Before we started watching our movies this week, each group was instructed to create a basis for their theme, then write it on the board. My group choose the marxist theme and decided to focus on the social side of it, specifically differences between social classes and the interactions between them. Making this main idea helped me understand the marxist theme in greater detail. It also gave me set boundaries for the notes we would later take during the movie, which will help us stay on track while writing our paper. When I first started watching King Lear I couldn't find anything that I thought matched our theme. In the beginning the movie focused on the top of the social classes, making it hard to understand the lower parts of society. However, as the play continued, people started gaining or losing power, which made them change classes. For example, Edmund started as a man who had no inheritance to speak of, then through plots and schemes had command of the army. Edmund’s experience made it clear that power has a major influence on which social class you reside in. Without the summary my group wrote about our theme, the notes I took would have been all over the place, making our group’s paper much harder to write. A distinct main idea helped me throughout this week, and will continue to do aid me in the future. https://www.usu.edu/markdamen/WritingGuide/21quest.htm
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This week we dove back into analyzing poems by reading “Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth” by Shakespeare and “Ozymandias” by Percy Shelley. Shakespeare started his poem with a sad, regretful feeling that spoke about the body’s end. However, by the end the tone changed. The poem still conveyed that the body will someday die, but it also introduced the idea that the soul can live on forever. The meaning of “Ozymandias” was exactly the opposite. This poem spoke of a statue that stood alone in the sand. Only the legs were left standing, with the head half sunk in the sand beside it. On a pedestal at the feet of the statue a sign read “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!” (Shelley) Ozymandias assumed that his works would go on forever, when in reality, all was forgotten. Shelley used this story to poke fun at the idea of living forever. The statue that Ozymandias created to display how amazing he was only showcase his fall. The poem of the week question asked us to compare and contrast how loss was displayed in both poems. All of the studying done on the poems made me greatly prepared to answer this question. As I remembered the strategies we used to analyze the poems, the essay was easy to write. The work we did with poems this week taught me that the most important part of writing an essay it the preparation you do beforehand. https://www.vaniercollege.qc.ca/tlc/tipsheets/reading-and-analyzing/how-to-analyze-a-poem.pdf Learning about the layout of an test can help you when taking it. During the PSAT, I didn't know what to expect and as a result my grade wasn't as good as I wanted it to be. In class this week, we took a practice test that showed us what part of the AP test for this class will be like. It was a multiple choice test with 55 problems, and was only worth 45% of your total grade on the test. Knowing that this specific part of the test was worth less than half of your grade will make it easier to focus during the real test. By the end of taking the practice test, I had a few minutes left to spare. This tells me that when I take the real test, I can spend a few more minutes on especially hard problems. A couple days later, we graded our tests and were told the percentage of Americans that answered each question correctly. There were quite a few questions that less than half of the population answered right, which makes me feel better about the hard questions that I missed. When we went over our answers, I did the worst on the questions relating to the Dickinson poem because I misinterpreted a paragraph. Knowing this shows me my weaknesses which tells me what I need to work on to do better on the test in the future. http://www.testtakingtips.com/test/gentest.htm While during the last week we learned the basis of what tragedy is, this week we learned how much sympathy impacts tragedy and dove into an example. To do this, we watched a TED Talk by Alain de Botton titled "A Gentler, Kinder Philosophy of Success", and read Oedipus Rex by Sophocles. Sympathy is an important element of tragedy. Alain de Botton stated "It would be insane to call Hamlet a loser. He is not a loser though he has lost." Sympathy allows the audience to connect with the characters and makes them seem more real in our minds as we feel emotions for them. This is why it would be crazy to call Hamlet a loser, we feel bad for his misfortunes. Sympathy makes what was once just a sad story, into a tragedy. The story of Oedipus the king is certainly one that makes its audience feel sympathy. Although Oedipus causes most of the misfortunes that befall him, he did it accidentally. Unknowingly he killed his father and married his mother, causing the town he ruled over, Thebes, to begin to fail. After he learned of the terrible deed he did, Oedipus stabbed his eyes and blinded himself. As the townspeople learned what he did, they quickly turned on him, making him feel completely alone. The sympathy in Oedipus Rex makes this story a tragedy. We feel bad for the loneliness Oedipus feels and the pain of his mistakes. http://leavingcertenglish.net/2011/04/tragic-hero/ A well written essay includes not only facts but an explanation of how those facts support the main idea. In fact, the majority of an essay should be explanations. To show this concept, in class this week we read an essay that a student last year wrote during the AP Literature and Composition test, and focused on the different ways the author got their point across. First we read through the piece to become familiar with it. This particular essay had earned a perfect, allowing us to see what the instructors look for when they are grading the AP Literature and Composition essays. Then we learned what the different writing moves are, illustrating, authorizing, and extending. When an author uses illustrating, they list facts or literary tools that were used in the piece they had to analyze. Authorizing is direct quotes that were taken from from other pieces, and extending is describing the information that was used. After learning this, we used highlighters to distinguish the different writing moves in the essay. It soon became evident the main writing move this person used was extending. Directly after they said a quote or discussed a part of the poem they were analyzing they explained why they used that particular piece of information. As a result of this activity, I understand to a greater extent why it is important to extend on the information you use while writing. It allows the readers to see what your thought process was while writing and explains how that fact connected to their main idea. http://manoa.hawaii.edu/undergrad/learning/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/MAIN-IDEAS-AND-SUPPORTING.pdf Presentations are often a lot of work, but certain strategies can make them easier to create and give. This week I discovered the best way to do well while presenting, preparing. Lindsay and I presented on Thursday, but before we could present, there was lots to do. First, we finished analyzing our short stories by finding the symbolism in A Rose for Emily and Once Upon a Time, and decided whether or not Blackie fit the criteria of a good character from The Destructors. Then we made a claim that highlighted what we found out about our stories and our elements of fiction. Finally, Lindsay and I created our What is Literature presentation. The words easily fell into place since we had done so much preparation beforehand. It was easy to explain what was important about characterization and symbolism because we had spent a lot of time reading our our literary texts. The elements of fiction in all of our short stories was clear in our minds since we had analyzed them through close reading. Our big question and claim were clearly stated because we had a table that centered our thoughts to refer to. When it was time to give our presentation, we didn't have to read each slide word for word because we still remembered all the information from our sources. Lindsay and I were confident while presenting because of the preparation we had done. http://www.skillsyouneed.com/present/prepare-presentation.html Presentations can be tricky. There are many problems that can occur. For example, the listeners may not understand the meaning by the end if the "so what" question is left out, or they may have trouble keeping up with your thought process if the transitions are too harsh. To fix these problems and others, in class this week we were given tips on presenting that will help with our "What is Literature" presentations next week. One of the tips that I need to work on is an aforementioned tip, to transition smoothly from topic to topic. This helps the readers follow the "story" of the presentation which, in effect, keeps them interested. If the transitions are too harsh, they may get lost in what I'm are trying to convey to them and lose interest. Another tip I found helpful was to focus on the main topic. If too many tangents cloud what I'm are trying to say, the main topic will fade into the background. This will confuse the listeners as they try to follow my words. A "so what" question will help the listeners apply the message into their lives and help them understand what they can get out of the presentation. Finally, if I pick out the points that were interesting to me as I studied my topics, they will post likely be interested as well. These tips helped me pin point what changes I want to make to my presentation and made the final goal more clear. Now that I know what makes a great presentation, I will be able to explain to my audience what I have to say in the most effective way. http://www.skillsyouneed.com/present/presentation-tips.html The book I read this marking period was White Noise, by Don Delillo. It followed the life of a man named Jack and his family. The book was extremely stark with its descriptions and talked a lot about the natural evil inside of everyone, including the main character. As a result, most of the characters were fairly well rounded since the reader could see both the good and bad in each character's life. It also discussed different mentalities and thought processes that gave me different insights on how people interact. However, White Noise was a little descriptive in some situations for my liking.
In the beginning of the marking period, I was too relaxed about reading the SSR book I chose. I regularly read in class but never spent very much time reading outside of class. By the last week of the marking period I was only halfway through my book. As a result, I spent tons of time trying to catch up and barely finished White Noise the night before. However, because I had to speed read around a third of the book, I did not understand as much of it as I could have. For the next marking period, I will try to spend much more time reading outside of class. By doing this, hopefully I will understand the book at a greater level. http://www.booksbuyer.com/the-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-reading-books-fast/ In class this week we picked groups for our presentations and were given materials to study. When reading those materials, we were expected to close read them and take detailed notes. Lindsay Moore and I chose characterization and symbolism as our themes. The pieces we were given to read had many detailed and interesting thoughts. In the chapter on characterization I learned that creating a “real” character is harder than it seems. They need both good and bad impulses and all of their actions must be dramatized to help the readers understand their personalities. To do this, writers use either direct or indirect presentation; direct meaning telling the readers straight out what a character is like and indirect meaning showing instead of telling. Overall, the passage also stated that the quality of any book relies on its characterization. The chapter on characterization helped me as a writer. My characters never feel up to par; they always seem underdeveloped. The piece helped me understand what I was doing wrong in my writing and gave me ways to fix the problem.
The other theme Lindsay and I chose was symbolism, which is closely associated to allegory and fantasy. Those three themes together help compress a story by carefully selecting each word. The passage gave two major examples and showed how to analyze them to find the symbolism contained. This chapter taught me how to find symbolism in a story, which is something I tend to skip over. However, near the end of the part on symbolism the piece also gave a word of caution. When most people first learn about symbolism they tend to overanalyze parts of the story and are meant to be taken literally. Considering this fact, my goal for next week and on is to use “perception and tact”, as the piece described, when trying to find symbolism. http://nieonline.com/tbtimes/downloads/CCSS_reading.pdf In class this week we prepared for a presentation on literature that we will soon start by reading an essay by Philip Pullman. It discussed the amounts of "story" and literature contained in a book titled His Dark Materials. I enjoyed the essay; it gave me good insight on how much literature appears in films. For example, Pullman explained that it is hard to express what is happening to characters internally in movies and used Mary's conversation with Lydia to prove the fact. While Mary was talking Lydia felt like a dark house had become light inside of her. That vision would be very hard to put into a film. I have often wondered why movies that are based off of books always seem a little off and this essay showed me why that is, it is hard to put a narrative voice inside a movie that would describe what is happening to the author internally. Also it helped me understand the difference between story and literature in books; the story part contains the plot, characters, and settings. Literature is the more complex ideas that are often, as Robert Frost says, "lost in translation" when a book is converted into a movie.
https://www.bustle.com/articles/64990-why-you-shouldnt-be-mad-if-the-movie-adaptation-of-your-favorite-book-isnt-100-percent |
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