Let's meet at 11:30 instead of 11 tomorrow...closer to a regular lunch time, yes?
See you tomorrow! 11:30! :)
Wednesday, August 8, 2012
Wednesday, August 8th at 4 pm
Hello! I am worried that a lot of you will not check the blog today...since the semester is nearly over. So...if you are reading this, please spread the word; I would really appreciate it.
Friday, August 3, 2012
Friday, August 3, 2012--745 pm
Hello,
a few things:
1. Journal 4 will be on Monday.
2. Below is the schedule of oral presentations next week, on Tuesday and Wednesday. I simply pulled names out of a hat...well, actually, it was a bowl. :) Thought you would like to know sooner rather than later. Alan asked a quick question about the presentation paper after class yesterday...yes, it needs to be a minimum of one page, typed, and DOUBLE SPACED as usual. No unacceptable errors allowed.
Tuesday, August 7th:
Kyle
Chia
Farm
Rex
Jesse
Kenny
Rajdeep
Jessica Gomez
Jose
Kallista
Tamara
Wednesday, August 8th:
Miranda
Alejandra
Cheng
Isela
Alan
Jessica Mendoza
Sara-Tessa
Brianna
Maria
Karen
Ashlee
a few things:
1. Journal 4 will be on Monday.
2. Below is the schedule of oral presentations next week, on Tuesday and Wednesday. I simply pulled names out of a hat...well, actually, it was a bowl. :) Thought you would like to know sooner rather than later. Alan asked a quick question about the presentation paper after class yesterday...yes, it needs to be a minimum of one page, typed, and DOUBLE SPACED as usual. No unacceptable errors allowed.
Tuesday, August 7th:
Kyle
Chia
Farm
Rex
Jesse
Kenny
Rajdeep
Jessica Gomez
Jose
Kallista
Tamara
Wednesday, August 8th:
Miranda
Alejandra
Cheng
Isela
Alan
Jessica Mendoza
Sara-Tessa
Brianna
Maria
Karen
Ashlee
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Wednesday, August 1, 2012, 545 pm
Hello,
Below you will find an assignment that you need to complete and bring to class tomorrow...and the assignment for Packet 10.
1. For tomorrow, Thursday, August 2, please think about the word "immigration" and TYPE whatever comes to mind when you think about that word. There is NO minimum or maximum amount of words required. Just keep it to one page, double spaced. You may list your thoughts or write in paragraphs. DO NOT PUT YOUR NAME ON THIS PAPER. There is no wrong or right response or answer to this assignment.
2. Packet #10:
--"Losing Home--Immigrant Families' Path Through Foreclosure and Beyond"
http://newamericamedia.org/2011/03/losing-home--immigrant-families-path-through-foreclosure-and-beyond.php
--"Top 10 Pros and Cons--Illegal Immigration"
http://immigration.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000842
Below you will find an assignment that you need to complete and bring to class tomorrow...and the assignment for Packet 10.
1. For tomorrow, Thursday, August 2, please think about the word "immigration" and TYPE whatever comes to mind when you think about that word. There is NO minimum or maximum amount of words required. Just keep it to one page, double spaced. You may list your thoughts or write in paragraphs. DO NOT PUT YOUR NAME ON THIS PAPER. There is no wrong or right response or answer to this assignment.
2. Packet #10:
--"Losing Home--Immigrant Families' Path Through Foreclosure and Beyond"
http://newamericamedia.org/2011/03/losing-home--immigrant-families-path-through-foreclosure-and-beyond.php
--"Top 10 Pros and Cons--Illegal Immigration"
http://immigration.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000842
Friday, July 27, 2012
Hello again...I decided to post Packets 8 and 9 NOW instead of later this weekend...:)
PACKET 8
"Boots to Books: The Rough Road from Combat to College"
(This is an approximately 14 minute video and a short article)
http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=8c310eacfeb08aba2e7f1e29411543e9
PACKET 9
"For Many Returning Veterans, Home is Where the Trouble is"
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/03/opinion/03mon4.html
PACKET 8
"Boots to Books: The Rough Road from Combat to College"
(This is an approximately 14 minute video and a short article)
http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=8c310eacfeb08aba2e7f1e29411543e9
PACKET 9
"For Many Returning Veterans, Home is Where the Trouble is"
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/03/opinion/03mon4.html
Friday, July 27th, 1 pm
Greetings...
Below is your reading assignment for Packet #7, due Tuesday. Remember, there is a Q & C due for this packet. This will be your last Q & C homework for the semester.
Have a wonderful weekend. I will be posting the readings for Packets 8 and 9 for Thursday later this weekend.
PACKET #7:
"The Magic of the Family Meal"
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1200760,00.html
"The Good Marriage" (this is an introduction to a full length book)
http://www.ofspirit.com/tw-thegoodmarriage.htm
Below is your reading assignment for Packet #7, due Tuesday. Remember, there is a Q & C due for this packet. This will be your last Q & C homework for the semester.
Have a wonderful weekend. I will be posting the readings for Packets 8 and 9 for Thursday later this weekend.
PACKET #7:
"The Magic of the Family Meal"
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1200760,00.html
"The Good Marriage" (this is an introduction to a full length book)
http://www.ofspirit.com/tw-thegoodmarriage.htm
Wednesday, July 25, 2012
July 25th, Wednesday evening, 10 pm
Hello!
Some reminders...
1. revisions for out of class essay 2 are due on Tuesday, July 31st.
2. rough draft (optional) for out of class essay 3 is due on Tuesday, July 31st
3. Have you been thinking about the oral presentation assignment...?! :)
4. Remember to bring a blue/or green book to class on Wednesday August 1st for in class essay 2
5. Below is a copy of the assignment distributed today in class for out of class essay 3
Some reminders...
1. revisions for out of class essay 2 are due on Tuesday, July 31st.
2. rough draft (optional) for out of class essay 3 is due on Tuesday, July 31st
3. Have you been thinking about the oral presentation assignment...?! :)
4. Remember to bring a blue/or green book to class on Wednesday August 1st for in class essay 2
5. Below is a copy of the assignment distributed today in class for out of class essay 3
English 1A, Summer Bridge Academy
2012
C. Fraga, Instructor
Course Theme: The Significance of
Home
Out of Class Essay Assignment #3
Assigned: Wednesday, July 25
Rough Draft due (optional) no later
than Tuesday, July 31
Due: Thursday, August 2nd
TOPIC: What are the ‘ingredients’ for a
successful marriage?
A
successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same
person. (Mignon Mclaughlin)
Marriage
is not just spiritual communion, it is also remembering to take out the trash.
(Joyce Brothers)
To keep
your marriage brimming,
With love in the loving cup,
Whenever you're wrong
admit it;
Whenever you're right shut up. (Ogden Nash)
Assignment: Even with the current high
divorce rate in the United States, couples continue to choose marriage as a way
of life. Most couples marry with the intention and confidence that their
marriage will be successful and will last forever.
Write an essay in which you explore
the ingredients (or elements) required for a marriage to be successful and long
lasting. Focus on a minimum of four
ingredients/elements.
Conduct research and talk/interview
those who you feel might have some helpful, interesting and relevant opinions
and experience with this topic.
The most important thing to
remember about this essay is that you will need to be very SPECIFIC. Avoid
rambling and using mostly vague terms. Your essay will benefit from specific
examples from professionals as well as interviewees.
Suggestions for people to
interview: your parents; your grandparents; relatives; siblings; teachers;
neighbors; marriage counselors; family friends, etc.
Information/opinions about what
constitutes a successful marriage is quite simple to locate. I spent only 20
minutes doing a cursory search on the Internet and found many intriguing
articles.
Your Game Plan:
1. Research and read read read as
much as you can about the topic.
2. Interview at least three people
about this topic.
3. From your research, reading and
interviews, select the four elements YOU feel are the MOST ideal and necessary
ingredients for a successful, lasting marriage.
4. Write your thesis statement—an
assertion based on your findings.
5. Plan the organization of your
essay.
6. Write your essay.
7. Proofread and edit very
carefully and thoroughly.
Reminders:
• Follow MLA format.
• Double space entire essay.
• Must have in text citations and a
Works Cited page.
• Use 12 pt., Times New Roman
• Use at LEAST three outside
resources and at LEAST information from three interviews. In other words, these
six minimum resources will be found on your Works Cited page as well as cited
within your essay.
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
Tuesday, July 24th, 11:15 am
Hello, thank you to Farm for recognizing the error I made on Monday's posting.
I listed items to complete for Packets 5 and 6, but we already completed a Packet 5...
so, all three items listed are all for Packet 6. And a question and comment is due for EACH of the three.
See you later today.
I listed items to complete for Packets 5 and 6, but we already completed a Packet 5...
so, all three items listed are all for Packet 6. And a question and comment is due for EACH of the three.
See you later today.
Monday, July 23, 2012
Monday evening, July 23, 10 pm
Hello!
Below you will find the handout I distributed in class today--a synopsis of the film we viewed and a set of seven discussion questions.
Please come to class tomorrow prepared to address these questions in a class discussion.
Also, a few quick reminders:
1. no class on Friday
2. you may revise out of class essays 1 and 2 only, not out of class essay 3. You may revise essays 1 and 2 AS MANY TIMES AS YOU WISH until you are happy with your score.
English 1A, C. Fraga----About
the Film--Daughter from Danang (2002)
This documentary often upsets the viewers’
expectations of happily-ever-afters.
It is a riveting emotional drama of longing for home, grappling with
identity issues, and witnessing the personal legacy of war.
To all outward
appearances, Heidi is the proverbial “all-American girl”, hailing from small
town Pulaski, Tenn. But her birth name was Mai Thi Hiep. Born in Danang,
Vietnam in 1968, she’s the mixed-race daughter of an American serviceman and a
Vietnamese woman. Fearing for her daughter’s safety at the war’s end, Hiep’s
mother sent her to the U.S. on “Operation Babylift”, a Ford administration plan
to relocate orphans and mixed-race children to the U.S. for adoption before
they fell victim to a frighteningly uncertain future in Vietnam after the
Americans pulled out.
Mother and daughter would know nothing about each other for 22 years.
Now, as if by a miracle, they are reunited in Danang. But what seems like the cure for a happy ending is anything but. Heidi and her Vietnamese relatives find themselves caught in a confusing clash of cultures and at the mercy of conflicting emotions that will change their lives and their definition of home forever. Through intimate and sometimes excruciating moments, Daughter from Danang profoundly shows how wide the chasms of cultural difference and how deep the wounds of war can run--even within one family. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival.
Below you will find the handout I distributed in class today--a synopsis of the film we viewed and a set of seven discussion questions.
Please come to class tomorrow prepared to address these questions in a class discussion.
Also, a few quick reminders:
1. no class on Friday
2. you may revise out of class essays 1 and 2 only, not out of class essay 3. You may revise essays 1 and 2 AS MANY TIMES AS YOU WISH until you are happy with your score.
English 1A, C. Fraga----About
the Film--Daughter from Danang (2002)
This documentary often upsets the viewers’
expectations of happily-ever-afters.
It is a riveting emotional drama of longing for home, grappling with
identity issues, and witnessing the personal legacy of war.
To all outward
appearances, Heidi is the proverbial “all-American girl”, hailing from small
town Pulaski, Tenn. But her birth name was Mai Thi Hiep. Born in Danang,
Vietnam in 1968, she’s the mixed-race daughter of an American serviceman and a
Vietnamese woman. Fearing for her daughter’s safety at the war’s end, Hiep’s
mother sent her to the U.S. on “Operation Babylift”, a Ford administration plan
to relocate orphans and mixed-race children to the U.S. for adoption before
they fell victim to a frighteningly uncertain future in Vietnam after the
Americans pulled out. Mother and daughter would know nothing about each other for 22 years.
Now, as if by a miracle, they are reunited in Danang. But what seems like the cure for a happy ending is anything but. Heidi and her Vietnamese relatives find themselves caught in a confusing clash of cultures and at the mercy of conflicting emotions that will change their lives and their definition of home forever. Through intimate and sometimes excruciating moments, Daughter from Danang profoundly shows how wide the chasms of cultural difference and how deep the wounds of war can run--even within one family. Winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS---THINGS TO THINK ABOUT
1. One reviewer describes the film
as a “gut-wrenching examination of the way cultural differences and emotional
expectations collide.” Would you agree this is an accurate description? Why or
why not? Explain specifically.
2. Were there parts of the film
that made you feel uncomfortable? If so, what were those parts and can you
articulate why they made you feel uncomfortable?
3. Heidi acutely feels that she has
been rejected by two mothers: her birth mother who gave her up and her
Tennessee mother, whose cold, untouching demeanor drove a wedge between them.
How does this fact impact Heidi and what she ultimately experiences when she
returns to Vietnam?
4. The film is considered a very
powerful one by many other small filmmakers as well as many reviewers. In your
opinion, what makes this an effective or ineffective film?
5. What preconceived ideas about
home are proven inaccurate after viewing the film?
6. In an interview with the
filmmakers, they admit that when they decided to film Heidi’s return to
Vietnam, they assumed that the reunion would be a healing story, a kind of full
circle coming home. The war in Vietnam was long over and they felt they could
create a film that would ease the collective pain that is still connected to
the war. Instead, what they did discover?
7. Some viewers have condemned
Heidi for representing an aspect of American culture that they believe is
selfish and individualized. What do you think and feel about Heidi’s reaction
for the family’s request for money?
Monday, July 23, 845 am
Good morning,
Here is your assignment for Packets 5 and 6. Remember that a Q and C is due for each of these packets. That translates to a Q and C for all three readings. In one case, the reading is actually a video on TED Talks to watch.
Packet 5:
(two items)
"Becky Blanton: The Year I was Homeless"
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/becky_blanton_the_year_i_was_homeless.html
(this is a video which is a little over seven minutes)
"Homelessness and Hungry with No Excuses" by Rich Linberg
http://www.cdobs.com/archive/syndicated/homelessness-and-hungry-with-no-excuses/
Packet 6:
(1 item)
"Down & Out in Fresno and San Francisco"
http://www.esquire.com/features/down-and-out-0709
Here is your assignment for Packets 5 and 6. Remember that a Q and C is due for each of these packets. That translates to a Q and C for all three readings. In one case, the reading is actually a video on TED Talks to watch.
Packet 5:
(two items)
"Becky Blanton: The Year I was Homeless"
http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/becky_blanton_the_year_i_was_homeless.html
(this is a video which is a little over seven minutes)
"Homelessness and Hungry with No Excuses" by Rich Linberg
http://www.cdobs.com/archive/syndicated/homelessness-and-hungry-with-no-excuses/
Packet 6:
(1 item)
"Down & Out in Fresno and San Francisco"
http://www.esquire.com/features/down-and-out-0709
Wednesday, July 18, 2012
Wednesday, July 18th, 2012 9 pm
Hello,
in case you have not heard yet, there is going to be a group photo taken of all Summer Bridge students and faculty. Meet on the steps of the Guy West Bridge at 1130 on Friday!
in case you have not heard yet, there is going to be a group photo taken of all Summer Bridge students and faculty. Meet on the steps of the Guy West Bridge at 1130 on Friday!
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Tuesday, July 16th, 6 pm
Hello,
Just a reminder for those who are considering revising your out of class essay #1. Revisions are due no later than Monday, July 23rd. Revisions must be stapled to the original version, and all changes and additions must be highlighted on the revision. These instructions are also on your course syllabus.
Also, just a "heads up" that I will be unable to hold office hours next Tuesday, July 24th, due to a meeting for Summer Bridge instructors. Sorry for this inconvenience!
Just a reminder for those who are considering revising your out of class essay #1. Revisions are due no later than Monday, July 23rd. Revisions must be stapled to the original version, and all changes and additions must be highlighted on the revision. These instructions are also on your course syllabus.
Also, just a "heads up" that I will be unable to hold office hours next Tuesday, July 24th, due to a meeting for Summer Bridge instructors. Sorry for this inconvenience!
Monday, July 16, 2012
Monday, July 16th, 5 pm
Hello!
Here is a copy of the out of class essay #2 assignment that I distributed today in class.
Also, remember the assignment for tomorrow: come to class with your essay #2 topic chosen and a working thesis statement.
Here is a copy of the out of class essay #2 assignment that I distributed today in class.
Also, remember the assignment for tomorrow: come to class with your essay #2 topic chosen and a working thesis statement.
English 1A, Summer Bridge Academy 2012---C.
Fraga
Date assigned: Monday, July 16
Rough draft (optional): due no later
than Thursday, July 19
Final draft due: Monday, July 23
Details:
1. MLA format
2. At least 4 outside sources on your
Works Cited page
3. Please, no Wikipedia
4. No formulaic, 5 paragraph essay
5. Underline thesis statement
OUT OF CLASS ESSAY ASSIGNMENT #2
Course theme: the significance of home
Every family, at some point, must
face something extraordinary that challenges the family entity and requires a
very serious adjustment. How do members of the family cope, adjust, and/or
“deal” with the event/situation?
I am not referring to the everyday
“bumps in the road” that occur for all families. Instead, I am asking you to
consider the family unit when faced with an especially challenging situation.
These situations could include but are not limited to:
• death
• birth
• infidelity
• serious injury
• dementia
• serious illness
• divorce
• unemployment
• new employment
• moving to a new
home/state/area/country
• the return of a war veteran
• moving BACK home after initially
moving OUT
• alcoholism
• drug abuse
Select ONE situation that you are
most interested in exploring. You will conduct research (and possibly personal
interviews, if possible) in order to write an essay that offers the reader
background on the topic and makes an assertion about what elements of a
particular situation impact a family in the most challenging of ways and supports it logically and
interestingly.
Your thesis might read something like
this:
When a family member develops
dementia, the challenges are often devastating, yet the disease definitely
impacts family members more than the dementia patient.
Or…
When a couple divorces, it most
certainly impacts the children still living at home; however, it is the older
children who have already moved away that are most affected by the split.
Sunday, July 15, 2012
Sunday, July 15, 2012, 530 pm
Greetings!
Remember to underline your thesis statement before you submit out of class essay #1 tomorrow.
Also, if you submitted a rough draft to me, please attach it to the back of your final draft when submitting tomorrow.
You will be receiving out of class essay #2 assignment tomorrow. During this week, you may begin to feel a little more challenged with time management. Things will become especially busy. Use your time wisely.
ASSIGNMENT--PACKET #5
"A Family" (a short story by Guy de Maupassant)
http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/Afamily.html
"A Small Good Thing" (a short story by Raymond Carver)
http://astoryeveryday.com/2011/10/13/raymond-carver-a-small-good-thing/
Remember to underline your thesis statement before you submit out of class essay #1 tomorrow.
Also, if you submitted a rough draft to me, please attach it to the back of your final draft when submitting tomorrow.
You will be receiving out of class essay #2 assignment tomorrow. During this week, you may begin to feel a little more challenged with time management. Things will become especially busy. Use your time wisely.
ASSIGNMENT--PACKET #5
"A Family" (a short story by Guy de Maupassant)
http://www.classicshorts.com/stories/Afamily.html
"A Small Good Thing" (a short story by Raymond Carver)
http://astoryeveryday.com/2011/10/13/raymond-carver-a-small-good-thing/
Thursday, July 12, 2012
Thursday, July 12th, 10 pm
Assignment for PACKET #4:
1. "The Chrysanthemums" (a short story by John Steinbeck)
http://nbu.bg/webs/amb/american/4/steinbeck/chrysanthemums.htm
2. "Mrs. Dutta Writes a Letter" (a short story by Chitra B. Divakaruni)
http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/98apr/dutta.htm
(please note, this story is in two "parts")
3. "The Five Dollar Smile" (a short story by Shashi Tharoor)
(I will hand this out tomorrow, Friday the 13th of July, in class.)
1. "The Chrysanthemums" (a short story by John Steinbeck)
http://nbu.bg/webs/amb/american/4/steinbeck/chrysanthemums.htm
2. "Mrs. Dutta Writes a Letter" (a short story by Chitra B. Divakaruni)
http://www.theatlantic.com/past/docs/issues/98apr/dutta.htm
(please note, this story is in two "parts")
3. "The Five Dollar Smile" (a short story by Shashi Tharoor)
(I will hand this out tomorrow, Friday the 13th of July, in class.)
Thursday, July 12th, 830 am
Good morning!
Just yet another reminder to allay any confusion about Q & C homework and Reading Packets.
On your course outline, you highlighted the four Q & C due dates. The packet NUMBERS do NOT correspond with the Q & C number (1 through 4).
There are clearly more Packets than Q & C's due. If there is NOT a "Q & C" after a Packet assignment, then you simply read the Packet but do NOT complete a Q & C. :)
See you this afternoon!
Just yet another reminder to allay any confusion about Q & C homework and Reading Packets.
On your course outline, you highlighted the four Q & C due dates. The packet NUMBERS do NOT correspond with the Q & C number (1 through 4).
There are clearly more Packets than Q & C's due. If there is NOT a "Q & C" after a Packet assignment, then you simply read the Packet but do NOT complete a Q & C. :)
See you this afternoon!
Tuesday, July 10, 2012
Tuesday, July 10th, 7 pm
Hello,
Below you will find two items:
1. the oral presentation assignment from Monday's class
2. the out of class essay #1 assignment from today's class
Reminder:
Please bring a hard copy of packets to class on the day they are due to be read. As I have mentioned in an earlier blog, if you own a laptop, you may bring that to class instead to access the readings; however, be sure to come to class prepared. Do not wait until class to read the assignments.
**************
Below you will find two items:
1. the oral presentation assignment from Monday's class
2. the out of class essay #1 assignment from today's class
Reminder:
Please bring a hard copy of packets to class on the day they are due to be read. As I have mentioned in an earlier blog, if you own a laptop, you may bring that to class instead to access the readings; however, be sure to come to class prepared. Do not wait until class to read the assignments.
**************
English 1A, Summer Bridge Academy 2012
Instructor: C. Fraga
Out of Class Essay
Assignment #1
200 points possible
Assigned:
Tuesday, July 10
Rough Draft Due (optional): no later than Thursday, July 12
Final Draft Due:
Monday, July 16
Reminders:
·
Please underline your thesis statement
·
If you submit a rough draft, please attach it to
your final draft when you submit.
This essay must follow MLA format for the set-up of your
essay. No Works Cited page is required since you will not be conducting any
outside research for this essay.
Your essay must be double-spaced and in Times New Roman
font.
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF
HOME
Essay Prompt:
This essay asks you to employ your narrative,
descriptive and analytical writing skills.
Consider your childhood and write
about a place where you felt most comfortable, safe, happy and content. This
place COULD be your actual house, or a room in your house, but it could be
ANYWHERE. (your grandparents’ home; the school yard; the playground at a
neighborhood park; Little League games; dance class; the tree house your dad
built for you, etc.)
Your essay must include a detailed
description of this place and the story of this place—what happened here? Why
did this place bring a sense of comfort and safety and enjoyment to you? What
did you do when you were at this place? And finally, why do you think it was so
significant and memorable for you? Looking back, does this place in any way
reflect or symbolize or help define who you are today? Why or why not? Be
specific.
Your goal is for the reader to
actually SEE this place and UNDERSTAND its importance and effect on you as a
young child. Perhaps the reader will also get a sense of your personality and
sensibility and passions.
REQUIRED LENGTH:
I do not believe in giving my students a specific page
length requirement or word count requirement. Part of being a successful writer
is knowing how to address a prompt accurately and fully and knowing when to
stop writing. I WILL suggest that it would be challenging to complete this
assignment in less than at least three to four pages. Not impossible, but
challenging.
******************
English 1A, College Composition I
Summer Bridge Academy 2012
Instructor:
Catherine Fraga
Oral Presentation Assignment
The
Significance of Home
Assigned:
First week of semester
Due:
August 7 or 8 (Tuesday or Wednesday)
For this
assignment, please select an article, observation, photograph, painting,
collage, film, song, poem, essay or anything else that offers some
message or reflection on the theme of home. It could have a personal meaning for
you, but it does not have to.
After you have
selected your “item,” write a minimum of one page about the item. Include a brief description of the item
and a detailed explanation of why you chose this item; include a thoughtful
commentary. Proofread carefully
for unacceptable errors as well as other proofreading mistakes.
On the day of
presentations, please do not read your essay to the class, but
simply summarize the main points aloud to the class. The presentation usually takes only a few moments.
You will submit a copy of the essay only to me.
As the semester
progresses, you may get ideas for your presentation from our readings, the films
we will be viewing, or from class discussions.
Remember that you
will not receive this short essay back nor will you receive any credit for the
assignment if there are ANY unacceptable errors present.
Please do not take this assignment
lightly. It is worth 100 points.
Friday, July 6, 2012
Friday, July 6th, 2012, 8 pm
Greetings!
A few reminders:
1. There was a question about the William Stafford poem discussed in class today. There is NO question & comment due for the poem. It was merely used for an example.
2. Remember your stapler on Monday. :)
3. You will want to print out the packet readings and bring them to class on the day they are due. An option is, if you own a laptop, you can bring your computer to class and access the reading for discussion or a quiz. Please do not abuse this privilege. Come to class having already read the assignment.
3. You will want to print out the packet readings and bring them to class on the day they are due. An option is, if you own a laptop, you can bring your computer to class and access the reading for discussion or a quiz. Please do not abuse this privilege. Come to class having already read the assignment.
Also, below you will find a few important items:
1. The revised weekly schedule. You may want to print this out for your records since there are a few adjustments.
2. Packet 2 and Packet 3 assignments for next week.
Week One (Friday
July 6)
·
Introduction to the Course (course theme
explained)
·
Course Outline Distributed (handout) & Class Blog explained
·
Question/Comment Homework Explained (handout)
·
Unacceptable Errors (handout)
·
Packet 1 distributed (Q & C #1due for this packet)
Week Two (July
9-13)
·
Packet 1 due (Q & C #1 due) (Monday)
·
Stapler check…25 points! (Monday)
·
Oral Presentation Assigned (for last week of
class) (Monday)
·
Discussion: Reading and Evaluating Poetry (Monday)
·
Out of Class Essay #1 assigned today (Tuesday)
·
In class Demonstration/Discussion on the Writing
Process (Tuesday)
·
Read Packet 2 (Wednesday)
·
In class Journal #1 (Wednesday)
·
Read Packet 3 (Thursday) Q & C #2
due today
·
Group Work #1 (Thursday)
·
Discussion: Reading and Evaluating Short
Fiction (Friday)
·
In class Journal #2 (Friday)
Week Three (July
16-20)
· Out
of Class Essay #1 due today (Monday)
· Out
of Class Essay #2 assigned today (Monday)
· Read
Packet 4 (Tuesday)
·
Group #2 – Exercise in Critical Thinking/Analysis
(Wednesday)
·
Read Packet #5 (Thursday)
·
Group Work #3 (Thursday)
·
Discussion: How to Evaluate a Documentary
Film & a Narrative Film (Friday)
· This will be a shortened class (we will dismiss at 2:15 pm)(Friday)
Week Four (July
23-27)
·
Out of Class Essay #2 due today (Monday)
·
View 1st half of film in class (Monday)
·
View 2nd half of film in class (Tuesday)
·
Preparation for in-class writing tomorrow (Tuesday)
·
In Class Essay #1 – remember blue or green
book (Wednesday)
·
Assign Out of Class Essay #3 (Wednesday)
·
Discussion: How to Read and Evaluate Essays (Wednesday)
·
Read Packet 5 & 6 -- Q & C #3 due today (Thursday)
·
In Class Journal #3 (Thursday)
·
No
class this Friday, July 27th
Week Five (July
30-August 3)
·
View 1st half of film in class (Monday)
·
View 2nd half of film in class (Tuesday)
·
Read Packet # 7 – Q & C #4 due today (Tuesday)
·
In Class Essay #2 – remember blue or green book (Wednesday)
·
Out of Class Essay #3 due today (Thursday)
·
Read Packets #8 & 9 (Thursday)
·
No class
this Friday, August 3
Week Six (August
6-9)
·
Read Packet #10 (Monday)
·
Group Work #4 (Monday)
·
Oral Presentations today (Tuesday)
·
Oral Presentations today (Wednesday)
·
Last day of classes—Grade Worksheet Check &
Celebration!
********************************
PACKET 2 ASSIGNMENT:
(four poems)
“Taking my Son to School”
by Eamon Grennan
(do a google search of the above poem exactly as it is written above. The first posting will be a commencement speech give by Mr. Grennan. Open this and you will see the poem right at the beginning of the speech. Focus only on the poem, not the speech)
*********************************************************************************
"One Home”
By William Stafford
Mine was a Midwest home—you can keep your world.
Plain black hats rode the thoughts that made our code.
We sang hymns in the house; the roof was near God.
The light bulb that hung in the pantry made a wan light,
but we could read by it the names of preserves—
outside, the buffalo grass, and the wind in the night.
A wildcat sprang at Grandpa on the Fourth of July
when he was cutting plum bushes for fuel,
before Indians pulled the West over the edge of the sky.
To anyone who looked at us we said, “My friend”;
liking the cut of a thought, we could say “Hello.”
(But plain black hats rode the thoughts that made our code.)
The sun was over our town; it was like a blade.
Kicking cottonwood leaves we ran toward storms.
Wherever we looked the land would hold us up.
*************************************************************
“Where Children Live”
by Naomi Shihab Nye
Homes where children live exude a pleasant rumpledness,
like a bed made by a child, or a yard littered with balloons.
To be a child again one would need to shed details
till the heart found itself dressed in the coat with a hood.
Now the heart has taken on gloves and mufflers,
the heart never goes outside to find something to do.
And the house takes on a new face, dignified.
No lost shoes blooming under bushes.
No chipped trucks in the drive.
Grown-ups like swings, leafy plants, slow-motion back and forth.
While the yard of a child is strewn with the corpses
of bottle-rockets and whistles,
anything whizzing and spectacular, brilliantly short-lived.
Trees in children's yards speak in clearer tongues.
Ants have more hope. Squirrels dance as well as hide.
The fence has a reason to be there, so children can go in and out.
Even when the children are at school, the yards glow
with the leftovers of their affection,
the roots of the tiniest grasses curl toward one another
like secret smiles.
**********************************************************************
“To a Daughter Leaving Home”
by Linda Pastan
(please google the poem and you will find it on PoemHunter.com)
(four poems)
“Taking my Son to School”
by Eamon Grennan
(do a google search of the above poem exactly as it is written above. The first posting will be a commencement speech give by Mr. Grennan. Open this and you will see the poem right at the beginning of the speech. Focus only on the poem, not the speech)
*********************************************************************************
"One Home”
By William Stafford
Mine was a Midwest home—you can keep your world.
Plain black hats rode the thoughts that made our code.
We sang hymns in the house; the roof was near God.
The light bulb that hung in the pantry made a wan light,
but we could read by it the names of preserves—
outside, the buffalo grass, and the wind in the night.
A wildcat sprang at Grandpa on the Fourth of July
when he was cutting plum bushes for fuel,
before Indians pulled the West over the edge of the sky.
To anyone who looked at us we said, “My friend”;
liking the cut of a thought, we could say “Hello.”
(But plain black hats rode the thoughts that made our code.)
The sun was over our town; it was like a blade.
Kicking cottonwood leaves we ran toward storms.
Wherever we looked the land would hold us up.
*************************************************************
“Where Children Live”
by Naomi Shihab Nye
Homes where children live exude a pleasant rumpledness,
like a bed made by a child, or a yard littered with balloons.
To be a child again one would need to shed details
till the heart found itself dressed in the coat with a hood.
Now the heart has taken on gloves and mufflers,
the heart never goes outside to find something to do.
And the house takes on a new face, dignified.
No lost shoes blooming under bushes.
No chipped trucks in the drive.
Grown-ups like swings, leafy plants, slow-motion back and forth.
While the yard of a child is strewn with the corpses
of bottle-rockets and whistles,
anything whizzing and spectacular, brilliantly short-lived.
Trees in children's yards speak in clearer tongues.
Ants have more hope. Squirrels dance as well as hide.
The fence has a reason to be there, so children can go in and out.
Even when the children are at school, the yards glow
with the leftovers of their affection,
the roots of the tiniest grasses curl toward one another
like secret smiles.
**********************************************************************
“To a Daughter Leaving Home”
by Linda Pastan
(please google the poem and you will find it on PoemHunter.com)
PACKET 3 ASSIGNMENT:
(three poems--two are noted below; the third one will be given out in class on Monday)
"Arturo" by Maria Mazziotti Gillan
http://www.pccc.edu/home/cultural-affairs/poetry-center/maria-mazziotti-gillans-poems2
************************
“Flies”
By: Donald Hall
A fly sleeps on the field of a green curtain. I sit by my grandmother’s side, and rub her head as if I could comfort her. Ninety-seven years. Her eyes stay closed, her mouth open, and she gasps in her blue nightgown—pale blue, washed a thousand times. Now her face goes white, and her breath slows until I think it has stopped; then she gasps again, and pink returns to her face.
Between the roof of her mouth and her tongue, strands of spittle waver as she breathes. Now a nurse shakes her head over my grandmother’s sore mouth, and goes to get a glass of water, a spoon, and a flyswatter. My grandmother chokes on a spoonful of water and the nurse swats a fly
In the Connecticut suburbs where I grew up, and in Ann Arbor, there were houses with small leaded panes, where Formica shone in the kitchens, and hardwood in closets under paired leather boots. Carpets lay thick underfoot in every bedroom, bright, clean with no dust or hair in them. Nothing looked used, in these houses. Forty dollars’ worth of cut flowers leaned from Waterford vases for the Saturday dinner party.
Even in houses like these, the housefly wandered and paused—and I listened for the buzz of its wings and its tiny feet, as it struggled among cut flowers and bumped into leaded panes
In the afternoon my mother takes over at my grandmother’s side in the Peabody Home, while I go back to the farm. I nap in the room my mother and my grandmother were born in.
At night we assemble beside her. Her shallow, rapid breath rasps, and her eyes jerk, and the nurse can find no pulse, as her small strength concentrated wholly on half an inch of lung space, and she coughs faintly—quick coughs like fingertips on a ledge. Her daughters stand by the bed, solemn in the slow evening, in the shallows of after-supper—Caroline, Nan, and Lucy, her eldest daughter, seventy-two, who holds her hand to help her die, as twenty years past she did the same thing for my father.
Then her breath slows again, as it has done all day. Pink vanishes from cheeks w3e have kissed so often, and her nostrils quiver. She breathes one more quick breath. Her mouth twitches sharply, as if she speaks a word we cannot hear. Her face is fixed, white, her eyes half closed, and the next breath never comes.
She lies in a casket covered with gray linen, which my mother and her sisters picked. This is Chadwick’s Funeral Parlor in New London, on the ground floor under the I.O.O.F. Her fine hair lies combed on the pillow. Her teeth in, her mouth closed, she looks the way she used to, except that her face is tinted, tanned as if she worked in the fields.
This air is so still it has bars. Because I have been thinking about flies, I realize that there are no flies in this room. I imagine a fly wandering in, through these dark-curtained windows, to land on my grandmother’s nose.
At the Andover graveyard, Astroturf covers the dirt next to the shaft dug for her. Mr. Jones says a prayer beside the open hole. He preached at the South Danbury Church when my grandmother still played the organ. He raises his narrow voice, which gives itself over to August and blue air, and tells us that Kate in heaven “will keep on growing . . . and growing . . . and growing”—and he stops abruptly, as if the sky had abandoned him, and chose to speak elsewhere through someone else.
After the burial I walk by myself in the barn where I spent summers next to my grandfather. I think of them talking in heaven. Her first word is the word her mouth was making when she died.
In this tie-up chaff of flies roiled in the leather air, as my grandfather milked his Holsteins morning and night, his bald head pressed sweating into their sides, fat female Harlequins, while their black and white tails swept back and forth, stirring the flies up. His voice spoke pieces he learned for the lyceum, and I listened crouched on a three-legged stool, as his hands kept time strp strp with alternate streams of hot milk, the sound softer as milk foamed to the pail’s top. In the tie-up the spiders feasted like emperors. Each April he broomed the webs out and whitewashed the wood, but spiders and flies came back, generation on generation—like the cattle, mothers and daughters, for a hundred and fifty years, until my grandfather’s heart flapped in his chest. One by one the slow Holsteins climbed the ramp into a cattle truck.
In the kitchen with its bare hardwood floor, my grandmother stood by the clock’s mirror to braid her hair every morning. She looked out the window toward Kearsarge, and said, “Mountain’s pretty today,” or, “Can’t see the mountain too good today.”
She fought the flies all summer. She shut the screen door quickly, but flies gathered on canisters, on the clockface, on the range when the fire was out, on set-tubs, tables, curtains, chairs. Flies buzzed on cooling lard, when my grandmother made doughnuts. Flies lit on a drip of jam before she could wipe it up. Flies whirled over simmering beans, in the steam of maple syrup.
My grandmother fretted, and took good aim with a flyswatter, and hung strips of flypaper behind the range where nobody would tangle her hair in it.
She gave me a penny for every ten I killed. All day with my mesh flyswatter I patrolled kitchen and dining room, living room, even the dead air of the parlor. Though I killed every fly in the house by bedtime, when my grandmother washed the hardwood floor, by morning their sons and cousins assembled I the kitchen, like the woodchucks my grandfather shot in the vegetable garden which doubled and returned; or like the deer that watched for a hundred and fifty years from the brush on ragged mountain, and when my grandfather died stalked down the mountainside to graze among peas and corn.
We live in their house with our books and pictures, writing poems under Ragged Mountain, gazing each morning at blue Kearsarge.
We live in the house left behind; we sleep in the bed where they whispered together at night. One morning I wake hearing a voice from sleep: “The blow of the axe resides in the acorn.”
I get out of bed and drink cold water in the dark morning from the sink’s dipper at the window under the sparse oak, and fly wakes buzzing beside me, cold, and sweeps over set-tubs and range, one of the hundred-thousandth generation.
I planned long ago I would live here, somebody’s grandfather.
(three poems--two are noted below; the third one will be given out in class on Monday)
"Arturo" by Maria Mazziotti Gillan
http://www.pccc.edu/home/cultural-affairs/poetry-center/maria-mazziotti-gillans-poems2
************************
“Flies”
By: Donald Hall
A fly sleeps on the field of a green curtain. I sit by my grandmother’s side, and rub her head as if I could comfort her. Ninety-seven years. Her eyes stay closed, her mouth open, and she gasps in her blue nightgown—pale blue, washed a thousand times. Now her face goes white, and her breath slows until I think it has stopped; then she gasps again, and pink returns to her face.
Between the roof of her mouth and her tongue, strands of spittle waver as she breathes. Now a nurse shakes her head over my grandmother’s sore mouth, and goes to get a glass of water, a spoon, and a flyswatter. My grandmother chokes on a spoonful of water and the nurse swats a fly
In the Connecticut suburbs where I grew up, and in Ann Arbor, there were houses with small leaded panes, where Formica shone in the kitchens, and hardwood in closets under paired leather boots. Carpets lay thick underfoot in every bedroom, bright, clean with no dust or hair in them. Nothing looked used, in these houses. Forty dollars’ worth of cut flowers leaned from Waterford vases for the Saturday dinner party.
Even in houses like these, the housefly wandered and paused—and I listened for the buzz of its wings and its tiny feet, as it struggled among cut flowers and bumped into leaded panes
In the afternoon my mother takes over at my grandmother’s side in the Peabody Home, while I go back to the farm. I nap in the room my mother and my grandmother were born in.
At night we assemble beside her. Her shallow, rapid breath rasps, and her eyes jerk, and the nurse can find no pulse, as her small strength concentrated wholly on half an inch of lung space, and she coughs faintly—quick coughs like fingertips on a ledge. Her daughters stand by the bed, solemn in the slow evening, in the shallows of after-supper—Caroline, Nan, and Lucy, her eldest daughter, seventy-two, who holds her hand to help her die, as twenty years past she did the same thing for my father.
Then her breath slows again, as it has done all day. Pink vanishes from cheeks w3e have kissed so often, and her nostrils quiver. She breathes one more quick breath. Her mouth twitches sharply, as if she speaks a word we cannot hear. Her face is fixed, white, her eyes half closed, and the next breath never comes.
She lies in a casket covered with gray linen, which my mother and her sisters picked. This is Chadwick’s Funeral Parlor in New London, on the ground floor under the I.O.O.F. Her fine hair lies combed on the pillow. Her teeth in, her mouth closed, she looks the way she used to, except that her face is tinted, tanned as if she worked in the fields.
This air is so still it has bars. Because I have been thinking about flies, I realize that there are no flies in this room. I imagine a fly wandering in, through these dark-curtained windows, to land on my grandmother’s nose.
At the Andover graveyard, Astroturf covers the dirt next to the shaft dug for her. Mr. Jones says a prayer beside the open hole. He preached at the South Danbury Church when my grandmother still played the organ. He raises his narrow voice, which gives itself over to August and blue air, and tells us that Kate in heaven “will keep on growing . . . and growing . . . and growing”—and he stops abruptly, as if the sky had abandoned him, and chose to speak elsewhere through someone else.
After the burial I walk by myself in the barn where I spent summers next to my grandfather. I think of them talking in heaven. Her first word is the word her mouth was making when she died.
In this tie-up chaff of flies roiled in the leather air, as my grandfather milked his Holsteins morning and night, his bald head pressed sweating into their sides, fat female Harlequins, while their black and white tails swept back and forth, stirring the flies up. His voice spoke pieces he learned for the lyceum, and I listened crouched on a three-legged stool, as his hands kept time strp strp with alternate streams of hot milk, the sound softer as milk foamed to the pail’s top. In the tie-up the spiders feasted like emperors. Each April he broomed the webs out and whitewashed the wood, but spiders and flies came back, generation on generation—like the cattle, mothers and daughters, for a hundred and fifty years, until my grandfather’s heart flapped in his chest. One by one the slow Holsteins climbed the ramp into a cattle truck.
In the kitchen with its bare hardwood floor, my grandmother stood by the clock’s mirror to braid her hair every morning. She looked out the window toward Kearsarge, and said, “Mountain’s pretty today,” or, “Can’t see the mountain too good today.”
She fought the flies all summer. She shut the screen door quickly, but flies gathered on canisters, on the clockface, on the range when the fire was out, on set-tubs, tables, curtains, chairs. Flies buzzed on cooling lard, when my grandmother made doughnuts. Flies lit on a drip of jam before she could wipe it up. Flies whirled over simmering beans, in the steam of maple syrup.
My grandmother fretted, and took good aim with a flyswatter, and hung strips of flypaper behind the range where nobody would tangle her hair in it.
She gave me a penny for every ten I killed. All day with my mesh flyswatter I patrolled kitchen and dining room, living room, even the dead air of the parlor. Though I killed every fly in the house by bedtime, when my grandmother washed the hardwood floor, by morning their sons and cousins assembled I the kitchen, like the woodchucks my grandfather shot in the vegetable garden which doubled and returned; or like the deer that watched for a hundred and fifty years from the brush on ragged mountain, and when my grandfather died stalked down the mountainside to graze among peas and corn.
We live in their house with our books and pictures, writing poems under Ragged Mountain, gazing each morning at blue Kearsarge.
We live in the house left behind; we sleep in the bed where they whispered together at night. One morning I wake hearing a voice from sleep: “The blow of the axe resides in the acorn.”
I get out of bed and drink cold water in the dark morning from the sink’s dipper at the window under the sparse oak, and fly wakes buzzing beside me, cold, and sweeps over set-tubs and range, one of the hundred-thousandth generation.
I planned long ago I would live here, somebody’s grandfather.
Thursday, July 5, 2012
Thursday, July 5, 2102 8 pm
Welcome to Summer Bridge Academy, English 1A!
Below you will find the course outline that you received in class today. You will also find a copy of the Unacceptable Errors handout. In case you misplace handouts, they can be found here on the blog, along with reading assignments (packets), etc. Please check this blog daily.
Below you will find the course outline that you received in class today. You will also find a copy of the Unacceptable Errors handout. In case you misplace handouts, they can be found here on the blog, along with reading assignments (packets), etc. Please check this blog daily.
SUMMER BRIDGE
ACADEMY--2012, CSU SACRAMENTO
COURSE: English 1A: College Composition I
July 6-August 9
Mendocino Hall Room 1020; 1:00 pm – 2:35 pm M through F
INSTRUCTOR: Catherine Fraga
E-mail: sacto1954@gmail.com
Office Hours: Calaveras 149, MTWThF; 12-12:50 PM or
by appointment
CLASS BLOG:
http://SummerBridge1A.blogspot.com
Prerequisites: Placement by examination OR successful
completion of English 1 or its equivalent.
************************************************************************
REQUIRED
TEXTS & MATERIALS
(ALL READING MATERIAL WILL CONSIST OF
HANDOUTS AND READINGS FOUND ON THE INTERNET)
- 8 1/2” x 11” lined notebook paper
(paper that is torn out of a notebook without a straight edge will not be
accepted).
- Stapler
- Reliable access to a computer and a
printer. (Remember, all Summer Bridge Academy students have 200 copies
free on their One Card.)
- Two (2) Blue (or Green) Books for the
two in-class essays
(these can be found in the university’s bookstore or at the Student
Union store—they are available in two different sizes—either size is
acceptable)
COURSE
DESCRIPTION:
English 1A is a freshman writing course that offers students
the opportunity to learn and develop the reading and writing skills that
will be most useful to them during a four-year college program. The course is designed to help students
improve their ability to understand and critically judge reading material
and to write an essay which has a single controlling idea and which is
coherently developed using idiomatically and grammatically correct English.
The heart of the course is readings that require a range of
narrative, analytical, reflective and research writing skills.
COURSE
REQUIREMENTS:
1. Attendance and punctuality are required.
I have designed this course so that it depends on your presence and
participation. Summer Bridge Academy
is a very intense course—a 15 week course in only five weeks.
2. There
will be numerous reading and writing assignments in this course. I expect you to complete them on time
and come prepared to class. We may
not get an opportunity to discuss everything we read for class, but that is
inevitable in any college course.
3.
You will complete a question and comment assignment for several of the reading
assignments, BUT NOT ALL. The course outline indicates clearly when a question
and comment response is due for a particular reading. The question is optional,
but the commentary is not. Your commentary must be a minimum of eight
sentences in length. (I know
ALL the shortcuts students may try.
Be assured that if you write eight very short, simple sentences you will
not receive credit for the assignment. A thorough explanation of what is
required for these question and comment assignments and a sample will be
provided.)
4.
No
late work is accepted. No exceptions. This is a fairness issue.
5. Journal writing assignments
are assigned and completed in class and are not allowed to be made up.
6. Quizzes: There will be five unannounced,
unscheduled quizzes during the semester. If you come prepared to class, the
quizzes should present no problems for you. Quizzes cannot be made up.
7. A note on classroom etiquette:
If you feel you cannot survive each class
session without the use of your cell phone, iPod, iPad, laptop computer or
other similar devices, please do not enroll in this class. Simply, it is the
highest degree of rudeness and disrespect.) If I see you busy texting, etc. I will not hesitate to ask
you to leave. (IF THERE IS A COMPELLING REASON THAT YOU MUST KEEP YOUR PHONE ON
VIBRATE FOR AN EMERGENCY PHONE CALL THAT MAY OCCUR DURING CLASS HOURS, PLEASE
INFORM ME BEORE CLASS.) Each cIass session is a mere 95 minutes long and I plan
to give you my full attention for 95 minutes and I expect the same from all my
students. (Of course, if you have documented paperwork from the university
indicating the need for a computer in the classroom, that is perfectly fine!)
8. HOW YOUR GRADE IS EARNED:
See attached grade roster. At no time should you
wonder how you are “doing” in the course. The grade worksheet makes it very
easy to keep track. Simply record your scores as you receive back your graded
work. Do not discard any assignments that are graded and returned to you until
the semester is over.
9.
English 1A is graded A, B, C, D, or F. Do not assume that because you have not
submitted an out of class essay assignment, you will still be able to pass the
course. Even though you have
missed the due date, and have an automatic “F” for that assignment, YOU STILL MUST WRITE AND SUBMIT ALL THREE
OUT OF CLASS ESSAYS TO PASS THE COURSE, as well as earning passing scores on
your other work.
Theme: The Significance of Home
· We will consider home
as our
course-long theme. The significance of home – as a place of beginnings, as a
starting point, as a place of comfort, regret, anguish, joy, personal growth,
and loss – fuels a meaningful, intriguing collection of themes. Home is a base from which all of us
emerge.
· Most of us have
pre-conceived notions of home as a place of love, comfort, security. For millions of children, however,
these definitions do not fit their reality of home as a place to escape: escape
from cycles of poverty, mistrust, abuse.
· The course will explore
not only home as a safety net, but also the illusions we have of home
perpetuated by Madison Avenue advertising agencies.
· What are our expectations
of home? Again, does our “real”
home live up to the expectations society has created? How do different cultural values and priorities play a role
in determining what home should and should not be? Attempting to answer these questions is the task I have set
for us during this semester.
· What does it mean to leave
home for the first time? What does
it mean to be rootless, without a home?
· Finally, how can we
reconnect to the earth as home, knowing full well that the lives we have
created for ourselves impact the finite planet all of us call home?
·
We view at least one film (possibly two) which explore the theme of home.
These films will allow us to observe and witness concepts we have read about
and discussed.
COURSE OUTLINE
(Please note: Bring this outline to class each
session; changes could occur at a moment’s notice. Also, most reading and writing assignments are noted --
other class exercises and lectures
may not be noted specifically)
ALL OUT OF CLASS ASSIGNMENTS (HOMEWORK, ESSAYS, ETC) MUST BE TYPED
AND DOUBLE SPACED UNLESS INSTRUCTED OTHERWISE. PLEASE USE TIMES NEW ROMAN, 12
POINT FONT and MLA DOCUMENTATION GUIDELINES.
Week One (Friday
July 6)
·
Introduction to the Course (course theme explained)
·
Course Outline Distributed (handout) & Class Blog explained
·
Question/Comment Homework Explained (handout)
·
Unacceptable Errors (handout)
·
Packet 1 distributed (Q & C #1due for this packet)
Week Two (July
9-13)
·
Packet 1 due (Q & C #1 due) (Monday)
·
Stapler check…25 points! (Monday)
·
Oral Presentation Assigned (for last week of
class) (Monday)
·
Discussion: Reading and Evaluating Poetry (Monday)
·
Out of Class Essay #1 assigned today (Tuesday)
·
In class Demonstration/Discussion on the Writing
Process (Tuesday)
·
Read Packet 2 (Wednesday)
·
In class Journal #1 (Wednesday)
·
Read Packet 3 (Thursday) Q & C #2
due today
·
Group Work #1 (Thursday)
·
Discussion: Reading and Evaluating Short
Fiction (Friday)
·
In class Journal #2 (Friday)
Week Three (July
16-20)
· Out
of Class Essay #1 due today (Monday)
· Out
of Class Essay #2 assigned today (Monday)
· Read
Packet 4 (Tuesday)
·
Group #2 – Exercise in Critical
Thinking/Analysis (Wednesday)
·
Read Packet #5 (Thursday)
·
Discussion: How to Evaluate a Documentary
Film (Friday)
· This will be a shortened class (we will dismiss at 2:15 pm)(Friday)
Week Four (July
23-27)
·
Out of Class Essay #2 due today (Monday)
·
View 1st half of film in class (Monday)
·
View 2nd half of film in class (Tuesday)
·
Preparation for in-class writing next week (Tuesday)
·
In Class Essay #1 – remember blue or green
book (Wednesday)
·
Assign Out of Class Essay #3 (Wednesday)
·
Read Packet 5 & 6 -- Q & C #3 due today (Thursday)
·
In Class Journal #3 (Thursday)
·
Discussion: How to Read and Evaluate Essays (Wednesday)
·
Discussion: How to Evaluate a Documentary
Film (Wednesday)
Week Five (July
30-August 3)
·
View 1st half of film in class (Monday)
·
View 2nd half of film in class (Tuesday)
·
Read Packet # 7 – Q & C #4 due today (Tuesday)
·
In Class Essay #2 – remember blue or green book (Wednesday)
·
Out of Class Essay #3 due today (Thursday)
·
Read Packet #8 (Thursday)
·
Read Packet #9— (Friday)
Week Six (August
6-9)
·
Read Packet #10 (Monday)
·
Oral Presentations today (Tuesday)
·
Oral Presentations today (Wednesday)
·
Last day of classes—Grade Worksheet Check &
Celebration!
***A NOTE ABOUT REVISIONS***
Since this is a composition course,
where the goal is to become a better writer and a more sophisticated thinker,
you are invited to revise either out of class essay 1 OR 2. You will not have
time to revise out of class essay 3. The decision to revise is purely optional.
If you choose to revise an essay, the revision along with the original, is due
no later than one week after you receive the graded essay back. You MUST
highlight all changes and additions you make on your revised essay.
English
1A, Summer 2012, Prof. Fraga
GRADE WORKSHEET-----1675 POINTS
POSSIBLE
Stapler Check (25 pts.)
Monday,
July 9—stapler in your possession!______(25)
Oral Presentation=(100 pts.)
Oral
Pres._____(100)
Out of Class Essays (600 points)
Out
of Class Essay 1_____(200 pts.) Out
of Class Essay 2_____(200 pts.) Out
of Class Essay 3_____(200 pts.)
Unannounced Quizzes (250) (50
points each)
Quiz
1____Quiz 2_____Quiz 3_____Quiz 4_____Quiz 5_____
Journals=(100 pts.)
Journal
1 (25) _____Journal 2 (25)_____Journal 3 (25)_____Journal 4 (25)_____
Homework=(200 pts.)
Q and
C #1 (50)_____Q and C #2 (50)_____Q and C #3 (50)_____Q and C #4 (50)_____
In Class Group Work (200 pts.)
Group
Work 1 (50 pts)_____Group Work 2 (50 pts)_____Group Work 3 (50 pts)_____Group
Work 4 (50 pts)_____
In Class Essays (200 pts.)
In
class essay #1 (100)_____In class essay #2 (100) _____
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How
to assess your grade earned: Divide the points you earn by 1675 to find the
percentage. Then see chart below.
100-94=A
63-60=C- Example:
1505 pts. earned=91.4%=A-
93-90=A- 59-54=D
Example:
1444 pts. earned=86.2%=B+
89-84=B+
53-0=F Example:
1376 pts. earned=82.1%=B+
83-80=B
Example:
1189 pts. earned=70.9%=C+
79-74=B-
73-70=C+
69-64=C
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*******************************************************************
UNACCEPTABLE
ERRORS
In English 1A, students should already be very proficient in word usage. We do not have time for grammar
lessons. (I will, however, provide
short ‘mini’ lessons when I feel they are warranted.) The following errors that are commonly made on student
papers are considered unacceptable.
For out of class essays, each unacceptable error
takes ten points off your final earned grade. You may correct unacceptable
errors and receive the points back if you choose to revise. In class essays
that have unacceptable errors CAN
always be corrected to earn back the points lost.
1. there – place Put
it over there.
2. their – possessive pronoun That
is their car.
3. they’re – contraction of they
are They’re
going with us.
4. your – possessive pronoun Your
dinner is ready.
5. you’re – contraction of you are You’re
not ready.
6.
it’s – contraction of it is It’s
a sunny day.
7. its – possessive pronoun The
dog wagged its tail.
8. a lot – always two words I
liked it a lot.
9. to – a preposition or part of an
infinitive I
like to proofread my essays carefully.
10.
too – an intensifier, or also That
is too much. I will go too.
11.
two – a number Give
me two folders.
12.
In today’s society Instead
use “Today” or “In America” or “Now” etc
13. right(s)/write(s)/rite(s) rights are a set of beliefs or values
in which a person feels entitled: His rights were read to him before he
was arrested for stalking Dave Matthews. Writes
is a verb indicating action taken with a pen, pencil or computers to convey
a message: Michelle writes love letters to Dave Matthews in her sleep. Rites are a series of steps or events
which lead an individual from one phase in life to the next, or a series of
traditions that should be followed: The initiate began his rite of
passage ceremony at the age of thirteen.
14. definitely/defiantly This
error USUALLY occurs when a writer relies solely on spell-check. You really
must learn to become the final editor of your work. Definitely is an adverb and it means without a doubt. Mary will definitely
miss the Dave Matthews Band concert. Defiantly
means to show defiance. She was in a defiant mood. It is an adjective.
Or it could be used as an adverb. She was defiantly rude and sullen
towards the professor.
15. On your Works Cited page: you
MUST center and type at the top the heading just as it is here: Works Cited.
NOT ALL CAPS, NOT BOLDED, NOT UNDERLINED, NOT MISSPELLED, NOT IN A DIFFERENT
SIZED FONT, ETC.
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An accumulation of the following
errors can affect your grade, but not one error, ten points down. The number depends on how serious the
error is, and how often you make it.
Some do not slow up the reader as much as others.
- Misuse of the word
“you”. You must actually mean
the reader when you use the word “you”.
- Avoid use of contractions
in formal expository writing. (can’t, shouldn’t, didn’t, etc.)
- Agreement of subject
and verb. Both must be either
singular or plural.
- Fragmented sentences,
comma splices and run-ons. Be
sure to proofread your papers carefully before turning them in.
You
will not pass English 1A if you cannot write an intelligent sentence in correct
English.
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