JV Basketball

To the right, below the slideshow of this year's authors and books, you will find two links to some things we will do with our offense and defense. For your own copy, either use the "print" link, or see Coach Jackson next week.

Assignment for Monday, 12/1 (Day 5), and Tuesday, 12/2 (Day 6)

For Monday and Tuesday, read the short essays from The New Yorker and the article from The Onion that were handed out in class. Write a journal entry (250 words) that responds to how these articles use comic elements in different ways. Be sure to comment on the visual elements of these pieces as well. If you misplace the readings, you can use the links below, but be sure to print them out and bring them to class.

International  Con Man Barack Obama (The Onion)

Play Nice (The New Yorker)

Animal Tales (The New Yorker)

Enjoy the weekend!

Homework for Monday, 11/24 (Day 3), and Tuesday, 11/25 (Day 4)

Find a humorous text and bring it to class to share with your classmates. The text may be a short video clip, an audio recording, or a reading. You must also write one-paragraph (in your journal) that discusses how the situation, characters, and language of your text contribute to the humor. If your piece is ironic, discuss the qualities that make it ironic, as well. 

Technical details: If your text is  on DVD, be sure to write down the timer markers for the beginning and end. If your text is online, e-mail the link to me so I can have it ready for viewing in class

 

Homework for Wednesday, 11/12 (Day 2), and Thursday, 11/13 (Day 3)

Write a transitional paragraph that connects the two sections of the paper on Antigone and the story from Uncle Tom's Children. You should continue to work on your thesis, and do anything else you can to improve the essay (find evidence for the Uncle Tom's Children story, make sure that you have interpreted or analyzed your evidence, make sure that each paragraph has a topic sentence that interprets some aspect of the story, and so on). Print two copies of the essay, and either e-mail it to yourself or put it on a flashdrive. This is the last class that you will have to work on the essay; you are off Tuesday and Friday, and the essay is due Monday, Nov. 17 (Day 4), and Tuesday, Nov. 18 (Day 5).

You are bringing two copies to class because with one copy, you will peer-edit your essays on Wednesday and Thursday; the other copy will be for me to compare to your final essay. You need to e-mail it to yourself or bring it on a flashdrive because you will continue to work on it in class. 

On transition essays consider the following from Floyd Watkins, et al., Practical English Handbook, 11th edition:

A transitional paragraph usually occurs in longer essays to indicate that the author has finished discussing one major point and is now moving to another. Transitional paragraphs can be relatively brief as the following example illustrates:

The women of some ancient tribes exercise a great deal of control in the family unit even though they have little political power in the tribe as a whole. The men, on the other hand, may rule the tribe but lack power in the domestic aspects of life. (PEH, p. 61) 

In the preceding paragraph, it should be clear that the first sentence refers to some aspect of the earlier part of the essay, and the second sentence refers to the remainder of the essay. The first sentence summarizes what has already been analyzed, and the second sentence anticipates what is to follow this transition. 

Homework for Monday, 11/10, Day 1

Write one page on a story from Uncle Tom's Children for the essay that you've been working on. E-mail this page to yourself or put it on a flash drive and bring it to class. We will continue working on  the essay in class. The questions for that section of the essay are posted below. In class, we will work on developing a thesis and working on a transitional paragraph from the Antigone section to the Uncle Tom's Children section. 

To clarify, the end product of all the work you've been doing and will do over the next couple of classes is an essay on Antigone and a story from Uncle Tom's Children. The final paper will be approximately four to five pages in length. 

Uncle Tom's Children and Antigone essay

Now that you have worked on revising the Antigone essay, you are now ready to begin writing about Uncle Tom's Children. The following reproduces the topics from the in-class essay, and adds directions for writing about your story from Uncle Tom's Children.

If you answered Topic 1 (whether Antigone is a tragedy), consider the following: In what ways is your story tragic (if it is at all)? Do you find that your story reverses the critic's statement about tragedy's imitation of real life? If it is not tragic, why does it not rise to the level of tragedy?

If you answered Topic 2 (whether Antigone or Creon is the central tragic figure), consider the following: Is the main character of your story a tragic figure? If so, is he or she tragic because of a major failure (like Creon), or because his defeat becomes a triumph (like Antigone), or because of some other criterion? If not, why do the characterization, circumstances, and other factors fail to render your character a tragic figure?

The final version of this essay is due Monday, Nov. 17 ( Day 4), and Tuesday, Nov. 18 (Day 5).