If you get bored during Winter Break ...

The Circuit Bouldering Gym, otherwise known as The Happiest Place on Earth, is offering high school kids free climbing from December 18th - 24th. Click the link for more info.

Agenda, December 14

• Due Now: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 
• Due Thursday: "On Being a Cripple," by Nancy Mairs, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 
• Due Friday: Using two of the essays we've read this term, write a synthesis paragraph that answers the question "How do people overcome obstacles?" Typed. MLA. In the unlikely event of a snow day on Friday, this will be due on January 4. 

Agenda:

1. What's a synthesis paragraph again?
2. Santa Stull ... is coming to class ...
3. Research time

Agenda, December 13

• Due Now: "'I Just Wanna Be Average'," by Mike Rose, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Read it with a dictionary open. Add it to your Bib (pay attention to the quotation marks).
• Due Tomorrow: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 
• Due Thursday: "On Being a Cripple," by Nancy Mairs, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 

Agenda:

1. Hall Pass Procedures
2. Violence questions?
3. Device and Purpose
4. One thing you looked up ...
5. An"Average" class discussion

I'm somebody! Who are you?*

*The title of this post is, as is always often the case, a brilliant pun / allusion. You're welcome.


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1.     Chris Kyle 2.     Kyle Carpenter 3.     Somebody who does crazy things 4.     Marilyn Monroe 5.     Michelle Obama 6.     A person who, by existing, made the world a better place 7.     Ruth Bader Ginsburg 8.     Emma Watson 9.     Edward Snowden 10. Neil deGrasse Tyson 11. Donald Trump 12. Walt Disney 13. Jim Jordan 14. Myself 15. Elvis 16. The Rich 17. Rosa Parks 18. The PIGs 19. People who do great things as opposed to the people who do bad things 20. Abraham Lincoln

21. Bill Nye 22. The Supreme Court 23. Steve Jobs 24. Jordan Low 25. Donald E. Knuth 26. Michael Jordan 27. Kanye West 28. The Rock 29. J.K. Rowling 30. David Bowie 31. Emma Watson 32. Alexander Hamilton 33. Nelson Mandela 34. The Bush Family 35. Kim Kardashian 36. Brian Kernighan 37. Maya Angelou 38. Anyone

Agenda, December 12

• Due Now: Review the definitions of rhetorical strategies that you've already been quizzed on this year. Know the definitions and be able to recognize examples.
• Due Now: Says/Does/Because for "Two Ways to Belong in America," by Bharati Mukherjee, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 
• Due Tuesday: "'I Just Wanna Be Average'," by Mike Rose, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Read it with a dictionary open. Add it to your Bib (pay attention to the quotation marks).
• Due Wednesday, 12/14: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 

Agenda:

1. Device and Purpose
2. The synth prompt, just for kicks
3. Who is somebody?
4. Diction in "Two Ways ..."
5. Says / Does / Because ...

Hey, Period 4!

A couple of delinquents stayed after class today to keep talking about the issue of colorblindness in "How it Feels ..." We realized that people were using the same quotes to argue opposite opinions. This is probably because we never actually defined the term "colorblind."

It might be a good use of your time this weekend to figure out what you mean when you say "colorblind."

Agenda, December 9

• Due Now: Review the definitions of rhetorical strategies that you've already been quizzed on this year. Know the definitions and be able to recognize examples.
• Due Now: "How it Feels to be Colored Me," by Zora Neale Hurston, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. Take good notes.
• Due Now: Says/Does/Because for "Two Ways to Belong in America," by Bharati Mukherjee, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 
• Due Now: Hard copy of your Bibliography. Did you add The Color Purple? Please review this post before offering help to your guy. 
• Due Tuesday: "'I Just Wanna Be Average'," by Mike Rose, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Read it with a dictionary open. Add it to your Bib (pay attention to the quotation marks).
• Due Wednesday, 12/14: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 

Agenda:

1. How it Feels to have a whole class discussion
2. Diction in How it Feels
3. Device and Purpose

Agenda, December 7

• Due Now: Review the definitions of rhetorical strategies that you've already been quizzed on this year. Know the definitions and be able to recognize examples.
• Due Wednesday: "How it Feels to be Colored Me," by Zora Neale Hurston, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. Take good notes.
• Due Friday: Says/Does/Because for "Two Ways to Belong in America," by Bharati Mukherjee, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 
• Due Friday: Hard copy of your Bibliography. Did you add The Color Purple? Please review this post before offering help to your guy. 
• Due Wednesday, 12/14: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 

Agenda:

1. Device and Purpose
2. Vocab Quiz
3. How it Feels to have a whole class discussion

Agenda, December 6

• Due Now: Review the definitions of rhetorical strategies that you've already been quizzed on this year. Know the definitions and be able to recognize examples.
• Due Wednesday: "How it Feels to be Colored Me," by Zora Neale Hurston, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. Take good notes.
• Due Friday: Says/Does/Because for "Two Ways to Belong in America," by Bharati Mukherjee, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 
• Due Friday: Hard copy of your Bibliography. Did you add The Color Purple? Please review this post before offering help to your guy. 
• Due Wednesday, 12/14: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 

Agenda:

1. A Game Called Bluff
2. MC Discussion
3. Device and Purpose

Agenda, December 5

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• Due Now: Review the definitions of rhetorical strategies that you've already been quizzed on this year. Know the definitions and be able to recognize examples.
• Due Wednesday: "How it Feels to be Colored Me," by Zora Neale Hurston, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. Take good notes.
• Due Friday: Says/Does/Because for "Two Ways to Belong in America," by Bharati Mukherjee, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 
• Due Friday: Hard copy of your Bibliography. Did you add The Color Purple? Please review this post before offering help to your guy. 
• Due Wednesday, 12/14: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 

Agenda:

1. Your next synthesis
2. Topic Sentence Sort
3. Multiple Choice Discussion Groups

"Somebody" Synthesis Prompt

“Somebody” Synthesis Essay
Due Wednesday, January 11^th 

Task: In Alice Walker’s 1970 novel, The Color Purple, when Mr. _________ discovers that Celie is leaving him to strike out on her own, he declares, “You black, you pore, you ugly, you a woman. Goddamn, he say, you nothing at all” (Walker 206). Based on several of our in class readings, your personal observations and experience, and your independent research, write an essay in which you answer the question, “What does it mean to be somebody in America?” and / or “How does one become somebody in America?”

Support your claim with direct quotations from multiple texts (a minimum of five sources from class or independent research), properly formatted in MLA style.

Typed. Double Spaced. Twelve point. No blank lines between paragraphs, except to indicate a major shift in tone or setting. Four - seven pages. Don’t forget a title.

Required:

·      Underline and label examples of three different rhetorical strategies. 
·      A minimum of two synthesis paragraphs. 
·      A minimum of five sources. 
·      A minimum of two sources from independent research. 
·      Properly formatted Works Cited Page.

Suggested: Define “a somebody” without referring to the dictionary. Consider exemplification and analogy as powerful tools for definition.

Audience: 1) The editor of a nationally published magazine. 2) The well-educated readers of that magazine. 3) Yourself.

Purpose: 1) To explore the definition of success in America. 2) To explore strategies for achieving success in America. 3) To explore the relationship between identity and success. 4) To suggest a plan of action for the future.

How to approach this paper:

·      Develop an opinion on this subject. 
·      Gather evidence (from our texts and from research) to support your opinion. This is an argument; therefore, personal experience is valid evidence and first person is an acceptable POV (when used effectively). 
·      Create clear, defensible topic sentences. 
·      Draft paragraphs with two quotations to support your topic sentences. 
·      Draft paragraphs with an eye towards ethos, pathos, and logos. 
·      Proofread to ensure your quotations are properly formatted and cited. For this essay, “you will need to include the author’s name in your parenthetical citation” (Kline 1). 
·      Create your Works Cited page.

Agenda, November 29

• Due Now: Review the definitions of rhetorical strategies that you've already been quizzed on this year. Know the definitions and be able to recognize examples.
• Due Wednesday: "How it Feels to be Colored Me," by Zora Neale Hurston, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. Take good notes.
• Due Friday: Says/Does/Because for "Two Ways to Belong in America," by Bharati Mukherjee, from 50 Essays, 2nd edition. Add it to your Bib. 
• Due Friday: Hard copy of your Bibliography. Did you add The Color Purple? Please review this post before offering help to your guy. 
• Due Wednesday, 12/14: Optional Essay: Write a narrative or an argument that answers this question: How would you solve the public health crisis of gun violence? MLA format. 650-750 words. Include word count under the header on page 1. 

Agenda:

1. A game called bluff
2. Multiple Choice Discussion Groups

The Art of Rhetoric

Rhetorical Appeals
Ethos One’s credibility as a speaker and writer.	Logos The intellectual power of one’s speech or writing.	Pathos The emotional power of one’s speech or writing.
Style: Artful expression of ideas: detail, diction, figures of speech (see below), imagery, syntax, tone

Figures of Speech
Figures of Speech: Tropes Artful deviation from ordinary or principal signification of a word.	Figures of Speech: Schemes Artful deviation from the ordinary arrangement of words.
Reference to one thing as another Metaphor Simile Synecdoche Metonymy Word play/puns Personification Zeugma Onomatopoeia Overstatement/understatement Hyperbole Litotes Semantic Inversions Rhetorical question Hypophora Irony Oxymoron Paradox	Structures of balance Parallelism Antithesis Omission Ellipsis Asyndeton Repetition Alliteration Assonance Anaphora Epistrophe Anadiplosis Epanalepsis Chiasmus Polysyndeton

Agenda, November 28

• Due Now: The Color Purple, pp. 1-289
• Coming Tomorrow: Argumentative Timed Write
• On Finals Day: A high-challenge, low stakes exercise that you cannot and should not study for.

Agenda:

1. One sentence gut reaction
2. Alice Walker's purpose ...
3. Timed Write Expectations
4. Pick a question: 3-6
5. Pick a question: 7-10

The Color Purple Discussion Question

The Color Purple

Discussion Questions

All of the questions below should be answered with specific examples and direct quotations from the book. You may note those locations with sticky notes in your book. For ease in writing, you may want to remove sticky notes that don’t address those questions.

Your timed write question will most likely not be one of these questions, though the evidence you find will help you write your essay.

Answer questions one and two first, briefly. Revisit these questions again after you have considered the rest of the questions.

1.    What is Alice Walker’s purpose in writing The Color Purple? What does she want readers to do when they’ve finished the novel? How do you know?

2.    Is Alice Walker’s 1982 novel, The Color Purple, a novel about race? gender? poverty? religion? something else? How do you know?

3.    Who has power in the novel? How is it earned? How is it lost? Who wields it well? Who wields it irresponsibly? What conclusions can you draw about Alice Walker’s attitude towards power from these examples?

4.    How many families are there in the novel? How are they formed and how are they split? What makes families strong? Weak? Genuine? Artificial? What can we learn about families in the African American community from this novel? What can we learn about families in white society from this novel?

5.    In the early chapters of Alice Walker’s novel, The Color Purple, Celie meets a variety of characters who have an impact on the development of her identity. As the novel progresses, however, Celie begins to impact and shape other characters.  Looking at these incidents, what conclusions can we draw about Alice Walker’s beliefs about the way people develop their sense of self?

6.    Alice Walker’s novel, The Color Purple, explores a variety of attitudes towards religion. Locate moments where characters are discussing or practicing their faith. What conclusions can you draw about Walker’s attitude towards religion from these examples?

7.    While in Africa, Nettie witnesses the impact of white colonialism on the Olinka tribe. How do Nettie’s experiences in Africa contrast or reinforce Celie’s experiences in America?

8.    The Color Purple, by Alice Walker, exists – as all novels do – in three contexts: the time in which it is set, the time in which it was written, and the time in which it was read. What lessons does the novel hold about or for each of these contexts?

9.    The Color Purple is a widely banned book, frequently appearing in the top 20 amongst lists of books that have been banned or challenged in an academic setting. What examples of language and content have caused this book to be so controversial? How does the inclusion of this content help (or hinder) Walker’s argument?

10.                  What is the most interesting element in the novel that doesn’t appear in the questions above? How does it help you understand the novel and illuminate Walker’s purpose?

Links to WeLead

Here's a link to the page with the video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TQ2bOq1vGI

Here's the link to the page with the application:

http://oregonhumanities.org/programs/collaborative-projects/we-lead/1367/

Let me know if you need any help with the essays!

Agenda, November 23

• Due Now: The Color Purple, pp. 244-255 and 256-276
• Due Next: The Color Purple, pp. 1-289
• Due Now: Optional revision of synthesis essay. Highlight changes on NEW draft. Clip new draft on top of old draft. 
• Due Now: All fear synthesis papers, revised or unrevised.

Agenda:

1. Important thoughts, connections, and questions
2. Why don't we have school tomorrow?
3. Everybody leaves