1. We’ll watch 2-3 scenes per day, pausing when necessary for immediate clarification. As you watch, follow along with the text in your books or on the screen, recording questions, reactions, insights, and connections.
2. Each night you should read back over the scenes, answering questions as you can, looking up information, asking more questions, recording more insights and connections.
3. Come to class the next day ready to ask your questions about the previous night’s reading and help others answer theirs.
4. Repeat.

You will write over Hamlet and the poems for your midterm (due tentatively by 30 September). While I will not give you a required topic to write over, it would be a good idea to start with those poems (3-5) that you feel the most comfortable with and find connections to Hamlet’s story as we move forward. I will give you guidance as I check your journals (at least once weekly from now on, but if you are uncomfortable with your grade you may come see me before or after school to ask questions or show me your progress) and we will be discussing these connections as we move through the work.

The writing process for my classes is as follows:

1. Journaling (yep, you’ve already started your papers! How do they look so far?)
2. Review of your notes, looking for patterns and connections. If more research is required, it is done at this stage.
3. Outlining your ideas, ensuring sufficient support for your points and an appropriate thesis statement.
4. Peer review, presentation of outlines. This ensures that your ideas and connections are clear to you and others.
5. Revision of outlines, peer review as necessary.
6. Rough drafting of the paper, watching for proper style, grammar, etc.
7. Peer review of rough drafts followed by a one-on-one review with me.
8. Revision of rough draft into final draft.
9. Peer review, revise (last time!) then turn it in.

It seems like a lot of work (and it should), but if you have thoroughly journaled a work (plenty of quotations, answered questions, and connections), the outline only requires organizing your thoughts and information, the rough draft entails making the information clear and engaging, and the final draft is a run-through for grammar and punctuation.

So, what’s the punchline? Journal well, my friends, and ask plenty of questions.

In an effort to make the gradebook mean something to you, I’ve broken down the “Journal” assignment into five skills, each worth five points. The following is a list of the five with explanations and examples from our readings.

Record Personal Connections—reactions to the text, parts you think are interesting, etc. It’s always a good thing to remember cool stuff you read, and gives you plenty to discuss in class.

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;

If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim (Kipling 9-10)

A warning against losing sight of the things in front of you, of thinking without discovering ideas, perhaps?

Record Literary Connections—thematic connections to other works, allusions to characters or themes in other works, etc. These connections are the bread-and-butter of literary analysis. As you begin writing, you can use the theme in another work to help you understand the work you’re reading, or vice versa. Plus, looking for thematic connections will help you write papers over a topic (like Isolation) amongst several works.

“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:

Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!” (Shelley 10-11)

Ramesses II? Watchmen? Seems like Coldplay’s “Viva la Vida”

Record Questions and Answers—parts you are confused about, possible answers. Ever get stuck or frustrated with a complicated reading only to drop it and realize in class the next day that you still don’t know what is going on? Recording questions as they pop up allows you to set them aside for later (either in class or after you’ve read further). Once you’ve found the answer (after discussion or insight through further reading), record it and you’re good to go.

I see the boys of summer in their ruin (Thomas 1)

Who are the boys of summer?

Record Vocabulary—words you aren’t familiar with and definitions. Because learning words is good.

Record Synopses—recount the story, line, or passage in your own words. This will help you work out difficult passages and remember what you are reading. I do this for all the characters, too, ‘cause I have a hard time keeping them straight at times. It is also helpful to record the tone or theme presented, as you might come across a shift, or be able to make connections to other works with similar ideas.

WE wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties. (Dunbar 1-5)

We hide ourselves (our personalities? our beliefs? our fears and shortcomings? our pain?) in a deceitful world while our speech is distorted and circumlocutionary.

You’ll notice that most of the responses here are questions or tentative answers. The reading journal is a place for experimenting, for making guesses about a work and finding counter-evidence, revising the hypothesis and finding more support. It is for prewriting. Once you have a solid grasp on a work, you are ready to organize your ideas and share them in an essay¹. I emphasize the journals so heavily not only because they will make you better writers and readers, but also because they will make you better students; this reading strategy applies to all types of study, regardless of field.

So. If you feel that your grade isn’t what it should be, take the advice I gave you in class today go back over the poems more closely and record your thoughts. Bring your brilliant new insights to me before or after school (or during lunch) Monday and I’ll give you some feedback and make your grade reflect your awesomeness.

1. Why checking the etymology of a word is the best thing ever: essay.

• “We Wear the Mask” by Paul Lawrence Dunbar (1913)¹
• “Sympathy” by Paul Laurence Dunbar
• “Not Waving But Drowning” by Stevie Smith (1957)
• “Ozymandias” by Percy Bysshe Shelley (1875)
• “If” by Rudyard Kipling
• “Viva la Vida” by Coldplay (2009)
• “I am a Rock” by Simon & Garfunkel (1965)²
• “Eleanor Rigby” by The Beatles (1966)
• “Self-Dependence” by Matthew Arnold (1852)
• “Warning to Children” by Robert Graves
• “Do not go gentle into that good night” by Dylan Thomas (1952) (With audio!)

I asked you to read and journal over “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” by T.S. Eliot, which you can find here. It is a complicated poem, so don’t worry if you have more questions than answers at this point³—I don’t expect a dissertation, just a record of your initial reaction and questions, lots of questions.

If you come across (or know of) any other poems we should read, post a link in the comments or bring a copy to class.

1. Yep, he’s American, but these are important poems.
2. Can’t find a clean link—search if you’d like.
3. And here I use an emdash to set off a parenthetical elaboration…

News

• Time isn’t my favorite news source, but the photography is always amazing.
• Google’s Interesting Reads²
• New York Times: Front Page The NYT has lots of feeds, so you can choose what you’re interested in.
• The New Yorker.  I subscribe to all feeds.  But then, I’m addicted to this.
• NYT: Magazine
• NPR.org breaks up the site sections into different feeds, which can be found here.  After you sign up with an RSS reader, click on the RSS button next to the section you’re interested in.  I’m subscribed to Top Stories, All Things Considered, World Cafe, Morning Edition, Topics: Music, and of course, Education.

Opinion

• Arts & Letters Daily—Brilliant site bringing together articles from all over the Interwebs. Mostly scholarly; all well written.
• In These Times—Began as an “Independent Socialist Newspaper,” but is primarily progressive (left of center) in it’s leanings today. Kurt Vonnegut was a frequent contributor until 2005.
• Slate.com—Online-only news magazine. Gotta love the Explainer.
• The New Republic is always a good source for opinion articles.  It’s a bit liberal, but always creates solid discussions.
• Bad Idea—A British magazine that publishes “young journalism.” Definitely worth checking out, as it brings a fresh face to opinion and editorials. Check out the Butcher’s Shop for an overview of the editing process articles go through before publication.
• AdBusters—Popular amongst my students for the past two years. Worth checking out.
• National Review—Very well-written conservative magazine.
• Popmatters—Articles on popular culture; music, video games, books, television, and movies are all topics. Great place to find an article and a new favorite band.
• The Urban Tulsa Weekly is my favorite source for local entertainment and opinion articles.  The Most Recently Posted feed delivers all content for your perusing pleasure.

Stuff to Make

• DudeCraft
• Wunderkammer
• Instructables
• Make
• Afrigadget
• Typographica
• I Love Typography

Wasting Time

Probably not a good idea to add any of these…

• The Art of Manliness
• Atlas Obscura
• BibliOdyssey
• Neatorama

1. I was going to organize these into “Relevant to School” and “Not,” but they all seemed relevant in one way or another.
2. Not exactly sure how this works, but I think there’s an algorithm that finds news links that are often shared/read.