Check the Student Toolbox!  It's right on top.  Technical difficulties ensued last night from home, but all is fixed and THE REVIEW IS UP.

Warning:  It's long.  As in over three pages long.

Here's how you should approach it:  Because there's so much present, go through the items and place a check by the items you can thoroughly discuss.  If you can't discuss or answer a question or item, highlight it and go over those items. 

It is not for a grade, nor is it mandatory.  It is, however, highly suggested. 
 
 
Yeah, I'm weird.  Whatever.

Below is the file to the Jeopardy powerpoint.  This will be available until 12/22 @ 10:00am (no funny comments about the Earth being gone.  The Earth will be here.  So will you, in my classroom, taking a final.)


english_1_pre-ap_final_review.ppt
File Size: 1708 kb
File Type: ppt
Download File

I will also post a study guide shortly.  It will be a PDF file - you can write all over it, abuse it, use it as toilet paper, whatever (you'll have to print it out first for toilet paper, which takes effort...). 

I am so slap-happy and ready for finals!  Are you?  Let's show this test who is BOSS.  After all, as SO MANY of you said today, it's time to "go big or go home."  Let's go big, then go home..fo
 
You could have read this in true Early Modern English...like this...  :-0

Here is your poem for tomorrow's TPCASTT breakdown:

William Shakespeare

Sonnet 130



My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun;

Coral is far more red, than her lips red:

If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun;

If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

I have seen roses damasked, red and white,

But no such roses see I in her cheeks;

And in some perfumes is there more delight

Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.

I love to hear her speak, yet well I know

That music hath a far more pleasing sound:

I grant I never saw a goddess go,

My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground:

   And yet by heaven, I think my love as rare,

   As any she belied with false compare.

Again, your responsibility is to complete, at least, the T, P, and C of the TPCASTT protocol.  That should give you enough time to transfer/complete your work (with your partner as well, if necessary).  We discusssed the "title" in class (what does the word 'sonnet' tell you?), and paraphrasing is easy...if you can get past the antiquated/inverted syntax.  What you need to focus on is the connotation; that will give you lots to discuss when you start talking about attitude and theme. 


Good luck; come ready to work tomorrow.


 
That's Sasha, my grading buddy...

I am working on your essays, and they take a while, so I will only give minimal feedback on the essay itself, along with the rubric score. If you guys want more feedback, I have no problem doing so in a one on one tutorial session.

Now, on with the TPCASTT...

Most classes left off on A - attitude. So, that's where I shall pick up. I will give a few small hints to assist you in your annotations, then you can resume.

Attitude - well, we know this is a war poem. Also, because of Owen's word choice, we can gather his opinion regarding the war. Use your connotation notes as a stepping stone to attitude; how does he feel about the death, about the glory of war? Why does he call dying for your country "that old Lie"?

Shift: Ahhh, so much can be told from shift, and the easiest way to look for it is in a stanza break. When we read the poem together in class, we pointed out that the third stanza continues the rhyme scheme that should conclude the second stanza... and yet it stands apart. Why? Why does the author want us to focus on those two lines? What changes? Same thing for the last stanza. In the last stanza, the point of view and audience focus changes completely. Again, what's the point? What is different in the first stanza to the last stanza? What shifts??

Title: Now that you know what the title means, you can begin to give some interpretation, connecting it to all the clues located in the text up to this point. This should be easy now.

Theme: Theme, unlike the title, is never easy interpretation. What does Owen want us to understand after reading this poem, other than the cautionary message he leaves behind for his reader? Is there anything else we are not catching? Is there something else we are supposed to learn?

That's it folks...I am back to grading. Gotta get these essays locked up! See you tomorrow,
Ms. B
 
Apparently, when Wilfred Owen wrote this poem during WWI, he borrowed from the Roman poet Horace for his signature line.  Horace wrote the following:

Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori:
mors et fugacem persequitur virum
nec parcit inbellis iuventae
poplitibus timidove tergo.

...Which translates to...

"How sweet and right it is to die for one's country:
Death pursues the man who flees,
spares not the hamstrings or cowardly backs
Of battle-shy youths."


This website actually gives you a little bit of background on the diction choices made in Owen's poem.  It's kind of interesting to see how vivid his imagery is when it is all tied together, especially through these explanations.

There is an entire body of war poetry - it is something borne out of the heartbreak of loss and the fear and stress of battle that drives men and women to write about their experiences, wondering if we civilians will ever see anything so intense, dramatic, and threatening in our own experience.  It is love poetry's opposition:  love poetry can be just as intense, dramatic, and threatening, but the stress gives something to the continuance of life, while war gives to the continuance of death.

Just to conclude, I found an op-ed in the New York Times that uses this title (the phrase has become something of a pop culture allusion after Owen's poem was posthumously published).  Make some connections between this op-ed and the poem regarding attitudes of war.  Se
 
poetry_terminology.ppt
File Size: 316 kb
File Type: ppt
Download File

The above file includes the poetry notes, given in the right order.  To recap, here's what you need, as far as the notes...

Poetry notes review:  No required examples or explanations.
Poetry forms:  One found example required; no explanations
Poetry structure:  Two examples with explanations.  

And, for your viewing pleasure...an incredible slam poet who happens to be an English teacher (I'll bet you'd never guess...ha!)