Lessons, 24-28 September 2012, Week 5

English 1301

Monday P.M.
Tuesday and Thursday A.M.
Angryverbs.blogspot.com
mhall46184@aol.com
Week of 24-28 September 2012

Week 5 – DESCRIPTIVE WRITING concluded,

PERSUASIVE WRITING continued

1.   Class begins when you enter the room; put away the plastic electrical toys that light up and make noises.  Open your journal and begin writing, work on your current assignment, update your notebook, or read the assigned pages in your textbook, but do not idle.

2.   Each class begins with journal writing.  Follow the prompt on the board.  Talk with each other.  Share knowledge.

3.   A typed, complete final draft of your descriptive essay in MLA format will be submitted as your name is called for roll on your first meeting of the week.  Two weeks are more than enough time for an effort requiring perhaps two hours; no late papers will be accepted.  An absence is no excuse; the assignment has been posted on angryverbs.blogspot.com and on BlackBoard for over three weeks.  If you miss class, your essay is due at the next class with no penalty, but will not be accepted after that.

4. Your two persuasive mini-essays are due at the beginning of your first class next week.  There will be no rough-draft sessions, so if you want me to look over a rough draft, see me before or after class this week.  I command you to help each other.  When I don’t want you to work together I’ll let you know.
5. This week we will begin reading “The Seafarer” in translation (it’s some 1,500 years old) as a prelude to an expository essay with internal citations and a short bibliography. Read Item 53, “MLA Documentation Style,” on pp. 517-519 in your Bedford 8^th edition.  Earlier editions may feature this on different pages.
6. I will make photocopies of “The Seafarer” (the title is in quotation marks / inverted commas because this is a short poem) for you; you can also find various modern translations on the ‘net.  We will read “Seafarer” not only as a gobbet for professional / career writing but as a literary work in itself.  Some terms you will need to learn: four-beat line rhythm, caesura, alliteration, elegy, exemplum, and kenning. 
7. A solar week of seven 24-hour days gives you a total of 168 hours.  You have chosen to take approximately 2 ½ of those 168 hours for formal class time in English 1301.  Thus, you have 165 ½ remaining hours each week in which you may put your head down and rest.