English 11 Noodleblog

Poor Fortunato!

As we discussed in class today, we will be doing something a bit different with A Cask of Amontillado. Your task tonight is to think through the story and find a character, scene, or theme that you would like to draw. The assignment sheet for this is here: Picturing the Text.

Remember, this isn’t going to be graded on how pretty it is, but how well it conveys your understanding/interpretation of the story.

For some of you, this assignment is right in your wheelhouse, while for others of you it is a dreaded albatross about your neck. Do not think of it as an art project per se. It is simply an alternate means of expressing your understanding of a text.

Bring your questions on this to class tomorrow and hopefully we can clear everything up before the long weekend.

Make sure you explain your point so there is no misunderstanding.

As you work on the Crucible paper (hopefully you got a decent start today), remember to keep a good balance between evidence (concrete details) and analysis (commentary).

The purpose of that balance is to do the following:

• The topic sentence sets the tone and direction of the paragraph
• The evidence supports the claim made in the topic sentence
• The analysis explains how the evidence supports the claim in the topic sentence

If you can accomplish the above relationship between claim, evidence, and analysis, then you will be on your way to writing a strong essay.

By Friday, you need to turn in a thesis and I will check off your evidence. Remember that a thesis, at its most basic, is the following:

Subject + Opinion (Pizza is good.)

An example of the type or level of thesis you need to write follows from the 1st option for the paper we discussed in class today:

The villainy of Abigail in The Crucible resides in her temptation and willingness to lie to get what she wants.

That thesis speaks to the source of her villainy. It could also focus on the effect or character of the villainy.

Due on Friday is your thesis and the evidence you gathered for your question thus far.

If you haven’t chosen a question to write on, do so tonight. All of you take your question and brainstorm as much as you can from the text that has to do with your question. That includes quotes and facts from the play.  Look for patterns and ways that you might be able to use this data, but at this point, primarily just brainstorm as much as you can.

If you lost the assignment sheet, it is linked in the previous post.

Act 3 questions: Friday October, 30

DGP Test: Friday October 30

Act 4 Questions: Monday November 2

Prompt choice for the Crucible paper: Monday November 2

Remember that the discussion questions for act one and the character sheets are due Friday.

Also we have a quiz on vocabulary week 6.

When you turn in your paper tomorrow, it should be typed, double-spaced and in either Times New Roman 12pt or Calibri 11 pt font.  If you cannot type it, it should be written in blue or black ink and double-spaced, though i much prefer it typed.  I will NOT accept pencil or pink pen.  If you turn it in with pencil or ink of another color, I will return it to you and you may resubmit it, though it will be counted as late.

Please staple your papers in the following order:

1. Final Draft
2. Rough Draft
3. Prewriting
4. Rubric

If you had your rough draft in class today and worked through the revision protocol we went over in class, please make whatever changes you need to in your paper and bring a fresh copy to class.

If you did not have a rough draft ready for class today, please have your rough draft for tomorrow.  Use the revision guidelines to look over your paper or have someone else examine it (remember 5 Higher Order Concerns — HOCs and 3 Lower Order Concerns — LOCs).

If you are willing, I would love to have someone’s paper to illustrate some things on the document camera tomorrow.

Your rough draft for your American Dream comparison essay is due on Monday.  We will spend most of Monday doing peer revision.

Suggested format:

1. Introduction
2. Body #1 (1st article — how does the American Dream affect this article?)
3. Body #2 (2nd article — how does the American Dream affect this article?)
4. Body #3 (discuss the comparison) — optional.  You may be able to do this in your conclusion. Do NOT write an empty, padded paragraph just to have five if your comparison is pretty uncomplicated.  That said, don’t oversimplify it either.
5. Conclusion (wrap up)

Have a good weekend and happy writing!

1. Identify the parts of the American Dream that appear in each of your essays/story. They don’t have to be obvious, though they might in the Declaration of Independence as part of the very definition of the American Dream comes from that document.  For example, they could be present as a shared belief between the writer and his audience that the writer counts on for his argument.
2. Collect details from your story that show/prove that the parts of the American Dream you identified are really there. You’ll use these for your paper.  For example, if you identify the right to a pursuit of happiness as a part of the American Dream in one of your articles, ask yourself “what was it in your article that made you think that?”  There’s your detail.  A detail can be a quote, an anecdote from the article, an idea in the article, etc.

Rough drafts will be due on Monday, October 5th.  We will have all day Thursday (10/1) to work on them.  Remember we will have a quiz on SAT Vocab Week 4 on Friday.

Thoughts on Work Ethic

Some of you (yes, I know not all) have used class time very poorly so far, spending most of your work time socializing while I’m busy helping those who are struggling.  That tells me that you aren’t worried about having time to work on this at home, thus you must have plenty of time to work on it at home.   If that is the case, we can use class time for other things and increase the pace of this class a fair deal.