Friday, January 29

Students (and Mr. P) shared their "Visual Essays" with the class.

Wednesday, January 27

Students received the assignment sheet (see Documents) for a "visual essay" due Friday comparing the worldview of the American Transcendentalists (based on readings to date, plus pages 216-21 ans 225 in the textbook -- the Emerson bio and excerpts from "Nature" and "Self-Reliance") with the worldview of the Pixar film WALL-E, which we began watching.

HW due Friday:
Visual essay. See Documents page.

Tuesday, January 26

Students took the final examination.

Monday, January 25

We reviewed the expectations for tomorrow's final exam, after which we read more of Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience."

Tuesday:
Final examination. See Documents page.

Friday, January 22

Students received a sheet with review questions for Tuesday's final examination (see Documents page) and we went over it. The sheet gave five thematic questions, two of which Mr. P will assign to each section on Tuesday, and it listed works which students may base their answers on; at least five works in total must be discussed. There will also be a few short answer or multiple-choice questions over language (grammar and other conventions, vocabulary, etc.).

We also read a bit more of "Resistance to Civil Government" ("Civil Disobedience") in which Thoreau describes his night in Concord jail.

Thursday, January 21

We watched certain Youtube videos regarding Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience" and its influence on the world. Students learned something about Mohandas Gandhi's mass campaigns of nonviolent resistance, and we compared his political application of Thoreau's ideas with Thoreau's own rather more inndividualistic slant.

Wednesday, January 20

We moved on from King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail" (p. 256) to a work which inspired King's campaigns of nonviolence, Thoreau's "Resistance to Civil Government" (p. 249), better known as "Civil Disobedience."

Tuesday, January 19

In honor of MLK, Jr. and in preparation for reading Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience" (aka "Resistance to Civil Government"), we watched the several minutes of a Citizen King, a documentary about MLK, treating the movement in Birmingham, Alabama, in April, 1963, then looked at King's "Letter from Birmingham Jail." Was Martin Luther King a troublemaker? What do we think of troublemakers??

Students turned in their Outside Reading assignments.

Friday, January 15

Students took a quiz over the essay on "The American Renaissance" in our textbook, and we graded it together.

Afterwards, we prepared to explore Transcendentalism by looking at the meanining of the word.

HW due Tuesday:
Final deadline for the Outside Reading Assignment.

Thursday, January 14

Students received their slavery essays back and spent the period making corrections in response to Mr. P's comments.

HW due Friday:
Read pp. 206-214 in the textbook ("The American Renaissance). Quiz over the reading.

HW due Tuesday:
Final deadline for the Outside Reading Assignment.

Wednesday, January 13

On Thursday when slavery essays are at long last returned, students will need to correct marked passages. Today, as practice for that, students corrected passages from other students' essays, categorized by types of compositional problems. Worksheets were partially completed in class.

HW due Thursday:
Completed worksheets from Wednesday's class.

Tuesday, January 12

We read the final two sections of The Song of Hiawatha, "The White Man's Foot" and "Hiawatha's Departure."

Mr. P announced yet another postponement of deadlines:
HW due Friday (not Tuesday or Thursday):
Quiz over "The American Renaissance," pp. 206-214, EOL.
HW due Tuesday, Jan. 19 (not Friday):
Outside Reading assignment.

Monday, January 11

Mr. P announced a postment of Friday's assignment, originally due Tuesday. The reading ("The American Renaissance," pp. 206-214) will now be due Thursday instead, and there will be a quiz over it on that day.

We read "Hiawatha's Childhood" and discussed both its meanings and its form.

Friday, January 8

Students read in their outside reading books.

HW due Tuesday:
Read "The American Renaissance" on pages 206-214 in the textbook.
Quiz on Tuesday over the reading.

Thursday, January 7

Students worked in small groups on an activity dealing with abstract concepts in a hands-on way. The major concepts involved were once again Classicism and Romanticism, and the assignment was to form pairs of words reflecting Classic and Romantic values, ideals, and inclinations.

For Friday:
Remember to bring your outside reading book.

Wednesday, January 6

We finished our analysis of "London" by William Blake, and moved on from that black condemnation of industrial civilization to Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's celebration of life in tune with Nature, Song of Hiawatha.

Heads-up for Friday:
Bring your outside reading book to class.

Tuesday, January 5

Students took a brief quiz over the essay on "American Romanticism" in the textbook, and we graded it together.

Next we discussed what students had learned about the Romantic movement from the essay and the quiz.

Finally, we began to read "London," by William Blake.

Monday, January 4

Mr. P reminded students about the deadline (a week from Friday) for the outside reading assignment. See Documents page for a copy of the assignment sheet.

In preparation for entering the Romantic period in American Literature, we discussed the meaning of the term "Romantic" in the relevant sense and its origins, and compared Romanticism with Classicism, and the Romantic Age with the "Age of Reason" (aka the Enlightenment).

HW due Tuesday:
Read pages 138-150 in Elements of Literature ("American Romanticism") and prepare for a quiz on Tuesday over the reading.