Before summer begins, it is a good time to look back over the year and think about what we have read and what we might want to read over the summer. Below are books and novels, related to the books and essays we have read in English and Creative Writing class, both in theme and setting, for students to enjoy in their summer reading. These are only suggestions and are definitely not mandatory reading.

The books have been labeled by genre. Books that are at a more challenging academic level or are more mature in subject matter than our class readings are marked with an asterisk (*).

These novels are generally not appropriate for students who have not yet completed the tenth grade.

Books related to Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

• 12 Years A Slave* by Solomon Northrup, Memoir (1853)
• The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman* by Ernest J. Gaines, Historical Fiction (1987)
• The House Girl by Tara Conklin, Historical Fiction (2013)

For more readings related to slavery in America, you may wish to visit Goodreads.

Books related to Things Fall Apart (these books are set in Africa, but present a 20th / 21st century perspective)

• Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier* by Ishmael Beah, Memoir (2007) – Sierra Leone
• Wildflower: An Extraordinary Life and Untimely Death in Africa by Mark Seal, Biography (2005) – Kenya
• The Poisonwood Bible* by Barbara Kingsolver, Fiction (2005) – Belgian Congo
• The Voluptuous Delights of Peanut Butter and Jam, by Lauren Liebenberg, Fiction (2008) – Zimbabwe

Also check out: TED Talk – The Danger of a Single Story by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Books related to Siddhartha

• Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit by Daniel Quinn, Fiction (1992)
• The Tao of Pooh by Benjamin Hoff, Philosophy (1982)
• The Te of Piglet by Benjamin Hoff, Philosophy (1982)
• Learning to Breathe, One Woman’s Journey of Spirit and Survival by Alison Wright, Memoir (2008)

Books related to “On Keeping a Notebook”

• The Year of Magical Thinking by Joan Didion, Memoir (2005)
• Slouching Towards Bethlehem* by Joan Didion, Essay Collection (1968)

Books related to Malala Yousafzai’s U.N. Speech:

• I Am Malala: The Girl Who Stood Up for Education and Was Shot By the Taliban by Malala Yousafzai, Memoir (2012)
• A Thousand Splendid Suns* by Khalid Hosseini, Fiction (2006)
• Three Cups of Tea: One Man’s Mission to Promote Peace…one school at a time* by Greg Mortenson, Memoir (2007)

Books related to “The Veldt”:

• The Illustrated Man by Ray Bradbury, Short Stories (1951)
• Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, Novella (1953)
• Bluebeard’s Egg* by Margaret Atwood, Short Stories (1998)

Books related to Of Mice and Men:

• The Pearl by John Steinbeck, Novella (1947)
• The Grapes of Wrath* by John Steinbeck, Fiction (1939)
• The Good Earth* by Pearl S. Buck, Historical Fiction (1931)

Books related to Curious Incident of the Dog in the Nighttime:

• Cloud Atlas* by David Mitchell, Fiction (2004)
• The Reason I Jump: The inner-voice of a Thirteen-Year-Old Boy with Autism* by Naoki Higashida, Memoir (2005)

Books related to Persepolis:

• Things I’ve Been Silent About: Memories* by Azar Nafisi, Memoir (2008)
• A Thousand Splendid Suns* by Khalid Hosseini, Fiction (2006)
• Habibi by Craig Thompson, Graphic Novel (2011)

Other Summer Reading Recommendations (just for fun):

The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd

World War Z: An Oral History of the Zombie War by Max Brooks

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

The Lovely Bones by Alice Seabold

Station Eleven by Emily St. John Mandel

Noughts and Crosses by Malorie Blackman (modern re-telling of Romeo and Juliet)

Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister by Gregory Maguire (author of Wicked)

 

What makes a short story come alive?

• the development of character?
• atmosphere?
• the turn of a phrase?
• setting?
• a dramatic and quickly resolved conflict?

Creative Writing students have been asked to share their favorite short stories with me for the next unit. We plan to read as much as we write in order to craft the best stories, with the best characters – filled with the literary devices and plot devices that most appeal to us as readers.

So far, students have shown a strong preference for the American Romantics Edgar Allen Poe and Washington Irving; Columbian author and Magical Realist Gabriel Garcia Marquez; and Irish humorist Oscar Wilde.

My favorite short stories come from two authors: Carson McCullers, a Southern Gothic author known for her tales of outsiders in desolate, half-deserted Depression-era towns; and Margaret Atwood, a Canadian author known mostly for her dystopian constructs. I am also fond of short stories by Stephen King, Alice Walker, Chinua Achebe, and Ray Bradbury – many of whom are likely to make appearances as we embark on our writing our short stories.

What is your favorite short story?

 

Grade 10 – 12  Creative Writing students are currently working on their third writing assignment of the semester – Digital Children’s Books. After reviewing their favorite books from when they were small, and reading the digital storybook The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore, they found elements that the stories and books shared and developed a plan for what they needed to include in their stories and began their character development and plot mapping before moving on to writing their stories.

Rough drafts are now complete and students have the option to choose any platform they would like to use to digitize their children’s books. These digital children’s books will then be made available to ASFM Elementary students.

Below are some program options for digitizing storybooks, many of which could also be useful for projects in other classes. Some are free and some are fee-based. If students choose a fee-based option, they are responsible for the cost.

Students are welcome to contribute their own suggestions for digitizing apps and programs via email to Ms. Crutchfield.

TikaTok: https://www.tikatok.com/

Culture Street: http://www.culturestreet.org.uk/activities/picturebookmaker/

Storybird: http://storybird.com/

Bubblr!: http://www.pimpampum.net/bubblr/index.php

Zooburst! http://zooburst.com/

Storyjumper (suggested by Andrea and Eugenia): http://www.storyjumper.com/

Links to the final digital children’s books will be posted here after Semana Santa.

Often, the hardest sentence of an essay to write is the first sentence. Drawing the reader into your work, while avoiding cliche techniques like starting with a quote, can drive a student to tears of frustration.

Pre-AP students are currently re-writing their thesis papers. These papers mostly begin with a personal anecdote, which is an excellent, and always original, way to begin.

English 10 students are currently writing Macbeth analysis essays, and opening becomes more difficult. Few of us have ever been Thanes in Medieval Scotland on a murderous rampage to acquire the throne – so a personal anecdote won’t work. A common error is to start with a statement like “In the famous play Macbeth” or “Macbeth, a well-known play by Shakespeare,” but in essays, we should avoid superlatives like ‘famous” and “well-known.”

So where should we start? Why not check-out this blog post on opening sentences: http://author-zone.com/write-opening-sentence/

If you’re still stuck, speak to Ms. Crutchfield or put a few options at the top of your rough draft and ask your peer-editing partner which one they like best.

Of course, after you’ve finished your masterpiece, make sure you check the spelling and grammar before turning it in. This checklist from Grammar Girl is a great guide for revising your own writing: http://www.quickanddirtytips.com/education/grammar/grammar-girls-editing-checklist

Having reached the mid-point in Shakespeare’s Macbeth, students are taking a pause for a few lessons to write mini-essays on the famous “Banquet Scene” (III.iv). Instead of analyzing written text, which they have done daily throughout the play, for this assignment they are comparing three different film versions (below) of the scene to determine which version is the most successful in reaching a modern audience.

The interpretation of ‘visual text’ is an important skill that the students will continue to develop as they move into the Persepolis unit next month.

In this assignment, students are also learning how to create bibliography entries without using automated programs like “Son of Citation” and “EasyBib” which often produce inaccurate results.

Below are the three videos students are watching for their paper. Which version do you prefer?

Akira Kurosawa’s Japanese Adaptation of Macbeth called Throne of Blood:

http://www.tcm.com/mediaroom/video/300647/Throne-Of-Blood-Movie-Clip-Pay-Him-No-Mind.html

Rupert Goold’s Modern Take on Macbeth

Jeremy Freeston’s Traditional take on Macbeth

On this, the last day of Semester 1, I wanted to provide a preview of our studies for Semester 2.

When Grade 10 students return from their three-week Winter Break, they will be expected to come prepared with their required reading materials for their Shakespeare studies.

Grade 10 will begin Macbeth on the first day back, January 13. Students can use electronic copies of the novel, but hard-copies are recommended. In our lessons, students are permitted to use “Side-by-Side” editions of Macbeth, which include the text in both Elizabethan and Modern English, such as: Shakespeare Made Easy, though on the major assessments they will need to show they understand the Elizabethan language of the source text.

The Assessment Calendar for the Macbeth unit is below. Students will have three major assessments: a test on Acts I – III where they will need to show their knowledge of the play and characters, their comprehension of Elizabethan English, and their ability to apply the literary terms they will be introduced to in the first half of the play; an essay evaluating three different film versions of the famous Banquet Scene from a diverse selection of productions; and an essay and project assessment for which they will have the choice of three different topics.

Students in Pre-AP English will begin 2015 by taking a look inward and thinking about what drives them personally with the This I Believe project. This I Believe was a radio series begun by Edward R. Murrow in the 1950s, which was revived on National Public Radio in the U.S. in 2005. You can learn more about This I Believe at http://thisibelieve.org/.

Students listened to and discussed several This I Believe essays during their study of Siddhartha in October, and were asked to begin thinking about the world around them and their core beliefs in anticipation of this project. For the first two weeks of 2015, Pre-AP students will be writing and recording their podcast essays and posting them to their student blogs.

After the This I Believe project is complete, students will begin their reading of Much Ado About Nothing, a comedy by William Shakespeare. The study of Much Ado will begin on January 23rd, at which time an assessment calendar will be posted.