31 Eve's Diary // Due the week of May 4, 2015

Hi Everyone!

Read Eve's Diary by Mark Twain and answer the following question in about 1 page total:

• What do you think Twain's purpose in writing this story was:

• To inform about some concept (psychological? historical?) that he found important?
• To entertain with just a funny, interesting story?
• To persuade us to believe a certain way?

• Support your opinion of what the purpose was with several different quotations from the story and explain each quotation.

30 A Dark Brown Dog // Due the week of April 28, 2015

Hi Everyone!

This week, read A Dark Brown Dog by Stephen Crane and answer both of the following questions in about 1 page total:

1. How does Crane create a sense of sympathy for the dog? What language does he use to accomplish this?
2. Do you think the dog might be symbolic of a person or group of people from history or real life? Who might he symbolize? Why do think so? 

29 The New Dress // Due the week of April 21, 2015

Hi Everyone!

Read the story "The New Dress" by Virginia Woolf and answer at least one of the questions below in at least .5-1 page.

• The New Dress
• Questions:
• Is Mabel a likable, relatable character to you? Why or why not? Do you think Woolf wanted her to be? Why or why not? Provide evidence (quotations) from the text to back up your opinion. 
• Does Mabel change over the course of the story? Why or why not? Provide evidence (quotations) from the text to back up your opinion. 

28 Homework // Due the week of April 13, 2015

Hi Everyone!

MONDAY:
Write 2 more pages to your novel.

TUESDAY:

• Read the short story "A Rose for Emily" and answer one of the two questions below in at least 1/2 page.
• A Rose for Emily online free
• Question:
• This story is told by "we": who do you imagine this narrator (or narrators) to be? Young or old? Male or female? Both? What is their attitude toward Emily? How is this represented by their calling her "Miss Emily"? What do they remember about her? How does this shape your attitude toward her? Do you find yourself sympathizing with her situation as the center of the town's attention (and gossip)? 
• Do you think there is a theme (lesson, moral)  to this story? If so, what do you think it is?If not, or either way, what is Faulkner's purpose in writing the story? Why? Give evidence from the story.

27 Homework // Due the week of April 7, 2015

Hi Everyone!

MONDAY

Write the next two+ pages of your novella, keeping in mind that you want dynamic, round characters that will both:

• change in some way over the course of the novella. Feel free to make them change for the worse--there doesn't always have to be a happy ending 
• have multiple sides to them so the protagonist is not just kind and the antagonist is not just evil. The best antagonists are often relatable and even likable in some way

TUESDAY:
Go ahead and read the following story which can be found free online at:
Harrison Bergeron
Then answer the following essay question:

• Some people think Vonnegut was being critical of some ideas of Communism, the ideas that all people should be made equal or treated exactly equally or similar. Some people think Vonnegut was instead being critical of people's fear of communism by making the fear seem ridiculous. 
• Which do you think is true? Why?
• Email me if you're confused by the prompt!

26 Novella and The Yellow Wallpaper // Due the week of March 31, 2015

Hi Everyone!

MONDAY:
This week, you are beginning your novels! Given that you have 2 weeks (spring break), I'd like you to write a minimum of 4 pages double spaced—but feel free to write far more than this! I've had students write 80 page novels during these two months of time to write, so if you put your mind to it, you can really create a great chunk!

Just remember that everything you write should either:

1. Push the story plot forward or
2. Develop the characters

Have fun!

TUESDAY:
Read "The Yellow Wallpaper" which can be found for free at:

The Yellow Wallpaper

Answer 2 of the following prompts in at least 1/2 page each:

• Which is more injurious to the narrator--the psychological demons or the societal demons she faces? Why?
• How does Gilman use changes in language (diction, tone) to affect the narrator's shift from seeming sanity to madness? Be sure to give examples from the story.
• How does the changing description of the wallpaper reflect the narrator's changing character? Be sure to give examples from the story. 

25 A Farewell to Arms and Novellas // Due the week of March 16, 2015

Hi Everyone!

The homework is broken up by day this week, so be sure to check the homework for your specific day.

MONDAY

• Create a plot diagram for a story idea on which you would like to write a novella.
• You should plot out an inciting event, 4-5 rising action events, a climax, and your resolution (ending). 
• You can use brief phrases instead of complete sentences.
• Write a set of about 15-20 scenes that encompass your entire story.
• Write about a sentence for each scene so you know what happens during that scene.
• Don't include any scenes that you think will be boring or filler—no need!
• Every scene should do at least one of the 2 following things:
• Carry the story forward
• Teach us more about an important character

TUESDAY

• Read the short story "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson. It can be found free online here:
• The Lottery
• Answer one of the following two prompts in about 1 page, double-spaced.
• What theme (moral) do you think the author is trying to get across to her audience? Do you think she gets it across well? Do you agree with the theme?
•  Is the lottery a collective act of murder? Is it morally justified? Is tradition sufficient justification for such actions? How would you respond to cultures that are different from ours that perform "strange" rituals?
• Describe the point of view of the story. How does the point of view affect what we know about the situation? How does it preserve the story's suspense?
  
  
  
  

24 A Farewell to Arms // Due the week of March 10, 2015

Hi Everyone!

Go ahead and read chapters 1-10 of A Farewell to Arms this week and write 5 discussion questions.

You can find the book free online at:

Book

23 Final Drafts // Due the week of March 3, 2015

Hi Everyone!

This week, just revise your final draft (I will be checking for big changes so make sure to actually take the advice of some of your comments—mine at the very least) and put it on the blog (local-option.blogspot.com).

There is the same login information as there is to get into our Google Drive account. If you don't remember that or have trouble getting on—email me!


Thanks!

22 Peer Review // Due the week of Feb. 24, 2015

Hi Everyone!

Today, your rough draft should definitely be on Google Drive (if it's not on by Feb. 18th, it is half-off).

You'll want it to be there so that your classmates can peer review your writing! This means that they will read through your essay and make comments as to what is good or what could be improved.

So that is your homework everybody:

Write 15 comments** total, spread out between all of your classmate's papers. Because your classmates are relying on you to be a good peer reviewer, I will be grading this assignment quite harshly—be sure to sign each comment with your name, and follow the following guidelines very closely :)

• PEER REVIEW GUIDELINES:
• Finish each comment with your name at the end.
• Look for big picture suggestions
• Organization: Does it follow the organization we learned in class? Is it missing certain pieces?
• Evidence: Is there enough good evidence about each reason? What specific evidence would you like to see?
• Relevance: Is everything on topic an useful for defending the thesis?
• Language: Is the language varied, with good vocabulary, metaphors, imagery, etc?
• Formatting: Is there a title? Is it double spaced, Times New Roman, 12 Pt font? 
• Don't worry about little picture suggestions
• Grammar
• Spelling
• Typos
• BE SPECIFIC and KIND!
• GOOD:
• "I would like to know more about the international space station that you bring up—I don't really know what that is. —Bob"
• "I like how your attention grabber is really tragic and moving—that's a tough goal to achieve. —Sally"
• "I notice that you don't have your sources cited within your paper. Remember to put parenthesis with the source number after each fact. —John" 
• BAD:
• "Nice intro! —George" (Not specific enough)
• "This paragraph needs more information. —Louis" (Not specific enough)
• "This part is boring. —Ronda" (Not specific or nicely put)

**To write a comment on Google Drive: 

1. Select a word or phrase of the paper.
2. Right click on that word or phrase.
3. Go down the menu that appears and click on "comment."
4. Write a comment in the bubble that appears in the right side of the screen.
5. Press "Comment" when you are done to save your comment. 

21 Rough Draft // Due the week of Feb. 16, 2015

Hi Everyone!

Next week, the rough draft of your research paper is due! It doesn't have to be perfect, but I'd like to see a genuine effort at each of the five paragraphs of the essay.

Please follow the following general outline (but use complete sentences and essay paragraph format)

1. Introduction
1. Attention Grabber: Gets the audience interested; choose one of the following:
1. Ask a question
2. State a shocking fact
3. Quote an interesting quotation
4. Make a joke
5. Feel free to try something not on the list, as long as it's attention grabbing!
2. Thesis: Opinion because reason1, reason2, and reason3.
2. Paragraph about Reason1
1. Evidence from your notecards
2. Possible Evidence types:
1. Logos: Facts, Statistics, Reasonings
2. Pathos: Emotional stories, personal accounts
3. Ethos: Expert opinions by doctors, teachers, professors, scientists, etc
3. Paragraph about Reason2
1. Evidence (See above)
4. Paragraph about Reason3
1. Evidence (See above)
5. Conclusion

Make sure it's all on Google Drive in the Rough Drafts folder. We will be doing peer review, so make sure you like your work enough to share it :)

Email me if you have questions!

20 Notecards // Due the week of Feb. 10, 2015

Hi Everyone!

This week, we went back to the sources you collected last week and started looking for information that would be useful to your research papers!

Materials you'll need:

• 12 notecards of 3 different colors (4 of each color)
• If you don't have colored notecards, you can distinguish them in other ways like shapes in the corners, or you can cut colored paper into notecards.
• I gave you notecards in class, so if you have lost those, you'll need to find your own.

Assign one color of notecard to each reason from your thesis. For example, if your thesis is:

• Cats are the best animal because they are clean, cheap, and cute.
• Then all evidence about their cleanliness will be blue, all evidence about their cheapness will be pink, and all evidence about the cuteness will be yellow.

Write one piece of information on each notecard, until you have 12 notecards of information.

Be sure you label the notecards in their corners with which source the information came from—you can write the number of the source (from your works cited page) or the last name of the author—or whatever you want, as long as you remember where you got the information.

Consider the following types of evidence to write down:

• Logos: Facts, Statistics, Numbers, Reasonings
• Pathos: Personal stories, emotional stories
• Ethos: Expert opinion: Doctors, Scientists, Politicians, people who've experienced it before

Email me if you have questions!

19 Works Cited Pages // Due the week of Feb. 2, 2015

Hi Everyone!

This week we talked about two main things:

1. 5 Rules for finding good research online
1. Do not use Wikipedia as a source**
1. **You can sometimes use facts from Wikipedia if you cite the place where the facts came from—instead of just Wikipedia. You can find the citation information if you click on the little blue number that can be seen right after the good fact. 
2. Do not use websites that get their information from the public—such as Answers.com, or any other comment-sourced pages.
3. Be wary of ".com" websites. The most trustworthy are ".edu," ".gov," and ".org."
4. If a website is not well-designed or well-written, it's probably not very legitimate.
5. Websites associated with well-known news sources or programs tend to be trustworthy on their facts (although not always unbiased in their opinions)—i.e.: Time Magazine, BBC News, etc
2. Using EasyBib.com to create a works cited page for your paper.
1. Every research paper needs a "works cited" page in order to show readers where information was gathered.
2. Each citation on this page must have a particular formatting (in this case, MLA)
3. Easybib.com asks for specific necessary citation information, and then takes it all and puts it into the format for you—yay!
4. Make sure to tell it to include the URL (or copy and paste it at the bottom of each citation yourself) so you can easily visit the website later on.
5. Copy and paste each finished citation into a document (saved with your name at the top) in Google Drive in the folder marked: "Works Cited Pages."
6. Title it: Works Cited 

So that said, your homework is:

1. Find at least 6 websites that look like they have good information.
1. Scan through the information.
2. You don't need to write down any facts yet—just make sure it looks like a helpful website for your topic.
2. Using Easybib.com, create citations for each of your 6+ sources.
3. Create a works cited page in Google Drive in the folder "Works Cited Pages."

Email me if you have questions or still are having trouble getting onto Google Drive!!!

18 Research Strategy // Due the week of Jan. 28, 2015

Hi Everyone!

This week in class, we talked about a way to reduce the time it takes to read an article—thereby helping you all in your future research!

The theory behind this strategy is this:

Every body paragraph (in general) should have the following outline:

1. Topic Sentence (Introduces the topic of the paragraph)
1. Evidence
2. Details
3. Facts
4. Reasonings
2. Conclusion Sentence (Wraps it up, reflects the topic sentence)

Given that, you can read the topic sentence (and also look at the conclusion sentence) of most good paragraphs and find out the general topic—without having to read it! Then you can see if you should read the paragraph or not—based on what information you are trying to find.

So your homework is:

1. Find an article about your chosen topic that has at least 6 paragraphs.
2. Print it out.
3. Read the topic sentence (and look at the conclusion sentence) of each paragraph.
4. Label each paragraph with 1-2 words that you think describe it well.
5. Check out the rest of each paragraph to see how well it worked.
6. Turn in!

17 Research Paper Choice // Due the Week of January 20, 2015

Hi Everyone!

We are now beginning our yearly research paper!

We are beginning a new blog as a giant project between several of my advanced English classes, which you can visit at: local-options.blogspot.com! Nothing is posted there yet (as we haven't written anything for it yet), but by the end of the first assignment, we should have about 30 projects on there, in a Time Magazine-esque creation—on which you research paper will be posted!

This week, we looked at some pages in Google Drive that are there to assist you in your choice of topic for the research paper. Email me if you do not remember the login username and password and I will send it to you.

The two parts to your homework are listed below (**Unless you are on Monday):

Topic Choice:
The first part of your homework is to choose and claim a topic.

Go to the page on Google Drive: "01 Research Paper Topics." This is a list of over 60 topics from you can choose your topic. Once you have chosen a topic, you will write your name next to it, as well as your chosen thesis*. Do it soon though, because if someone else claims your topic (and has written your same opinion on it), you'll have to choose another one.

If you want to write on a topic that is not one of these 60 topics, just add your topic to the list, and then write your name and thesis next to it.

*Thesis = Opinion because Reason 1, Reason 2, and Reason 3

• ie: Cats are the best pet because they are clean, friendly, and inexpensive.

Pre-Research Worksheets (**TUESDAY ONLY)

Before you choose your topic, I want you to make sure it is a topic you will truly enjoy! 

Therefore, go to the page: 02 Pre-Research Worksheets. Copy the template and paste it three times into a new document which you save into the folder: Pre-Research Worksheets Here under your first and last name.

Then fill out the templates for three different topics that interest you. Then choose one, and claim it—using the directions from above!

I know that is a boatload of information, so email me if you have questions!