Socratic Seminar Questions

1a.These concepts can enhance my learning as I arrive at the time when my grades no longer matter because it has taught me that my learning process should begin with first understanding the “system” and the way things work. Once I completely understand the building blocks of the society or problem, then I can begin to add my own so-called “pizzazz” to it. The grades will no longer matter because I am not in school, but I will then be measured by my success and understanding.

1b.These concepts that we spoke about in our Socratic seminar have enhanced my ability to master content for the AP exam because I know that now I must master the multiple choice section. I know that I have to work on my literary terms and their direct definitions because that is where I have trouble. I have an easy time writing the essays, but I need to add more of my personality into the content

1c. I can use these concepts to better collaborate with and inspire other to improve the information exchange and overall value of our learning work by sharing what I know. I think now I will conduct meetings in a softer environment where people feel comfortable to share their ideas and point of views.

NOTES:

• adults find it harder to be imaginatice
• 1st walk and talk.. then sit and be quiet
• play can be anything, but with no rules
• free play and free learning
• we are all built for a purpose and if we work hard and diligently we can accomplish many things.
• some people associate all learning with school
• understand the building blocks before youwant to try and change the system

Poetry Remix

The Chimney Sweep by William Blake

-Dramatic situation- young poor orphan boy who lived during the age of chimney sweeps

-Poems Structure- 4 lines. 6 stanzas. AABBAABBAABB

- Theme- a poem of hope

-Grammer and Vocab- shortened words such as ”shav’d”

-Images and Figures of Speech- paints a bald sad young boy dirty from soot. Then a perfect heaven

- Important Single Words- names of the boys: Tom

-Tone- sad and hopeless in the beginning, then happy, bearable, and hopeful

-Lit. Devices and Techniques

-Procody- rhymes AABBAABBAABB rhyming scheme

The Tyger by William Blake

-          Dramatic Situation- the speaker sounds like a person who is interested in and respects the tiger

-          poems structure- parallel lines. 4 lines and 6 stanzas

-          theme- curious and interested person who enjoys tigers

-          grammer- tiger is spelled tiger

-          images- a strong dangerous but disrespected tiger.

-          Important single words- tiger. Symmetry repeates

-          Procody- rhymes

The Lamb by William Blake

-          The lamb not knowing its creator

-          Every 2 lines rhymes AABBAABB

-          Theme- knowing ones origins

-          Diction- simple

-          Tone- curiosity

-          Lit techniques- personification and repitition

Literature Analysis: The Loved Ones

1. The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh is a story about a British poet who moves to Hollywood, California trying to pursue a career as a poet. Unfortunately for his dreams, he is forced to take a job as a mortician at a local pet cemetery. One day he is planning a ceremony and meet a girl named Aimee Thanatogenos. She is a cosmetician, and he tries to woo her by reciting British poetry that he claims is his own. The conflict arises when Mr. Joyboy enters the picture and both men have to compete for Aimee’s love and affection.
2. The theme of the novel is disillusionment and dreams. The protagonist, Dennis, is an expatriate from Britain who moves to Hollywood trying to fulfill his dream of being a poet. He does not know that Hollywood is also known as the “City of Broken Dreams” and is disillusioned by his naive hope.
3. The author, Evelyn Waugh, had a comedic but dark tone in this novel. She spoke grimly of death and painted detailed pictures using grotesque adjectives, but displayed it in a comic way. For example when she described Dennis, “A young man of sensibility rather than of sentiment. He had lived his twenty-eight years at arm’s length from violence, but he came of a generation which enjoys a vicarious intimacy with death.” The second example is, “As he said this there came vividly into Dennis’s mind that image lurked there, seldom out of sight for long; the sack or body suspended and the face above with eyes red and horribly startling from their sockets, the cheeks mottled in indigo like the morbid end-papers of ledger and the tongue swollen and protruding like an end of a black sausage.” In this last example, the author describes Dennis’s first thoughts of Aimee. “Her hair was dark and straight, her brows wide, her skin transparent and untarnished by the sun. Her lips were artificially tinctured, no doubt, but not coated like her sisters’ and clogged in all their delicate pores with crimson grease; they seemed to promise instead an unmeasured range of sensual converse. Her full face was oval, her profile pure and classical and light. Her eyes greenish and remote, with a rich glint of lunacy.”
4. Five literary elements in this novel include protagonist, minor character, plot, setting, and narrator. The protagonist in this novel is Dennis. He is the hero and main character of this novel.

Q and A after Practice AP Essay Exam

• What was easy/expected?
• What was difficult/unexpected?
• What did you learn about the AP questions?
• What did you learn about your own performance under pressure?
• How will this experience influence your preparation for the actual exam?

I am happy that we became well acquainted with the books enough to draw from the literature to write the essay, so it was easy to do that. The difficult part was organizing the the essay and deciding how to structure it. From the AP questions, I learned that we should not merely summarize the plot. Also, they ask multiple questions within the prompt, so you have to find a way to organize them. I worked well under pressure and was able to outline my entire essay and write an introduction. This experience has taught me that I need to work on essay structure, considering the prompts were organized in a very similar fashion. If you can be the boss of one AP English Lit prompt, then you can be the boss of all of them.

A Tale of Two Cities Notes

• Luicie was very similar to his wife, the blond actress (ellen turner)
• ATTC was very similar to his play, The Frozen Deep
• 1857- Frozen Deep was published
• 1858- began Public Readings for profit, which established a new relationship with his readers
• divorced, separated from publishers, and established a new journal having majority of ownership
• London, England and Paris, France. Major 2 cities. “extensive and peculiar way of the city” or described as “magic lantern”
• London- everything is there, but everything is disconnected
• Prison city, dust heeps. He described London. And he liked France when he visited.
• Bastille, theres a white bridge that has white brick that used to build a prison “Blood of a forgotten prisoners”
• “it was the best of times, it was the worst of times.. We had everything before us, and we had nothing before us.’ Year 1775-1794. Written 1859.
• Victorians haunted by the French Revolution. Doesn’t like revolutions nor mob rule.
• The novel was made as a warning to Victorian Rule, warning about mob rule and revolutions. It showed that the pre-revolution France, was very similar to the contemporary England and times. Possible books meaning?
• Historical narrative- says that it is the best story he had ever written
• Storming of the Bastille- echoing footsteps
• “headlong, mad, and dangerous footsteps.” Bloody, and fighting.
• Men and woman alike stormed the Bastille
• Boom, smash, and rattle
• De Farge at the door of his wine shop
• Then he got swept out and into the tower
• Saved the prisoners. Some dead, and some found alive
• “prisoners long dead of a broken heart”
• riveting public theme, and inevitability of history
• secret of individuality
• Jarvis Darvey dreams of the “recall to life” of Mr.Manette, the recalled prisoner
• “far far better thing, and a far far rest than I have ever had”

First 100 pages notes

• France starting a revolution. For example: Cask of wine breaks and everyone scrambles to drink the wine drops because they are so poor and thirsty
• diction, apostrophe (Lorry was speaking to the ghost, an abstract concept and being)
• antithesis- "it was the best of times, it was the worst of times" (page 13)
• Setting- uses England and France to address the theme. Also, the time period (Pre French Revolution)
• theme- rebirth. Revolutions change a country. (example: "Recalled to Life")
• symbolism
• syntax- death and fate creating a metaphor
• anaphora- repeating first phrase in the beginning of the book.
• tone-creepy, gloomy, and dark (example: talking about death and destruction)
• genre- historical fiction
• dialect- "aint" and "holla" and "do ya"
• metaphor- wine cask

A Tale of Two Cities Study Question (First 100 pages)

1. What does the first paragraph represent? (ex: It was the best of times and it was the worst of times..)
A: It represents confusion, contrast, and contradiction.

2. What to countries are mentioned in the beginning?
A: England and France

3.Who is the horseman looking for?
A: Jarvis Lorry of Tellson's Bank

4. What message does Jarvis send to the horseman?
A: He tells him to respond to the message saying "Recalled to Life"

5. What thought keeps returning to Lorry's mind?
A: that he has to dig someone out of a grave.. very mysterious if you ask me.

6. Who is Lorry talking to?
A: Lorry is talking to an imaginary ghost asking if he should "recall to life"

7. What does the ghost respond?
A: The ghost sometimes says that he does not want to see the woman, but then at other times he cries for the woman's companionship.

8. Why is chapter 3 called "The Night Shadows"?
A: The title refers to the ghost and intimate time that Lorry spends with him.

9. Who does Lorry meet at the hotel?
A: He meets Lucie, a pretty girl who has just been notified of the death of her father, and now has to deal with his estate (a small property).

10.So far from reading, what do you think is the authors tone?
A: His tone is gloomy and dark. Death is present, and this is obvious because it is mentioned many times in the story. For example with the ghost, midnight rider, cryptic messages, and the death of Lucie's father.