain how it relates to your narrative.  You will also receive extra credit just for attending class on Thursday.  You can receive up to 75 points extra credit by attending class on Thursday and presenting a visual piece.  

Homework

• Rough Draft of I-Search Paper (due tomorrow Friday, May 1st) (I will not provide feedback for any papers I do not receive on the due date)
• Extra Credit Visual Piece (due Thursday, May 7th)
• Final Draft of Historical Narrative and I-Search Paper (due Friday, May 8th)
• Revision Project (due Monday, May 11th)

Course Recap for Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Homework

• First Draft of Narrative (due Thursday via Google Docs and printed copy in-class)
• First Draft of I-Search (due Friday via Google Docs)

Annotated Bibliography

Your annotated bibliography has several purposes:

1. To practice your skills creating a Works Cited/Reference Page in the appropriate research format (in this case MLA).
2. To practice your skills using in-text citations if you choose to directly quote from any of your sources in your annotation
3. To show the instructor that you know how to synthesize data.  That you can find a reliable source and identify the information from the source that will be most useful to you and your group members' purposes.
4. To provide your group members with a master list of sources to choose from that covers as much information as the five of you could find on the time period you are writing about.
5. To help your group members determine which sources will be useful for the narrative they intend to write. 

Your descriptions of the source should give a brief summary of the overall purpose of the source and then point to specific details that you and/or your group members might find useful.  Check the Sample Annotated Bib in the right hand corner for more of an idea of what it should look and sound like.

Get your research done as soon as possible.  The sooner that is out of the way, the sooner you can start on the narrative and the i-Search Paper.  

i-Search Paper (where you should be at this point)

We wrote a very rough draft of the Intro to your i-search paper on Tuesday.  It should be at least a paragraph answering these two questions:what do a know about my time period/event before I research it and what do I want to know, what must I learn in order to accurately tell a story set during this moment.  

The second section of the i-Search paper is a description of your search.  How did you find the information you are going to be putting in your annotated bibliography?  Answers to the following questions can help fulfill this section

1. Where did you find your sources? The web? The library? What search engines did you use?  Did you request help from anyone?
2. How did you keep track of the sources you found? Did you write a list? Copy and paste links into a document? 
3. How did keep track of the useful information in each source? Did you print and highlight articles? Copy and paste?
4. How did you determine what information was useful and what information wasn't?
5. You probably won't use every source you look at? How did you decide which sources to keep and which ones to disregard?
6. How did you and your group exchange information? Did you meet in person? Chat online? How well did you work together?
7. What issues did you struggle with? Did you have a hard time finding the answers to any particular questions?  Were you able to stay organized?  Were you able to stay sane?  

These are the things you will have to think about for the second section of your i-search Paper.  We will talk about the last section once your research is completed and you've started on your narrative.  

Homework

• Annotated Bibliography due Thursday April 23rd

Course Recap for Thursday March 26, 2015

Homework


Friday Blog Post Topic: What is a word that you personally find offensive that other people may use casually?  Why don't you like it?  If you're extremely open-minded and are never offended by anything, tell me about a time that you casually used a word you thought was harmless but someone else found it offensive.  What did you learn from this experience?First Draft of Short Story Analysis (Due Tuesday) Pick one of the 3 stories we talked about this week to write your analysis on.

Course Recap for Monday, March 24, 2015

Homework

• Read Virgins by Danielle Evans
• Friday Blog Post Topic: What is a word that you personally find offensive that other people may use casually?  Why don't you like it?  If you're extremely open-minded and are never offended by anything, tell me about a time that you casually used a word you thought was harmless but someone else found it offensive.  What did you learn from this experience?

Course Recap for Thursday March 19, 2015

Homework

• Read The Story of an Hour by Kate Chopin and The All-Girl Football Team by Lewis Nordan.  Come to class prepared to talk about whatever themes you see in the two stories (Due Tuesday)
• Read Virgins (Due Thursday)

*You're going to pick one of these 3 stories to write your short story analysis on.  The rough draft will be due Tuesday March 30th

Sonny's Blues Discussion Questions

1. What is the conflict between the two brothers? Why don't they get along? How is the conflict resolved?
2. What are some reoccurring images or ideas in the piece?
3. What do you make of the story the mother tells about the father's brother?
4. Why does Sonny turn to drugs?
5. What role does music play in the piece?

Course Recap for Thursday, March 5, 2015

Homework

• Complete the Exercise on Page 13 of The Pocket Prof (Due Tuesday)
• Rough Draft of Song Review-bring in one printed copy please (Due Tuesday)
• Read Sonny's Blues (Due Thursday)

Course Recap for Tuesday, March 3, 2015

Homework

• Listen to Royals and fill out the Song Analysis Sheet for it.
  
• Bring in your Pocket Prof
  

 

 

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Course Recap for Tuesday, February 24, 2015

Reviews and Analysis

It is very easy to express love or hate for a piece of art.  It's a little bit harder to defend our love or hate for a piece of art.  A reviewer's goal is to express their opinion about a piece of work and let their readers know if the piece is worth their time.  A reviewer also has to keep in mind that their opinion will be compared against the opinions of others who may not agree with them.  They have to present the best argument for their interpretation of a piece.  Oftentimes, reviewers will analyze and look at the deeper meaning of a piece and its parts to find evidence for their opinion.

Most of us are pretty good at expressing our opinions.  The biggest challenge for this project will be providing analysis of the piece in order to support our opinions.  What is the piece saying?  What point does the piece make?  People rarely enjoy art that delivers messages they disagree with. This is where some of those old skills from former literature classes come into play.  What symbols are present in the piece?  What does the piece say about society?  Art is not created in a vacuum.  Cultural influences have a huge impact on the creators of art.  What societal influences do you think influenced the piece you are reviewing?

For Carrie, we came up with a few different messages from the film.  We looked at the symbols present and saw that there were a lot of symbols concerning purity, blood, and sexuality.  Then we looked to see what we thought the film was saying about those symbols.  We also looked at the characters and what the characters might have represented.  We determined that Carrie sent several messages.  Sexuality is evil.  Relentless bullying creates monsters.  Women are mean and manipulative and men are dumb and easily led by their sexuality.  And there are millions of other messages we could get from the piece if we tried.  Your goal for your own film is to pick an interesting theme for your film.  One that will draw people to it or discourage them from watching it. As long as you can back it up with evidence from the film, your opinion will be valid.

Homework

• Come to class Thursday with the film you want to write about and a potential theme you want to explore.  I suggest picking more than one film, just in case, your first choice doesn't work.

Course Recap for Tuesday, February 17, 2015

Carrie

We watched the first half of the movie, Carrie.  We will be reviewing and analyzing a movie as a class before we do it on our own to make sure we establish good ground rules and techniques for our own personal papers.  The types of questions and issues we discuss concerning Carrie, will be the type of questions or issues you want to look at for the film of your choosing.

Homework

• Read Carrie Movie Review by John Kenneth Muir and Pretty Bloody: Horror Movies and Stereotypes
• Friday's Blog Post Prompt: Your own personal review of Carrie.  Tell us how you feel about the film and why and address one message or theme the film sends and how you feel about it.

Course Recap for Tuesday, February 10, 2015

Tips for a Good Final Draft

1.  Make sure your central thesis is clear.  If either of your readers had a hard time distinguishing the the thesis or if the thesis they found is different from the one you intended, find ways to make it clearer.
2. The more specific you are in your narrative the better.  Even if your readers didn't point out areas where you could use more details or scenes you should expand, look for places yourself where you feel like you can add more.  Maybe there was a scene you wanted to expand but didn't have enough time to do it.  Add it now.
3.  Sometimes, however, less is more.  If there is any unnecessary information, cut it.  If your original draft was 5 pages, I'll be okay if it becomes a bit shorter if it is in the best interest of the story you're trying to tell.  Everything should tie back somehow to your central theme.
4.  Give your narrative a title.  And don't title it Personal Narrative.
5.  Actively work to make changes in your rough draft.  Do not just go and change a word here or there.  Revision means to take another look, to re-imagine, to look at it in a new light.  There is always some way we can make our work stronger, more interesting.  Take a chance.

Final Draft Due Friday, February 20, 2015 at midnight via Google Docs.

Course Recap for Thursday, February 5, 2015

Homework

• Check the Narrative Assignment Sheet underneath Class Documents.

Course Recap for Tuesday, February 3, 2015

Dialogue

We looked at Hills Like White Elephants by Ernest Hemingway, a deceptively simple story.  The story is told primarily through dialogue, and we looked at the dialogue to see how what the characters say help to us see the story. From the dialogue we learn details about the characters, about who they are, about their relationship (how it is now and how it used to be). We learn about the setting and the action is moved forward.  But most importantly we learn about the conflict of the story.  The majority of the dialogue provides us with conflict.  The man and the woman want different things from one another in order for one to get what they want the other person has to give up something.  There is no winning.

Conflict

Conflict is basically a character wanting something, and there being someone or something preventing them from getting what they want.  If there is no conflict, there is no story.  For your narrative, you will be the main character.  Think of times when you really wanted something and tried to get it and something prevented you from getting there.  This'll be a good jumping off point for your narrative.

Homework

• Read "The Unauthorized Biography of Me" by Sherman Alexie and "In the Fifties" by Leonard Michaels. Write a brief paragraph for each piece explaining what the thesis for the narratives are.  Why do the authors choose to highlight those events in their lives?  What do the events they choose to talk about have in common?  Upload this via Google Docs.

Course Recap for Thursday, January 29, 2015

Description vs Narrative

What is the difference between a description of a person or place and a narrative about a person or place?  That's the question we attempted to answer in our discussion today.

Homework

• Read "Hills Like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway.  Look at the lines of dialogue and in the margins take notes of the information that is revealed there.  Does the line tell you something about the characters, about the plot? What function does it serve? What do you learn about the story from each line? Based on your notes, write a paragraph summing up what you learned about the function of dialogue in this story.

Course Recap for Tuesday, January 27, 2015

Last week we talked about how to describe inanimate objects.  This week we are going to talk about describing people. 

Characterization

How do we characterize other people?  How do we show people who we are?  We looked at several pieces to determine the kind of details we can use to reveal important information about our people.

In Sister Flowers, Mrs. Bertha Flowers is a classy, intelligent, forbidding, yet kind woman.  We learned this from information about the way she dresses (she wears gloves), the way other people act around her (people carry her groceries), the way she speaks (she enunciates everything very clearly), and the way she treats others (the respect she shows Marguerite's mother).  These are all examples of showing information instead of telling it.  Angelou could have just said that Mrs. Flowers was well-educated but she decided to show us this fact instead. 

In the prose poem "Girl" by Jamaica Kincaid, we found out a lot of information about the speaker based on the advice she gives us.  We were able to determine she was a poor, minority woman who believed in keeping up appearances.  She values traditional gender roles but she also want her daughter to stand up for herself.  Nowhere in the poem does the speaker say "I am old-fashioned" or "I'm Caribbean" but we can infer this from the little details she provides us about her everyday life.  The same thing is true for "The Day Lady Died" by Frank O'Hara.  We were able to determine that the speaker was a white, wealthy, super-educated, older (possibly retired) male who loves Billie Holiday without him telling us those things directly.  We know this based on the details he provides us of his daily routine. 

Your challenge over the next few days is to write about a place or person significant to you.  You need to determine first what overall impression you want the reader to leave with in the end. Let that guide what details you decide to include.  Try and be specific as possible and avoid telling whenever possible.  Instead of saying Mike is really neat, say Mike wipes every surface of his house with a wet cloth everyday.  Instead of saying Shelly is really sweet, tell us about how when you first met Shelly she offered you her umbrella when it was pouring rain because she knew you had to walk down the street to your car.  Don't just say the park was empty.  Tell us how you were able to hear the squirrel climbing up the tree even though he was several feet away from you and how each breath you took echoed loudly in the darkness.  Not only will it paint a more vivid image, it will also be a lot more interesting to read.

Homework

• 500 word paper describing a person or place that is significant to you via Google Docs. (Due Thursday)
• Friday's Blog Post Prompt: What is story?  What makes a good story (Due Friday)

Course Recap for Thursday January 22, 2014

We took it back to the basics in order to make sure that we establish a common vocabulary and a basic understanding of how the English language works.  First we discussed the basic parts of speech.

Parts of Speech

• Nouns are person, places, or things.
• Verbs are actions or words that express existence such as is, was, has
• Sentences are a group of word that express a complete thought via a subject and a verb.  You must have both in order for it to be a sentence.  There must be some noun doing something in your sentence.
• Paragraphs are a collection of sentences centered around a specific idea or concept called the main idea.  
• These are the building blocks of most forms of writing.

Paragraphs are typically organized using a specific text structure.  They are organized to achieve a specific goal.  Examples of text structure include:

• Description
• Narration
• Definition
• Persuasion
• Process
• Cause and Effect
• Compare and Contrast

We will be focusing on description over the next week or so.

Then we talked about genre.  Genre is a category of writing with it's own set of rules and conventions.  Often times several different text structures can be used in the same genre of writing sometimes even the same paper.  Text messages can be descriptive, narrative, and or persuasive.  News articles may include paragraphs that describe a place, define a concept, and compare and contrast two related issues, all in the same article.  You will become a more versatile writer when you can determine what text structures are appropriate for what genres of writing and how do they change from genre to genre.

Homework due by the beginning of class Tuesday

• Read "Sister Flowers" by Maya Angelou pg 87-92
• Answer Questions for Close Reading on page 92 in a Google Document. 
• Your first two blog posts are due.  No prompt for this week.  Write about whatever you want.  Remember that your Friday post is your first post for your blog (unless you already completed one, then you're ahead of the game), so you might want to introduce yourself and give your audience an idea of who you are so they can know what to expect when they read your blog.  

Welcome to ENGL 151 Freshman Composition

Hello I'm Mickey Moses, and I am your instructor for ENGL 151.  Welcome to the class, and welcome to our blog.  This blog is our class's central hub.  Here you can find class recaps, homework assignments, readings, and helpful links. 

Our class syllabus is located to the right of this post underneath Class Documents.  It lists the rules and expectations for this course.  We will read through the entire document in class, but some of the major points you want to remember are....

1. Come to class everyday.  Attendance is important and necessary in order for you to pass this class.
   
2. Complete all your assignments.  You cannot get points for work you do not complete.
   
3. Be respectful of me and your classmates. 
   
4. Don't cheat. 
   
5. Ask questions and participate in class discussions.   

How you should be in class.





I'm looking forward to getting to know all of you.

Homework for Thursday January 22

You will complete this assignment on Google Docs (docs.google.com). I want you think about something you've written over the past few days.  It can be anything, a grocery list, a text message, an email.  Who was your audience for this piece of writing? What was your purpose?  What goal did you hope to accomplish with it?  Now reflect on how your audience and purpose affected what you said and how you said it.  Answer these questions in a brief paragraph.  Be sure to hit the share button and share it with me (micealaya.moses@gmail.com), or it won't be turned in.