Sunday, December 15, 2013
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
The Rainbow- Prose Passage Blog Post #20
Lindsay Mccalmont graded by essay and awarded it a 6. With the rubric in mind, Lindsay said she believed that my essay scored a high 6 because my writing provided a "sustained, competent reading of the passage" and "a reasonable analysis" of the prose passage. She said believed that I had good control on my writing and was very consistent on characterizing the woman's situation. I also "referred to the text for support" of my claims. What I could have improved on in my essay was introducing more literary devices in my thesis and ones that supported the woman's position more. Lindsay said she thought that I focused more on the woman's situation and feelings than on the literary devices and although I didn't list them all in my thesis I did however try to include others throughout my essay. I was surprised Lindsay awarded me a 6 because I wasn't as confident with my interpretation and literary devices. After reading the rubric and discussing the essay in class, I feel like I was on the right track but there was a lot of things that I missed in the passage and did not address, like some essential devices.
While reading the passage, I noticed that the word "know" was repeated multiple times as well as references to knowledge or questioning I attempted at including this in my writing but I wasn't sure how to interpret it as well as how we talked about later in class. We also discussed more about how knowledge supported the woman's position and her feelings towards it, which led to out introduction into self-self-assertation. I had about this pyramid a bit but never would have thought to relate it to the passage. Now I think that I could have used this complexity to better elaborate on some of the ideas that I started to propose in my body paragraph and many people could have related better to the passage and my thesis.
Looking back on what I wrote and from our class discussion, I realize that there were some better literary devices that I could have identified and explained, some even crucial to the passage. One of the devices that I brought up was parallelism which I think was solid but I could have been more specific as to what kind of parallelism was used. I also think there was more than one parallelism which I could have alluded to to strengthen my thesis better. In my essay, I also said that the contrast from a man and a woman as a kind of imagery. I never really included contrast in my thesis but it I did mention it later in my essay. With the pressure of time I feel like I may have somewhat ignored the importance the complexity of the passage and couldn't really find a way to form a concise thesis about it. I think in the future I should do a better job at "working the prompt" to help me lead myself to a better conclusion of the passage's importance.
A literary device I did mention correctly was repetition. Lawrence used a lot of repetition between the words knowledge and blood, or reference to these two words. He used this to emphasize the woman's dissatisfaction of her position and her desire to know how she got here and how she could get out of it. I think repetition is a great literary device that is easy to point out but it is hard to find the complexity accomplished by using the device. I feel like I lacked in that a little but am ready to improve on that. Overall, I believe that I had the right general idea in my essay but could have incorporated some more important literary devices that I noticed into my writing to support my thesis better and answer all of the prompt and not only part of it.
Friday, November 15, 2013
Final Portafolio Reflection #19
1. This trimester, I put the most time into the American Drama Assignment. My group was great because from the beginning we agreed on the play in less than two minutes and were content with it, our group was mixed with girls and boys so it was fun and hardworking, we all compromised our time to fit each others schedule so we could get the most work done, we split up the work evenly and overall the play and whole assignment went really well. Everyone in my group put in 100% effort into getting the project done to the best of our abilities. The strengths of our project ended up being our filming, acting, editing and how we used mis en scene techniques to convey meaning in each shot. It was lots of fun and very interesting because we were able to turn a very creepy and old play, The Glass Menagerie, into a funny and modern version of Keeping Up With The Kardashians.
The project that I am most proud of how it turned out was my group's my Creative Summer Assignment because I feel like I was able to really convey the importance of a book I really enjoyed. From the beginning I loved that we were able to choose our own book to read over the summer which made the experience ten times better, which is hard to say for having to do homework over the summer. The White Tiger was culturally appealing and overall very interesting for someone like me who loves to explore and learn about new cultures. I was intrigued by how the book was an epistolary novel and I really tried to bring out the greatness of the book with my creative project. I believe I was able to really portray really well what Arivand Adiga, the author, was trying to showcase, which was the corruptness of his home country, India. There have been several movies about India and the harshness that comes with a third world country, like Slumdog Millionaire, but this story was very different for me and taught be different things than the other movies had. I was very happy with my work on the project and my grade as well because I put a lot of effort in not just showcasing one symbolism on the book but all of the symbolisms, which derived form the most important symbolism of animal imagery.
2. In class this trimester, I feel that, as I grew more confident with the material. At first I was intimidated with the poetry we were learning and all the presentations we creating but now I feel much more confident about next trimester and the AP English exam. From the beginning, I did all of the assignments that I was asked to do and kept my blog updated. I learned the most I could from all the presentations we did and constantly looked back at others people’s blogs and their presentations. The presentations for me were what really build my confidence because I felt so much more knowledgeable about famous myths, fairytales, and literary periods that will surely come back up in my life.
I might not have asked as many questions as I could have or really pitched in on class conversations but I took notes on most of those conversations and paid attention because I sometimes I felt intimidated with other peoples answers but I knew to take advantage of them. I feel like I really learned a lot on how to build a purposeful thesis that could really build my essay well. Writing a thesis is something that I really started working on since AP Comp but I think this class’s essays were different that AP Comp’s so it taught me how to write thesis that fit those kinds of essays. Now I know that to really write a great a thesis I need to first of all understand everything that the prompt is asking me to analyze and in return answer it all on my thesis. In effect, I struggle with attempting to not make the thesis too wordy while I try to answer everything the prompt is asking of me.
3. Looking back on the measurable goals that I set for myself at the beginning of the trimester, it is evident that I have improved greatly. On the first practice AP test that we took, I received a 50%. On the practice AP test that we took for our Unit 1 test, before test corrections I got a 65%. On the practice AP test that we took for our final exam, before test corrections I got a 69%. In just one trimester, my performance on the practice AP exams has improved by 19%! And I still have almost all of second trimester to improve as well. If I show as much improvement next trimester that I did this trimester, then a reasonable goal would be to get around an 87% on the second trimester final exam which is a great score to go into the real AP test with. The important thing for me will be that since I have AP Lit again second trimester it will be essential for me to keep studying and keep going back to my blog and my peer’s blog.
On the first practice test I really had no idea the difference between Petrarchan or Shakespeare format of a poem but now I do. Although, I do feel like I need to keep reviewing the different things that each structure includes like how many couplets or quatrains. Another thing is that I need to improve on being able to narrow down the answers to a 50/50 chance because I usually struggle between at least three out of the five questions, which does not make me confident at all. I do believe I have improved a lot on knowing the differences between metaphors and the actual names for each. I do struggle with the vocab on the exams, which is just a matter for me getting used to the exams. I will for sure take practices exams either online or on the 5 steps workbook every once a month so that I feel more confident during the exam. Overall, I am proud of my progress in this class so far. I think that as of now, I am on a solid path to be able to achieve most of my goals by the time I take the AP exam.
The project that I am most proud of how it turned out was my group's my Creative Summer Assignment because I feel like I was able to really convey the importance of a book I really enjoyed. From the beginning I loved that we were able to choose our own book to read over the summer which made the experience ten times better, which is hard to say for having to do homework over the summer. The White Tiger was culturally appealing and overall very interesting for someone like me who loves to explore and learn about new cultures. I was intrigued by how the book was an epistolary novel and I really tried to bring out the greatness of the book with my creative project. I believe I was able to really portray really well what Arivand Adiga, the author, was trying to showcase, which was the corruptness of his home country, India. There have been several movies about India and the harshness that comes with a third world country, like Slumdog Millionaire, but this story was very different for me and taught be different things than the other movies had. I was very happy with my work on the project and my grade as well because I put a lot of effort in not just showcasing one symbolism on the book but all of the symbolisms, which derived form the most important symbolism of animal imagery.
2. In class this trimester, I feel that, as I grew more confident with the material. At first I was intimidated with the poetry we were learning and all the presentations we creating but now I feel much more confident about next trimester and the AP English exam. From the beginning, I did all of the assignments that I was asked to do and kept my blog updated. I learned the most I could from all the presentations we did and constantly looked back at others people’s blogs and their presentations. The presentations for me were what really build my confidence because I felt so much more knowledgeable about famous myths, fairytales, and literary periods that will surely come back up in my life.
I might not have asked as many questions as I could have or really pitched in on class conversations but I took notes on most of those conversations and paid attention because I sometimes I felt intimidated with other peoples answers but I knew to take advantage of them. I feel like I really learned a lot on how to build a purposeful thesis that could really build my essay well. Writing a thesis is something that I really started working on since AP Comp but I think this class’s essays were different that AP Comp’s so it taught me how to write thesis that fit those kinds of essays. Now I know that to really write a great a thesis I need to first of all understand everything that the prompt is asking me to analyze and in return answer it all on my thesis. In effect, I struggle with attempting to not make the thesis too wordy while I try to answer everything the prompt is asking of me.
3. Looking back on the measurable goals that I set for myself at the beginning of the trimester, it is evident that I have improved greatly. On the first practice AP test that we took, I received a 50%. On the practice AP test that we took for our Unit 1 test, before test corrections I got a 65%. On the practice AP test that we took for our final exam, before test corrections I got a 69%. In just one trimester, my performance on the practice AP exams has improved by 19%! And I still have almost all of second trimester to improve as well. If I show as much improvement next trimester that I did this trimester, then a reasonable goal would be to get around an 87% on the second trimester final exam which is a great score to go into the real AP test with. The important thing for me will be that since I have AP Lit again second trimester it will be essential for me to keep studying and keep going back to my blog and my peer’s blog.
On the first practice test I really had no idea the difference between Petrarchan or Shakespeare format of a poem but now I do. Although, I do feel like I need to keep reviewing the different things that each structure includes like how many couplets or quatrains. Another thing is that I need to improve on being able to narrow down the answers to a 50/50 chance because I usually struggle between at least three out of the five questions, which does not make me confident at all. I do believe I have improved a lot on knowing the differences between metaphors and the actual names for each. I do struggle with the vocab on the exams, which is just a matter for me getting used to the exams. I will for sure take practices exams either online or on the 5 steps workbook every once a month so that I feel more confident during the exam. Overall, I am proud of my progress in this class so far. I think that as of now, I am on a solid path to be able to achieve most of my goals by the time I take the AP exam.
Thursday, November 14, 2013
Sunday, November 10, 2013
Hamlet Blog Post #5
Ophelia's Funeral Song:
Cough Syrup- Young The Giant
Lyrics:
Life's too short to even care at all, oh
I'm losing my mind losing my mind losing control, oh oh
I'm losing my mind losing my mind losing control, oh oh
These fishes in the sea they're staring at me oh oh
Oh oh oh oh
A wet world aches for a beat of a drum
Oh
Oh
If I could find a way to see this straight
I'd run away
I'd run away
To some fortune that I, I should have found by now
I'm waiting for this cough syrup to come down, come down.
Life's too short to even care at all, oh
I'm coming up now coming up now out of the blue, oh
These zombies in the park they're looking for my heart
Oh oh oh oh
I'm coming up now coming up now out of the blue, oh
These zombies in the park they're looking for my heart
Oh oh oh oh
A dark world aches for a splash of the sun, oh
oh
If I could find a way to see this straight
I'd run away
I'd run away
To some fortune that I, I should have found by now
And so I run now to the things they said could restore me
Restore life the way it should be
I'm waiting for this cough syrup to come down
Restore life the way it should be
I'm waiting for this cough syrup to come down
Life's too short to even care at all, oh
I'm losing my mind losing my mind losing
I'm losing my mind losing my mind losing
control, oh oh
If I could find a way to see this straight
I'd run away
I'd run away
To some fortune that I, I should have found by now
So I run now to the things they said could restore me
Restore life the way it should be
I'm waiting for this cough syrup to come down
Restore life the way it should be
I'm waiting for this cough syrup to come down
One more spoon of cough syrup now (oh whoa) [x2]
Justification:
I feel like this would be the perfect song for Ophelia's funeral because it is sad while at the same time has a bit of a lovely beat to her, which kind of defines her. I thought the lyrics fit really well because this sing has to do with committing suicide because the person doesn't care about life anymore. Cough syrup is meant to be the way they commit suicide. I thought the lyrics in which it says "I'm losing my mind…losing control" because she starts singing Well, God 'ild you! They say the owl was a baker's/ daughter. Lord, we know what we are, but know not/what we may be. God be at your table!/", which prove how she is slowly losing her mind and going mad (4.5.42-45).
"These fishes in the sea they're staring at me" relate back to the reason Ophelia committed suicide since she was losing her mind about not having an option between all her men and how they controlled her. The line with the fishes made me think back to her drowning herself as told my Gertrude "So fast they follow; your sister's drown'd, Laertes."(5.7.187) and when she was thinking about it some fish were probably staring back at her and then she decided to be with the fish inside the pond. Gertrude described finding her as with "her clothes spread wide;/And, mermaid-like, awhile they bore her up"(5.7.187-205). This again reminded me back to the fish and and also her beauty. She was this creature that looks very beautiful and independent but deep down they just want to be loved and are kind of lost between being human or fish. She was lost between what to do and how to choose her men in her life. In the song it says "If I could find a way to see this straight I'd run away", and in Hamlet Ophelia was trying to run away from her status of being controlled by men and her only way of being to do that was to commit suicide, which I think is very sad.
This song fits her situation and really describes the sadness behind all the craziness in her life. And so The lines in the song "And so I run now to the things they said could restore me/ Restore life the way it should be" reminds me of "something rotten in the state of Denmark" and especially in the royal family since it was all based on betrayal (1.4.90). The relationships between the family were most certainly lacking as the ghost told "The serpent that did sting thy father's life now wears his crown,"(1.4.38-39). Although Ophelia wasn't directly part of the royal family it all led to her demise since anything that happened to Hamlet affected her severely. Ophelia's madness was practically like her begging for things to go back to how they were when Prince Hamlet would be the rightful heir or better yet when King Hamlet was still alive but it wasn't going to be restored so all she could do was run away and like mentioned before the only way to run away from the problems was for her to commit suicide.
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