Pun Intended: Class Log & Discussions

Totally my fault...

Yesterday I read Harry Potter from 12:30 - 12:30 and finished it, (I did make it to the gym for an hour, though!) so... yeah, I didn't update.  But as far as the book is concerned, I was not disappointed.

Thursday: We read "The Things They Carried" by Tim O'Brien and took our vocabulary test.  All grades were completed and report cards handed out.

Friday: Last day!  We watched "Finding Forrester," and went home!  VACATION!  (For all of three days, for me.)

Not my fault...

Typepad was down yesterday when I was ready to update, so here is all the excitment you may have missed:

Tuesday: We read A Long Way Gone, got some svocabulary out of the way, then began reading Hemingway's short story, "Big Two Hearted River."  We also finished up our group projects involving "A Modest Proposal" and the concept of satire. 

Today: We watched the movie Paradise Now and continued to think about literature/art with a social conscious and/or message.  The remainder of the hour was spent looking at grades and make up work.  Vocab test tomorrow, and all work due, also. 

The Last Week!

After the excitement of last week, let's finish with a smooth run.  Today we finally finished Lysistrata and took our test on it, then had time to catch up on unfinished work.  After break we read Jonathan Swift's "A Modest Proprosal" and answered some questions about that famous bit of classic satirical Swift, (I love him).  We then filled out our ten vocabulary words and (ideally) read Catcher in the Rye.  There was LOTS of make up time today and last Friday, so I don't want to see any missing assignments from ANYONE. 

Ready for the weekend!

Today I passed out progress reports, (thank God for excel!), and allowed time to catch up on some missed work.  Then we read the short story "Much Ado About (Censored)" from the collection entitled 2041.  We paired this with a fine selection of palete cleansing texts concerning censorship and its role in the world we live in, vintage NCAA as well as some pro-censorship motherships, I mean web sites.  Good discussion, guys!  We had quite a few written questions following this, so we had time to work on that, and then closed with a few poems by the amazing Adrienne Rich.  We also got to read a little bit of A Long Way Gone.  See y'all Monday!

Crash & Burn

As may be apparent, I did not update this page yesterday.  That is because my computer, may it rest in peace, died a slow and tortured death on Tuesday night while I was at the theater seeing "Transformers."  I am lucky to have my files recovered.  The world is lucky I have my files recovered.  Some one would have paid. 

Yesterday afternoon was spent (literally) replacing my computer that was an HP from their summer 04 runway.  This one on my lap is a new HP, and it is pretty and glossy.  Goodbye paycheck.

Anyway, back to business.

Wednesday: We watched Everything is Illuminated, based on the book by Jonathan Safran Foer, a discussed how to "read film."  Of course there was a fun worksheet to accompany our journey through the Ukraine.  We finished off the day with some vocabulary and Catcher in the Rye.

Thursday: We read an excerpt from Chuck Klosterman's book A Decade of Curious People and Dangerous Ideas, then answered some questions about what makes a "counter" culture and what gives different artifacts and ideas from a particular culture their value.  We followed this up with a look at some more slam poetry by authors featured in the books Spoken Word Revolution and Aloud, as well as a poem by Fayetteville's Russ Ritter, and, most importantly, there was even some semi-slam, mostly not, poems by me, because as I always say - I love a good little jolt of public humiliation.  We then wrote our own poems following the example of Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself."  After break we closed with some grammar, vocabulary, and came close to finishing Lysistrata.  Thank you to all of our boys who bravely took on the roles of angry Grecian women.

I've got a lovely bunch of coconuts

Just in case some of you thought my coconut story from yesterday was completely fictional, I have pictorial proof.  See below.  (Sound random?  We were reading A Long Way Gone on Monday morning, and the narrator spoke about eating coconuts.  Having tried to break one open with friends JUST THE NIGHT BEFORE - I decided to weigh in on the difficulties of coconut eating).

Anyways, back to the matter at hand.  In class today we continued reading ALWG, then took a look at other literature-with-a-cause.  We read Wilfred Owen's "Anthem for Doomed Youth" and "Dulce Et Decorum Est."  We paired this with a side of Picasso's "Guernica," compliments of the Toronto Star and its article about the UN covering the famous image during the announcement that the US would invade Iraq back in 2003.  If they were really afraid that the image would inspire anti-war sentiments simply from its presence in the room, then talk about the power of the paint brush!  IE the artist's message, IE all artists, writers, etc.  Go literature!  We followed this up with a nice course of Walt Whitman and his "Song of Myself," which helped us write our own "Name" poems.  This is a lesson that will be continued later this week.  After the interim we concluded with some nice vocabulary and our reading of the play Lysistrata.  Wow I'm tired!  Too bad raw coconut milk, as I so bitterly discovered, is sour and gross.  I guess it's "pass the orange juice" for my evening refreshment.

North Little Rock English III

Last Friday was the final day of Upward Bound, so no more literature and Spanish; bye guys!  In NLR summer school we took a test over Medea, created our own dramatic Greek tragedies, and took a look at the book When Rap Music Had a Conscious to talk about socially conscious art forms. 

Then I left for the weekend and got myself roasted in the sun, ouch!  Pass the lotion.

Today: Bringing us up to speed, today we continued to read A Long Way Gone, and read some articles concerning the civil war that took place in Sierra Leone, as well as the child soldiers who fought there.  Then we got an introduction to John Donne and his metaphysical poetry, (he's my fave!).  In the afternoon we picked up our ten vocabulary words, and then cast parts to begin reading Aristophenes' Greek comedy Lysistrata.  May the week commence!

Before the storm.

The TV keeps saying we are about to get a severe storm... I better get this typed before we lose the power!

NLR English III: Today we read some more of A Long Way Gone, did our ten vocabulary words, got close to finishing Medea, and began a study of sonnets from across the ages.

UB Spanish: Work on/finish your body biography projects.

UB Literature: Finish Oedipus Rex for homework.  Last day tomorrow!

humpty hump day

NLR English III: another long day!  I suppose a four hour stretch of anything is is a lot.  Today we began reading A Long Way Gone by Ishmael Beah.  We followed this up with our vocabulary.  The words/phrases today were: oral tradition, narration, narrator, parbale, plot, exposition, resolution, denouement, point of view, and protragonist.  We continued reading Medea, then resumed after break to write a persausive letter, following, (sometimes not following), examples from the book Letters From a Nut.  We concluded the day with a few grammar sheets.  In between, we began working on chapter guide questions for The Catcher in the Rye.  Productive day!

UB Spanish: Today was the dreaded test day.  Tomorrow we begin our "body biography" projects, be prepared to get creative!

UB Literature: First we broke in to groups to find examples of dark/light and blind/sighted imagery, ideas, occurences, etc. in the play Oedipus Rex.  Then we continued reading.  Read through p. 15 of your packet tonight

Are you serious it's only Tuesday??

NLR English III: With a little (HAHA, try hours) of preparation, we were able to do a WHOOOOLE lot more today.  We started by defining our ten vocabulary words, which today were comprised of: epithet, fiction, folklore, folk tale, genre, hero/heroine, legend, motivation, myth, and nonfiction.  Then we read a chapter from How to Read Literature Like a Professor, entitled "He's blind for a reason, you know," to follow up our lesson on "Cathedrals" and introduce our Greek tragedy, Medea, (can you tell I'm on a Greek kick??  Porbrecitos...), which we read till break.  Then we resumed with some poetry from Edgar Allen Poe, Todd Alcott, and Big Pappa E to get an idea of the range of poets we will be covering.  We finished off with a look at nouns and pronouns, and used, (ideally) our extra time to begin reading The Catcher in the Rye, one of my favorite books. Wow, that's a lot of stuff.

UB Spanish: Test tomorrow!!  Did you get that yet??  Test tomorrow!!  Today we reviewed all verbs, and learned the verb "ir" (to go) and how to use it properly with constructions involving the word "a" (to or at).  We then played fly-swat vocabulary review.  Congrats to the winnders of five bonus quiz points.

UB Literature: Today we continued reading Oedipus Rex.  The tension was so thick you could have sliced it with a butter knife and served it on bread.  Or something.  All I know is, if I were Creon, I wouldn't want Oedipus for my friend!  Or brother-in-law.... or nephew... whatever.

Homework: I want you to think about the possibility that Euripides wrote this play as a warning against engaging too deeply in intellectual/philosophical pursuits.  His protaganist, Oedipus, was determined, even down right ready to maim and deface, anyone who stood in his way as he pursued the truth about himself.  In your blog, tell me what truth about himself does Oedipus discover?  How does his truth stand as a metaphor for the truth(s) that exist about ourselves?  Is it easy for people to face the true nature of themselves?  Why or why not?  Do most people ever even accomplish the act of facing their true selves?  Why or why not?  Do you know the absolute truth about yourself, and if not, would you want to?  How could you go about discovering it, (short of murder and accusations of treason, etc.), or if you feel you already have, how did you do it?