Exam Study Plan for English I

Wednesday, May 16:

1) Review things from first semester that are likely to apply to this exam (Analyzing a Rhetorical Situation) 20 minutes

2) Spend time thinking about and recalling the plot and characters of Nervous Conditions 10 minutes**


3) Think about literary analyses
           -Look back at the one written as a paper and the comments received on it
           -Review notes about it (personal, Prezis) 20 minutes
           -There will be one on the exam about the reading completed this semester/year - read Dr. D's blog
            for more information

Thursday, May 17


1) Briefly review things covered yesterday 10 minutes

2) Do an in-depth review of Nervous Conditions (Look back at test if available)
          -Characters and their relationships to one another
                     -Like/dislike each other?
                     -Direct/Indirect Characterization
          -Structure of society and social class in the book
          -Setting (Macro, Meso, Mico and Physical, Temporal, Social, Psychological)
          -Point of View (1st, 3rd - limited vs. omniscient) 30 minutes

3) Think about the literary analysis specific to the exam 15 minutes

Friday, May 18


1) Review things from previous two days briefly 15 minutes

2) Look back at research paper
          -Look back at the one written as a paper and the comments received on it

          -Review notes about it (personal, Prezis) 20 minutes

3) Think about the literary analysis specific to the exam 10 minutes

Saturday, May 19

1) Review previous topics 20 minutes

2) Review poetry

         -Terms

         -Look at poetry book

                    -Annotations in it

                    -Analyze other poems

         -Review test, if available 30 minutes

3) Think about the literary analysis specific to the exam 10 minutes

Sunday, May 20

1) Review previous topics 20 minutes

2) Review Macbeth

        - Drama terms

        -Book

        -Annotations

        -Other notes 45 minutes

3) Think about the literary analysis specific to the exam 10 minutes

Monday, May 21

1) Review everything until this point 20 minutes

2) Spend more time reviewing the tougher things (opinionated) 20 minutes

3) Brainstorm ideas along with other ones already to be had and organize them in some way 30 minutes

Tuesday, May 22 and Wednesday, May 23

1) Review  25 minutes

2) Organize ideas for the literary analysis 20 minutes

**Times are suggested and may differ depending  on how difficult each topic is for someone

Class Participation - 4th Quarter

(Grading Scale 1-10: 10 being the best)

General Procedures:

10: I feel I did well in this area throughout the year and this quarter was no exception. Every day I brought my materials including my notebooks, books, and writing utensils to class. I also checked my email daily and when necessary, emailed the teacher for information regarding an assignment or even about a simple question. In addition, I rarely remember making unnecessary trips to the bathroom, water fountain, or to my locker during class time. I think all of this combined not only contributed to what I consider an appropriate grade in this category, but also improved my grade by always knowing what is expected of me. It also allowed me the full amount of class time to listen to discussions, which is part of what the next category of participation is about.

Lecture, announcements, whole class discussion:

9: Overall, I have done well in the parts listed in this area of participation. The reason I didn't consider this to be a ten is due to the infrequent side conversations in which I was involved. Another reason I gave myself a nine was due to my rare decision to not take notes on certain things that I felt unnecessary. For example, connections that I didn't consider important, I preferred not to write down. Another instance I felt taking notes was when a minute detail was discussed and it was something I felt I could remember easily without notes. Due to these two negative aspects of this area, I decided to equate each negative idea to be minus a half of a point or 5% for each.

Individual and Group Work:

10: I that when I was involved this quarter in group work or individual work, that I actually stayed away from and ignored many of the present distractions. In each of the assignments or projects that I completed individually were given good grades due to effort put in the task, which involved a lot of focus. During group work assignments, I often found myself trying to divide the work fairly and set up a plan to complete the work on time. Of course, I wasn't the only one with good ideas. The groups I was involved had at least one other person (usually everyone), who worked hard brainstorm ideas about the projects. Therefore, the group projects were balanced and divided evenly between everyone in the group, which ended up leading to successful projects.

Growth:

I feel that much of my participation has remained unchanged and steady throughout the year, however I have noticed minute growth during the year. Focusing and refraining from side conversations has improved quarterly. I am glad to see this improvement and I hope that my improvement alone helped to minimize the amount of time the teacher had to spend wasting on discipline.

English I Outside Reading

My outside reading this year forced me to read more this year. This is a good thing because I enjoy to read, but I often find many obstacles that minimize time to read. Outside reading allowed me to make time to read many books I have been waiting to read. This along with the outside reading days and lunches is why outside reading has been an easy and enjoyable experience for me.

Over the course of the year, some of my reading skills have improved, but some have stayed constant. I have noticed an improvement in my ability to notice foreshadowing that the authors hints at in the book. Also my overall understanding of scenes in books has improved because of an increased vocabulary. (For example, when reading a book yesterday I noticed the word "tenuous" which happens to be one of the words a part of the worldly cards this week.) Some things that have stayed constant includes my enjoyment of action and adventure books and my fast reading speed.

When reading, I find myself rarely thinking about literary elements unless it is something like foreshadowing. Focusing on certain literary devices seems to take away from my enjoyment of reading for me. I do however focus on the plot, characters and things I can envision occurring in the foreseeable future.

High school is an important time for my reading ability to grow as it will become even more vital in the years to come. I know that the later grades of high school and throughout college, reading is a large part of schoolwork and homework. I plan for my reading ability to grow and maybe enjoy more genres that I have never read before.

Reading times:

Monday: Inheritance - > 100 minutes
Friday and Saturday: Inheritance - > 50 minutes

Macbeth's Perspective

My time after the the recent war has been very eventful. I have gone from being the Thane of Glamis to become the Thane of Glamis and Cawdor. In addition, I have earned the title King of Scotland. I enjoy my recently earned positions, but I am now now, more than ever, frightened of my future. I am afraid of someone murdering me as I did to the marvelous King Duncan. Therefore, my outgoing trust is minimal. Sometimes even my wife seems like a person I should be afraid to confide in as I sense a different persona emanating from her.

Always I find myself thinking about the atrocities of the murder I committed. I despise thinking about this dark event, but the thought frequently returns. One reason this thought returns so often is I am terrified that someone will find out that it was me who committed treason against the former King. My wife seems to attempt to calm me down, but I find that she too is having difficulty.

Reading Lunch 4-25-12 (Bonus Post)

The second reading lunch of the year occurred last week and it was yet again an enjoyable experience. The book I discussed with others was Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins. There were actually three tables just for this one book! Part of what we did as a group was compare and contrast the movie and the book. Especially when talking about the movie, I learned a few things I didn't already know about the production choices of the movie.

Not only was the discussion enjoyable, but the food and drinks were too. This added to my enjoyment when attending the lunch. An added bonus to attending this reading lunch was actually being able to receive bonus points (no pun intended) by writing this blog post. I, again, had a good time at the reading lunch and hope that it will continue as a part of English I for years to come.

Reflection of English I Writing

            The writing aspect of English class this year has helped me become a much better writer and has led me to a better understanding of mistakes or errors that I commonly make. My improvement as a writer becomes apparent when comparing each consecutive paper I have written throughout the year. The variety of papers I have written in English this year included a literacy narrative, profile of a person, literary analysis and a research paper. In addition to papers, I have written blog posts, such as this one, and other countless writing assignments.

            When beginning English I, I knew that I needed to work on supporting ideas and writing faster because in the past I have often struggled with that. Those aspects of writing were part of my focus for improving my writing. The combination of the two transpired in my struggle with the WrAP test this year. Normally, I do well, but this year, I found it hard to write about the topic given as I found it rudimentary and hard to expand on. Of course, the amount of time given didn’t help because there was no time to just think for a while or make a detailed outline.

            Each of the “Traits of Good Writing” plays a crucial role in developing a good paper, or just writing in general. The traits focused on this year include ideas, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency and conventions. With each paper I have written, I have noticed a fluctuation in my grade for each of these traits. Therefore, I made a table and graph to calculate which traits needed the most work. I figured out that my two weakest categories are sentence fluency and conventions (results are an average of all papers combined). Both of these categories would be another place to focus on next year.

            Not only do I need to work on the broader categories of writing, but I also need to work on specifics. One specific I need to work on is punctuation. Sometimes I find myself overusing commas. This can become a bad habit because it might lead the reader to a wrong interpretation. Other components of writing that need work are quotations and paraphrasing. In the research paper, I did well with quotations, except for that instance where I made the mistake of “dating Spiderman”. However, when looking back, I feel that I need to incorporate my quotations better. I also need to work on paraphrasing. Not once in the research paper did I use this technique. Looking back, I realize the advantages of paraphrasing and the potential it had for making my paper even better. Lastly, I need to refrain from using words like “very” and “a lot” because they are often overused and are less specific than other adjectives.

            I have noticed that each paper that I have written this year has its own unique struggle. With the first paper, the literacy narrative, the vivid details and sentence fluency were the hardest aspects of it for me. The next paper I worked on, the profile, I found it hard to write and keep in mind the perspective of the reader. Thinking in the reader’s perspective was crucial because the reader was supposed to be able to infer characteristics about the person or place being described in the paper. This is opposed to just simply stating the characteristics of the place or person. The third paper, the literary analysis, was the most difficult for me. I think if I had chosen a different story it would have been better and easier to write. In this paper I lacked support for my thesis, which in this paper seemed more essential compared to others. The final paper I completed this year was the research paper. If I had not “dated Spiderman”, this paper would have almost been impeccable because the rest of it was well written.

            One of the most vital things that I need to work on is analyzing my rhetorical situation. Often, I find myself taking this step for granted and ignoring it. I need to step out of this mindset of thinking and work towards utilizing what it has to offer me. I now realize after learning about it this year that analyzing my rhetorical situation can provide me with more ideas and help me to decide how to write in any situation.

            Moving into next year when I take English II, I plan to take with me everything I have learned throughout all of my years of writing. I plan to continue to work on two of my biggest obstacles supporting a topic and writing in a limited amount of time. Not only could this help with the WrAP test, but it could also help me to get better grades. The time management could also allow me to finish writing assignments faster and more efficiently. Another goal of mine is to make sure to stay in the tense I am writing in when it is essential. I also plan to continue to work on the basic writing skills, which could always need improvement such as word choice and sentence fluency. If I succeed in doing well with these goals next year, it will make it much easier throughout my last two years in high school and onward.

            I need to continue to work on analyzing my rhetorical situation, time management, support, tense and the “Traits of Good Writing”. This gives me plenty to consider when writing next year. There is always something to be improved when writing, but if I improve all of these aspects of my writing, it will be much easier to read and more enjoyable.

My Common Errors List

Punctuation
     Using commas at the appropriate times

Example: "Early, one morning in January...."

-From "My First Book" (Literacy Narrative)

Quotations

  "Dating Spiderman"

Example: "Another part of this treaty allows, 'the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), an independent arm of the United Nations based in Vienna, Austria, routinely inspects member countries with peaceful nuclear programs to make sure they are not secretly diverting the equipment and fuel to military use' (Griffin)."

(I quote this in my paper, but do not explain what I am trying to explain with it)

-From "Man-Made Disaster" (Research Paper)

Sentence Structure

  Wordiness

Example: "Another change between then and now is my style of writing has changed as with my opinions on writing."

-From "My First Book" (Literacy Narrative)

Staying in the same tense

Example: "This concludes.... Pepé had"

(Present tense changed to past tense)

-From "Pepé's Newfound Maturity" (Literary Analysis)

Avoid using "a lot"

Example: "Nuclear weapons cost a lot of money"

-From "Man-Made Disaster" (Research Paper)