Monday, October 29, 2012

ENGLISH - 1^st trimester – Day 38

1.      Write a paragraph about what you think makes some siblings treat each other cruelly; unkindly. (to be COLLECTED)

a.       Underlined the “core” of each sentence of our warmup and drew arrows connecting the various “chunks” to the core. Discussed how “I think” or “I believe” makes the writer the actor (which is NOT what we want).

Discussed the following:

a.       Your feelings sit in the backseat of your car. You are the driver of your car. Your feelings are backseat drivers always yelling out directions to you, telling you what to do and how to drive. You can listen to them, acknowledge them, but you don’t have to do what they say. You get to drive wherever and however you choose. You’re in the driver’s seat.

b.      In “The Scarlet Ibis” James Hurst wrote, “There is within me (and it is with sadness I have watched it in others) a knot of cruelty borne by the stream of love, much as our blood sometimes bears the seed of our destruction, and at times I was mean to Doodle.” (pg. 336)

·         TO BE COLLECTED - (add to same paper as above paragraph), for 15 full minutes, write out what you think is the author’s purpose of this “knot of cruelty” (pg. 336) or “childish spite” (pg. 343) or “streak of cruelty within me” (pg. 343)

o   Answer one (or all) of the following questions (as long as you write for 15 minutes):

1.      When (and with whom) does your knot of cruelty show up?

2.      What could you personally do differently with your knot of cruelty? What could you do differently with your spite?

3.      What could you learn from this older brother’s tragedy?

·         Next, for 8 minutes: Pretend someone is unfamiliar with the concept of the “knot of cruelty” that we discussed in “The Scarlet Ibis.” Give them a taste of what it is (explain it to them in your own words - for 8 full minutes) and how it is present in one of the other short stories that we have read in this class (“The Cask of Amontillado,” “The Interlopers,” “The Most Dangerous Game”).

·         Picked up this week’s vocabulary word list (Lesson 5)

ENGLISH homework:

Study for Friday’s vocabulary test (Lesson 5: jaded, gist, advocate…)