Practice Senior Project Presentations

These practice presentations are a chance for you to try your work out on the rest of the class before presenting to the big audience. Your presentation is a direct reflection of the kind of student you are and the work you completed this semester, so you should take every opportunity to make it as good as you possibly can.

You will receive a grade for your presentation practice. I will calculate your grade as follows:

90 -- 100: Student is completely prepared to give his or her presentation BEFORE the class starts. The presentation is nearly complete, and it shows that the student has spent ample time preparing a presentation for this practice. Students who receive a score of 90-100 are attentive to the other students who are presenting.

80 -- 89: Student is prepared to give his or her practice presentation, but it is clear the student could have spent more time. The presentation may not be complete. Students who receive a score of 80-89 may not be attentive to other students while they are presenting.

70-79: Student is prepared to give his or her practice presentation, but just barely. The presentation shows that the student has done the bare minimum to prepare his or herself for this practice presentation. Students who receive a score of 70-79 are not attentive to other students as they present.

0 -- 69: Students are not prepared to give a presentation at the beginning of class. Presentations are incomplete or extremely brief (under 6 minutes). Students receiving a score in this range are not prepared to give an adequate presentation.

You should use this rubric from your handbook to create your presentation. It is the one the judges will use when they grade your real presentation.

Lit 9 End of Course Test

Follow this link to a copy of a Ninth Grade Literature End of Course Test.

Read each question carefully, and record your answers on another sheet of paper. We will review the answers once everyone is through.

TAKE YOUR TIME!
This test is loaded with "sucker" answers that are there to fool those who are not careful!

Lit 11 End of Course Test

Follow this link to a copy of the American Literature (lit 11) End of Course Test.

Read each question carefully, and record your answers on another sheet of paper. We will review the answers once everyone is through.

TAKE YOUR TIME!
This test is loaded with "sucker" answers that are there to fool those who are not careful!

Senior Project -- Product Rubric

While you are putting the finishing touches on your product, you should review how I will be evaluating what you have done:

90 - 100: These products illustrate that the student was willing to spend the time and effort necessary to showcase what they have learned this semester in a way that is thorough and complete. Products scoring in this range show the student was willing to exceed the bare minimum and created something of which they can be proud. These products can stand alone without much further explanation.

80 - 89: These products illustrate that the student was willing to spend valuable time and effort necessary to showcase what they have learned this semester, but not to the extent of those that garner higher scores. Products in this range meet the requirements of the senior project but do not exceed those requirements. These products show that the student could have taken more time and exerted more effort to complete this requirement. These products may not stand on their own, and may require additional explanation on the part of the student. Products submitted one day late will receive a grade not any higher than 80-89.

70 - 79: These products illustrate the student's willingness to spend only the minimal time and effort to complete this requirement. Products in this range meet the bare minimum requirements. These products do not stand on their own and require substantial explanation to make clear what the learning it illustrates. Products submitted two days late will receive a grade not any higher than 70-79.

0 - 69: These products are incomplete, show no true effort on the student's part, and do not illustrate much of the semester's learning if at all. Products scoring in this range illustrate the student's lack of serious work on this portion of the senior project. Products submitted three or more days late will not receive grades any higher than 0-69.

How About Those DIRTY BIRDS!!!

I've learned my lesson, y'all. After watching the Atlanta Falcons dominate my Carolina Panthers on Sunday, I am finally ready to admit they are the better team. When I looked up at the scoreboard and saw that 20-13 staring at me, I had no choice it was time to face the truth.

Man, I wish Alge Crumpler played for the Panthers!

Maybe if they didn't wear girly powder blue, the Panthers may even intimidate the other team a little instead of letting the officials decide the game like the one in Atlanta earlier this season.

I think the real lesson here is that I should listen to Mr. Siegmund when it comes to football matters since he told me all along the Panthers were pretenders. I am going to go ahead and say it -- you heard it here, folks -- The Falcons are going to take out the Buccaneers this week on their way to a NFC South Championship. GO DIRTY BIRDS!!!

Maybe Mr. Siegmund will let me keep this hat since I'm tired of looking like a member of The Backstreet Boys wearing that baby blue one. . .

Shakespeare Renaissance Project

During the next couple weeks we will be reading a Shakespeare play together. This post is to outline the tasks which are expected of you to receive credit for this project.

1. We will be reading the play together. Your participation is expected.

2. You should complete a post that is a response to the historical information I have posted about the Renaissance. This can be as simple as you discussing what stuck out to you the most and why.

3. You will complete four separate posts about the play (Act I, Act II, Act III, and Acts IV and V). These posts should be 3-4 paragraphs in length, include a very brief summary of what we read, as well as your reactions. You should incorporate direct textual evidence into these posts.

Your grade will be calculated with the following formula:
Participation = 50%
Web Posts = 10% each (x5)

Exemplar Research Papers

The following links are to exemplar research papers. None of these are perfect, but they all can show you something I am looking for. Some of these writers did an excellent job citing their sources, while others did well at including their own voice with their research. You will find small errors in these papers, but overall they can help you get an idea of what yours should look like when you are through.

Solar Energy

The Reef Tank

Belly Dance

Coaching Young People

Forensic Entomology

Game Design

Tattooing

LOOOKY HERE!!

Though I am not in the classroom today, your responsibilities have not changed. You should know most of this, but allow me to reiterate:

First Period: To be on pace, you should have both your Puritanism and Rationalism posts up on your blog. Your rough draft is due today. If you do not have a rough draft ready at the beginning of Monday's class, I will consider it late. Put drafts in my drop box BEFORE you leave today. You should be through with or working on Module 3.

Second Period: To be on pace, you should have your Short Story #1 posts up on your blog. Short Story #2 is due at the end of next week, so you should work on that. Your rough draft is due today. If you do not have a rough draft ready at the beginning of Monday's class, I will consider it late. Put drafts in my drop box BEFORE you leave today. You should be through with or working on Module 3.

Third Period: You should continue with your research. The next time you see me, I will be checking your research notes. I will be looking for paraphrased notes, direct quotes, and the bibliographic citations for ten separate sources. Showing me an article you copied or e-mailed to yourself is not good enough. You also have your Middle Ages Literature project to work on; it is due at the end of next week.

If you post something to your blog, make sure you leave me a comment, and then check yours to see if there is anything else you need to work on.

Questions?

E-mail Me:

dana.siegmund@gmail.com

My Autobiographical Writing -- Take me out to the BALL GAME

Even before I was born, it seemed to be determined that baseball would be a part of my life. As the story goes, my father was not ready to go to the hospital while my mother was in labor with me until the Boston Red Sox game was over. They were getting beat pretty badly (9-2) by the Baltimore Orioles, but perhaps there was something else interesting to see in that game, or maybe my mother was not quite ready to go to the hospital either – I didn’t get my first breath air until 3:56 that morning. To make a long story short, my father is a huge baseball fan, as was his father and grandfather before him. I am sure that when I was born, he was already thinking of how he could pass the love of this sport to his first child.

I remember watching baseball with my dad when I was very young. He would try to explain to me what was going on, but I am sure I did not understand much as I watched players run, throw, and hit. Later he would teach me how to sing “Take me out to the Ball Game,” which might have added a little more context to what I saw. The first big moment would not come however until 1980 when I was five years old when my family lived in Oxnard, California. My life as a baseball fan changed forever on that summer day when I stepped foot for the first time into a Major League stadium -- Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles California.

I can still remember going through the turnstiles on our way inside. Santa Claus had brought me a baseball cap the previous winter, but not a Dodgers’ cap. My first piece of respectable headgear was representative of the California Angels, and I can remember the man who ripped the tickets telling me, “Kid, you are in the wrong place. You need to go up the road a little.” I didn’t get the joke, and I remember not liking the man since he was trying to tell me that I did not belong at the stadium on that sunny California day that would be the one when I went to my first baseball game.

I cannot say I remember many of the details of that particular game aside from the food I ate: hotdogs, chocolate malt, peanuts, pretzels, and probably more. The scorecard for this game exists somewhere, and on it my dad kept track of the items I ate as well as the number of beers he drank. Before leaving the park, I remember stopping to get a Dodgers t-shirt for me with my name ironed onto the back of it. It was one of my prized possessions until I moved to Georgia and became a Braves fan.

I went to my first Braves game probably sometime in 1982. I remember they were playing the Cubs, and the game was at the old Atlanta – Fulton County Stadium that was the home of the Braves before Atlanta’s Centennial Olympic Stadium was constructed and later transformed into Turner Field. Once again, I do not remember the particulars of this game, but by this point, I knew that I was familiar with the rules and was able to follow the game since I was playing t-ball at the time. I was six or seven years old, and already at my second baseball stadium. Little did I know the list would continue to grow.

In the two or three years that followed, I would visit Fenway Park in Boston, the second-oldest existing Major League Baseball park twice, once to see the Red Sox play the A’s, and another time to see them play the Tigers. By the time I was ten, I had also visited Yankee stadium to see the Yankees play the Blue Jays. As I got older, I would see the San Francisco Giants’ former home, Candlestick Park, where I got to see the Braves as the visiting team; and the Philadelphia Phillies’ old park, Veterans Stadium. I added yet another stadium to my list when the Braves moved into their new home. I would see the Chicago Cubs play in Wrigley Field, where I was lucky enough to catch a ball, and just a couple of summers ago. I missed seeing Mark McGuire’s longest homerun of his career when I was standing in the concession line at the old Busch Stadium in Saint Louis, and I saw the Washington Nationals play in RFK Stadium where I saw Roger Clemens pitch a game where he struck out fourteen Nationals.

I still have more places I would like to add to my list of baseball stadiums, AT&T park in San Francisco, the new stadium in Pittsburg, and PETCO Park in San Diego to name a couple. I don’t think I would really crave going to new ballparks if my family would have never moved from California to Georgia and I did not get to see the first two so early. My list of stadiums is just a collection I keep, and I am not really sure what it says about me other than I like to travel and I like watching baseball games.

User Agreement

Using a weblog for our classwork will require some parameters for your safety and the quality of everyone's work. First, you should recognize that your work, as well as mine will be published for the entire on-line world to see. This will ultimately make us all responsible for better and more original output than ever before. By visiting other students' weblogs, you will be able to view all their work, and it will also make it easy for me to see who is not making an effort to submit work that is original.

Once you create your own weblog for this class, I will add it to the class blog roll so everyone's work can be accessed from this page. I encourage you to look at your peers' work for ideas or inspiration, but what you submit must be your own. Language Arts lends itself well to this format since you will be asked to respond to the literature and history we study with your own ideas and opinions. There are no right or wrong answers in a Language Arts class, so looking at other students' ideas can help you. It can also create problems if you choose to be lazy.

I will leave comments about your work. These comments will usually instruct you on how you can improve your work. Please make sure you check your comments and your e-mail regularly, and make sure you are finished with one assignment before moving to the next.

Since this weblog will be part of your education at Classic City High School, any activity on your weblog should be considered school activity, even if it is done outside of school. You should feel free to create posts that are not school related, but you should also be sure to refrain from anything that could be considered inappropriate. This includes, but is not limited to: references to alcohol or drugs, violence, or gang activity, foul language, nudity, threats, etc.

Plagiarism is submitting someone else's work as your own. This can be done in many ways: copying work from Wikipedia, classmates, Sparknotes, etc. If you plagiarize your work, you will receive a zero -- no questions asked.

THE USER AGREEMENT:

1. I agree to submit original work to my weblog. I realize I will have the opportunity to view my peers' work, and I will use this opportunity constructively. I understand that if I choose to plagiarize, I will receive a zero for the work in question with no option to redo the assignment in question.

2. I agree to keep my weblog appropriate for Classic City High School. I understand that if innapropriate material were to appear on my weblog, be it from myself or an outside comment, I will be asked to remove it. Failure to do so will result in my weblog being removed from the class roll. I also understand that refereneces to illegal or dangerous activities will be reported since it is the legal responsibility of my teacher.

To agree, post a comment to this message like this:
I agree to Mr. Siegmund's Weblog User Agreement.
I will not add your weblog to the class roll until I receive a comment from you like the example above.

The Puritans

The Puritans:

To study the Puritans' literature, we must first understand who they were as people. The Purtitans' core beliefs were as follows:

Total Depravity - through Adam and Eve's fall, every person is born sinful - concept of Original Sin.

Unconditional Election - God "saves" those he wishes - only a few are selected for salvation.

Limited Atonement - Jesus died for the chosen only, not for everyone. Irresistible Grace - God's grace is freely given, it cannot be earned or denied. Grace is defined as the saving and transfiguring power of God.

Perseverance of the "saints" - those elected by God have full power to interpret the will of God, and to live uprightly. If anyone rejects grace after feeling its power in his life, he will be going against the will of God - something impossible in Puritanism.

You should read more here. You should also read more about the Puritans in an American Literature textbook.

For some more real fun, check out some of these Puritan names.

YOUR TASKS:
Read some of this excert of William Bradford's Of Plymouth Plantation . You do not necessarily need to start at the beginning; just find a section that appeals to you. When you are through, you should post the following to your blog:

1. Briefly summarize the Puritans' beliefs. This should be a paragraph or two.

2. Write a 4-5 paragraph response to the Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God and Of Plymouth Plantation. Explain your thoughts about how these people lived. Better responses will have some direct textual evidence to support what you say. You may want to review these texts before writing your response.

3. Choose two of the four beliefs at the beginning of this post of which you saw examples in Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God, or Of Plymouth Plantation. Provide these examples with direct textual evidence.

Continue with The Rationalists:

Do you want to make an "A" on this and your next literature projects? Grades of 93 and up will be reserved for those who complete a better project. Details here.

SELF-EVALUATE YOUR WORK!!

ELAALRL1 The student demonstrates comprehension by identifying evidence (i.e., examples of diction, imagery, point of view, figurative language, symbolism, plot events and main ideas) in a variety of texts representative of different genres (i.e., poetry, prose [short story, novel, essay, editorial, biography], and drama) and using this evidence as the basis for interpretation.

ELAALRL2 The student identifies, analyzes, and applies knowledge of theme in a work of American literature and provides evidence from the work to support understanding.

ELAALRL3 The student deepens understanding of literary works by relating them to their contemporary context or historical background, as well as to works from other time periods.

ELAALRL5 The student understands and acquires new vocabulary and uses it correctly in reading and writing.

ELAALRC2 The student participates in discussions related to curricular learning in all subject areas.

The Summer is for Baseball.

Prospect by Bill Littlefield

Prospect is a novel about a retired baseball scout named Pete Easty who has given up on his own life once he is not needed anymore by the team he worked for since they started using computerized scouting systems instead of 'baseball men' like Easty. At the beginning of the novel, Pete is living in a nursing home, waiting to die. He makes friends with one of the employees named Louise who has a great nephew who is a promising baseball player.

Louise wants Pete to watch her nephew play, but he insists that he is retired. When a fire burns down part of thew nursing home, Louise invites Pete to live with her until the building can be repaired, which is a trick to get Pete to look at her nephew.

Littlefield shows how someone's life can be restored when they begin to have confidence in themselves. Louise does this for Pete by proving to him that he can still matter in the baseball world.

The AUtobiography of Malcolm X p 319 -- 421

The final section of The Autobiograohy of Malcolm X centers around his trip to Mecca, Africa, and other places across the Holy Land to learn more about true Islam. When Malcom arrives in the Middle East to make the Haj, the spiritual pilgramage to Mecca that Islam asks all able-bodied Muslims to attempt at least once in their lifetime, he feels like an outsider since he does not know many of the traditions and he does not speak Arabic.

Since only true Muslims are permitted inside the walls of Mecca, Malcolm, being an American was not immediately allowed inside the city. He had to stay in a dormitory at the airpoit awaiting a trial of sorts to prove he was a true Muslim. While staying in the dormitory with many other people, Malcolms suspicion of people with pale skin begins to drop when he his treated very hospitably by Middle Easterners with very pale skin. Malcolm explains that these people would have passed for white people in the United States, but here, people were all treated as brothers in Islam, no matter what they look like. This is where Malcom's attitudes begin to turn. He is still angry about the situation in the United States that has kept his people constantly oppressed, but readers can immediately see him begin to re-evaluate some of the beliefs Elijah Muhammad taught Malcolm.

When Malcolm returns to the United States, he continues building his new ministry and making speaking arrangements about what he had learned in the Middle East. He speaks of uniting the balck people across the globe to pressure the United States through the United Nations to give black people the human rights they have been denied since Europeans stepped foot in North America. Malcolm also makes many references to the fact that Elijah Muhhamad, though he never speaks ill of him, has people in his following dedicated to killing Malcolm in the name of the Black Muslim movement. Though the event is not printed in the book, Malcolm X is aware that he is unlikely to live to see the publication of this autobiography.

I firmly believe The Autobiography of Malcolm X should be required reading in American schools. It is extremely arrogant for anyone to deny that black people have been systematically degraded and denied access to the resourses of our country to this day. In schools, we are taught mostly about people like Martin Luther King Jr. because people (white) feel he is safe and peaceful, but it is impossible to understand the entire story without looking at the other side of the coin at a man who was angry and not afraid to show it, and not afraid to speak his mind to white people. I am not saying I understand the entire story of the struggle for equality that black people still fight, but now I feel I am a bit closer.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X p 179 - 318

Once Malcolm gets out of prison, he begins to meet personally with Elijah Muhammad, and eventually becomes one of his ministers. As a minister for the Nation of Islam, Malcolm X makes speaking arrangements across the country and later opens his own mosque in Harlem. The paraphrased speechs are some of the most interesting passages in the book. Malcolm X speaks very harshly about the white power structure that has kept black people an underprivelidged minority for 400 years. He points out that black people have been in North America longer than English colonists and other European immigrants, yet they have stayed at the bottom.

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Malcolm X is probably more critical of black people who seek integration with the white people more than the white people themselves. He sees these people as a much bigger problem, and he constantly chides them for being so complacent and gullible to think that the white power structure will ever give them anything.

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One part that will always stick out to me is his criticism of the 1963 march on Washington that Malcolm calls the Farce on Washington. As he explains, black people had been talking of marching on Washington for years and years before it happened, but this march was not going to be very civil. As originally planned, but not well-organized, black people were talking of marching on Washington to make specific demands of the government and show how angry they were with the way they have been treated. As Malcolm X explains, the US government began making huge contributions to the rally that also came with some of their suggestions, which eventually watered down the march to a picnic. Malcolm X is very critical of the middle-class blacks that were at the rally to make a scene -- showing off for the white people, he says. He goes further to criticize Martin Luther King Jr. among others for allowing this to happen.

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Malcolm serves as a minister for the Nation of Islam for twelve years before he begins to hear rumors about Elijah Muhammad's sexual misconduct. Any other Muslim would have been excommunicated for doing what Elijah Muhammad had done, yet Malcolm X tries to find ways to rationalize and excuse Elijah Muhammad's actions. Malcolm X's stature in the Nation of Islam was already making Elijah Muhammad jealous, and when it reaches the point that his sexual misconduct is reaching the mass of Black Muslims, he uses some comments Malcolm X made about the assassination of John Kennedy to suspend him from the Nation of Islam.

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Malcolm X heres of the first orders for his death while hanging out in Miami with Cassius Clay.

The Autobiography of Malcolm X pages 1 - 178

Up until now I have known very little about Malcolm X. If you would have asked me what I knew, I would have said he was a civil rights leader who did not believe in peaceful protest. I would have said he was the polar opposite of Martin Luther King Jr. in that he did not believe in turning the other cheek. I probably would have gone as far to say he hated white people and called them all devils.

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I am learning fast that some of my preconceived notions about Malcolm X are inaccurate. Many of the things I may have known come from the philosophy of Elijah Muhammad, Malcolm X's mentor for many years. Even though I am less than halfway through this autobiography, Malcolm has made reference many times to his split from Elijah Muhammad and how he now disagrees with his philosophies since they are not supported by true Islam.

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The beginning of this book is very exciting. It chronicles Malcolm Little's early life up until he is around 21 years old. Readers meet Malcolm's parents and his brothers and sisters. Malcolms father is a preecher who also holds meetings for the Marcus Garvey society, which troubles the white people in his town. One night a group of white men kill Malcolms father, and then lay his body across the train tracks to be run over. The insurace company cheats his mother out of the money she and her family have coming to them. Malcolm's mother eventually has a mental breakdown and is taken to a mental hospital. Malcolm and his siblings are split up into different homes.

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Malcolm's life changes several years later when he moves to Boston to live with his sister. It is here that Malcolm begins a life of pimping, hustling, drinking, and smoking 'reefers'. Malcolms talent for hustling eventually takes him to Harlem where he is eventually charged with burglary and sentenced to ten years in jail. I left many of the details out here. This part of the book was very easy to read since it caters to people's interest in crime and street living. Malcolm was smart to grab his readers attention in this way.

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I am now reading about Malcolm's first years in jail. He is beginning to learn more about Islam, and is coresponding with Elijah Muhammad on nearly a daily basis. I have been really interested in learning about Muhammad's philosophies, especially how he explains how the races developed.

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I am glad I am finally learning more about this important figure in American history. I am also glad I have not watched Spike Lee's film yet. It will be interesting to see how well it represents what I am reading now.

We Were the Mulvaneys by Joyce Carol Oats

I have not been keeping track of my reading records as of late, so there will be another book coming very soon. I finished this book last week while I was at the beach. I suppose I should have taken a picture of the book when I was there.

We Were the Mulvaneys is a novel that follows a family over the course of about twenty years. At the beginning of the book in 1976, the Mulvaneys have everything going for them: they own a beautiful farm, a successful roofing business, and their four children are all successful in their own ways.

The theme here is how a family may choose to deal with tragedy. In this case, the family tragedy happens to the daughter, Marianne on prom night 1976. Initially most memebers of the family deal with their pain in unproductive ways; in fact, by the midpoint of the novel, the family is in shambles -- almost all the things they have going for them are gone.

Joyce Carol Oates shows how a family can be torn apart, and then put back together, something that takes nearly two decades in the Mulvaneys' case. I liked this novel because it is the kind I like -- the kind that follows a family or another group of people for many years or generations. I also enjoyed Oates' writing style. She is very descriptive and can be witty at times. I am likely to read another of her novels.

This novel was from Oprah's book club. I do not know from where or whom I got this book. It was on my bookshelf for at least four or five years before I picked it up. I am glad I did.

p.s. : There is a copy of We Were the Mulvaneys in the Classic City High School media center.

Senior Project Presentations May 10

LIT 12 ONLY

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It is time to start working on your Senior Project Presentation which will take place on May 10. You should plan on a 7-10 minute presentation on which you will be judged by members of our community.

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You should review your research paper for material for your presentation. You may also want to discuss your mentor experience or your product.

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Check the Senior Project Presentation Rubric to see how you will be graded. You should also review the Judges Responsibilities and their Follow-Up Questions to know what to expect from them.

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Your COMPLETE Portfolio is also due now. You will need the Self-Evaluation form to complete this.

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Make sure you speak with me if you have questions or concerns.

Career Project III -- Reflection

Before you begin this part of your career project, you should be completly finished with parts I and II.

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The third part of your career project is a reflective piece of writing. You should done some substantial learning about your career choice in the past few weeks, and now it is time to sort out what it all means. Your reflection should be two pages of double-spaced 12pt Times New Roman and address the following:

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1. Are you still interested in your choice as a possible career? Did you learn anything that strengthend or weakened your desire to pursue this career?

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2. What do you believe was your most valuable learning experience during this project?

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3. If you were to pursue your choice of career, in what aspect or field do you see yourself doing so?

click to enlarge . . .

My Persuasive Writing -- Participating in Democracy

Many Americans, especially young ones, do not appreciate the privilege of participating in a democracy. People between the ages of 18 and 34 seem to be the ones who do the most complaining about the government, and how the elected officials do not represent their views very well. When we look at the voting habits of this same group of people, we see that only 29% of people 18 – 34 voted in the last presidential election. When I see this figure, I am very disappointed in people my age. What is going to happen when we are the older citizens of our country? Will we take more responsibility then?




The other day I saw a bumper sticker that read: “Dear World, We tried our hardest. –half of America”. At first I was amused at the message, but it did not take long for me to say aloud to myself, “no we didn’t”. The sticker was, of course referring to George W. Bush and at least one of the last two presidential elections. I do believe that at least half the country does not agree with his policies and decisions, and I also believe they felt this way before the election. Where were these people on election day? It is unfortunate that young people and the rest of the left-leaning citizens of our country are lazy. The last time we had a Democratic president, the country saw record voter turnout. What does that tell us?




I, in no way whatsoever, condone the war in Iraq, but one image has stuck with me. After the initial “fall” of Baghdad, the first democratic elections for some time occurred in Iraq. I do not want to make comment on the authenticity of these elections, but at least they had them. People felt like they had some say in their government after years of dictatorship. The photo I remember was of an old woman holding up her index finger to show the blue ink that identified her as someone who has voted. The story next to the photo told of the more than 20 people who were killed because they tried to vote, and that people who had the ink on their fingers were marked for death by several terrorist groups.




Isn’t it sad that people in other places in the world will risk death to participate in an election, and here in the United States, people can’t get off their couches to cast their vote? Nobody is getting shot at in voting lines in the United States. We are relatively safe from someone detonating a bomb at a polling site, yet we stay at home, and the people who know they very well may not make it back home after voting are happy to get out an participate.




Another image that sticks with me is an old black and white film shot in Selma, Alabama in 1965. A civil rights rally was being conducted to raise awareness to encourage the black citizens of Alabama to ignore intimidation from racist and segregationalist groups and register to vote. The march made it only as far as the Edmund Pettis bridge in Selma where they were met with local sheriff’s deputies who proceeded to beat the marchers with billy clubs and spray them with tear gas. The march ended with people lying bloodied and injured on the side of the road. A few weeks later, Martin Luther King Jr. led another march to the Alabama capitol, and the national attention to this event led to the passing of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.




Would you take a beating for the right to vote that the United States Constitution gives all adults over the age of eighteen? How about getting attacked by police dogs? Watching people as old as 80 get their heads split with a policeman’s club? These brave people did, but how much does that matter today when so few people go to the polls to do what these people fought so hard for? We do not place our lives in danger when we register or when we vote, but a little more than fifty years ago, people did. Americans should remember the sacrifices people made and the pain they endured just to do what so many people won’t turn off their television, drive across town in their air-conditioned car, or get up a little bit earlier to do.




More Americans voted for their favorite singer on American Idol than those who chose to vote last election day. This shows where many people’s priorities are. Too many of us are more involved in idiotic prime time television than the government of the people, for the people, and by the people. Maybe some feel their votes don’t count. What would these same people say when confronted with the fact that the last two presidential elections were decided by around 1% each? Wow. If 1-2% more of the eligible voters would have participated in one of the greatest privileges our country offers, history could have been changed.




For me it is as simple as this: if you don’t vote, shut up. I hear too many people complaining about George Bush, spouting off statistics about dead soldiers, the deficit, civil rights, and Hurricane Katrina, but where were these people on Election Day? I blame these people more than I blame George Bush and his associates for the way our country has been run for the past seven years. These people share many of my opinions about the administration, but they did absolutely nothing about it. Thanks a lot. At least George W. Bush made some effort to get himself elected.

You can see more fine examples of persusive writing here, here, and here.

Great Work!!

The excellent work just keeps on rolling in.

Marvel at these fine examples:

Descriptive Writing by Carson Walls -- Hell

A Study of Sonnets by Jalisa Brown (including one of her own at the end)

Beowulf by Manas Winfield

The Restoration by Natasha Long -- Check out her sonnet too.

Deon Sanders by Spenser Bostic

Senior Project Portfolio Check on April 17

I will be checking senior project portfolios on Tuesday the 17th

Listed below are all the componants of a completed portfolio. The sections you need appear in RED below.

Contents Checklist

1. Binder or notebook
2. Title page
3. Table of contents
4. Deadline checklist
5. Letter of Intent *
6. Parental Consent Form
7. Research Paper
8. Mentor Approval Form
9. Mentor Verification Log (7 Hours Worth)
10. Thank you letter to mentor
11. Additional documentation, pictures, etc.
12. Self Evaluation

* Your letter of intent may or may not be complete at this point. It will eventually be a required componant of your portfolio. You may want to finish this by the 17th. There is a good example of a letter of intent in your snior project handbook.

Career Project II -- Mentorship

Researching a career is one thing, but actually getting your hands dirty with some experience is altogether different. For the next portion of this project it will be necessary for you to find a professional in the field in which you are interested (I can help you find someone if you need). Once you have found someone who agrees to have you work with them, you should have them contact me at the school so I can confirm their interest and explain the project to them.

Once you make your contact, you should plan to meet with this person in their place of work for a total of five hours. I am not suggesting that you do all five hours in one visit. You should make a specific schedule with the person who has agreed to work with you.

You should keep journals of each of your visits. If you need an example of what these might look like, you can find one here. Each journal should represent one hour. If you had a two-hour visit, for example, your journal should be twice as substantial.

The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls p 1-230

This is a memoir of a young girl growing up in a very disfunctional family. It is an amazing story of how a young person had to fend for herself against very challenging odds: a father who is beyond the point of alcoholism, a mother who refuses to work and support her family, moving houses several times to avoid bill collectors, having to eat thrown-away food from her school trash cans . . . only the beginning.

Jeannette Walls tells the story in a way as if she is telling readers not to feel sorry for her. She is proud of what her past helped her become. This is not to say that I believe she would not have changed all the awful details of her childhood.

She does a great job describing her parents and siblings -- so well that they seem to leave the book and become real people you can empathize with or hate their guts. I would recommend this one.

Jeannette Walls is now the gossip writer for www.msnbc.com

Career Project I -- Reserch Paper

You have probably thought of your career goals to pursue after you graduate from Classic City High School, or you may still have no idea. This career project should help you with your goals no matter which case in which you might find yourself.

This project will have four parts:
I. A research paper
II. A mentorship with a professional in the career you have chosen to research
III. A reflective piece of writing
IV. Your complete resume

For the first section of your career project you will need to conduct some research about your career. You should look to on-line and print sources alike. Once you have completed your research, you should compile your findings in a short (4-5 page) research paper. You should also include a bibliography that lists all the sources you used to write your paper.

Your paper should address the following topics:

What schooling or training is required to enter the career you chose? Are certificates or licenses necessary? What kinds of grants, scholarships, or loans are available to those who seek this kind of training?

In what ways can someone specialize in the career you chose? Research one of the specialties you might like in this career field.

What is the opening salary for someone who wants to start the career you’re researching? What are some of the ways that someone can affect the amount of money they are paid?

Research some of the job openings for your career. What qualifications do potential employers look for.

Your paper will be assessed as follows:

A score of 90-100% will be awarded to papers that meet the required length, address all the above topics, have research from at least eight sources, and have so few grammatical and mechanical errors that the writer’s ideas are not clouded.

A score of 80-89% will be awarded to papers that meet the required length, address at least three of the above topics, have research from at least six sources, and have grammatical and mechanical errors that may cloud the writer’s ideas.

A score of 70-79% will be awarded to papers that do not meet the required length, address at least three of the above topics, have research from at least five sources, or have so many grammatical and mechanical errors that it is hard to understand the writer’s ideas.

A score of 0-69% will be awarded to papers that are incomplete or do not meet any of the above requirements.

Here are some good examples to view before you begin:
Journalism -- by Carmen Judy
Becoming a Lawyer -- by Ryann Runyan

A Place on Earth by Wendell Berry p 329 - 504

In short, I am glad I finished this book even though I did not care for it very much once I started. The end was very eventful: Franklin Roosevelt dies, the war ends, Nathan Coulter comes back home, and Mat Feltner begins to come to terms with the death of his son.

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Wendell Bery wrote several more books about the inhabitants of Port William, and I plan to read more of his work in the future. I will probably wait a few months to a year before doing so.

The Renaissance -- Sonnets

The sonnet was the most accepted form of written art during the Renaissance. People loved them then, but today they can leave us scratching our heads. I was often confused by sonnets and their flowery language, but once I learned how to read them, they became much easier to understand.
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IF YOU PAY CLOSE ATTENTION TO THIS POST, SONNETS WILL BE EASY FOR YOU TOO.

This will come in handy since you will be writing one of your own.

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First, it would be important to define a sonnet as a fourteen-line poem composed in iambic pentameter. Iambic pentameter is the beat of the poem, and it essentially means that each line is made up of five pairs (penta) of syllables -- the first one unstressed, and the second one stressed. Here is an example of a line of iambic pentameter from Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet:

But soft! What light through yonder window breaks?

But soft! - What light - through yon - der win - dow breaks?

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Now imagine you are a poet writing a sonnet, and if you were a poet in the Renaissance, sonnets and plays (also written in a certain meter) were the only accepted forms of literature. Imagine how dificult it would be to choose words with exactly the right stress as well as number of syllables. You see, these poems weren't written the way they were just to give you a hard time.

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Next, we need to talk about rhyme scheme. This is pretty simple. Check out my example below; it is one that may also help you with geometry:

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Pythagoras had a good ruse (A)

With a rule just for triangles to use (A)

"Add the squares of each side," (B)

He said with some pride," (B)

That's the square of the hypotenuse!" (A)

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The rhyme scheme of this poem is AABBA. All you have to do is look at the last word on each line. I start with ruse, and since it is the first line, I assign it an A. Then I look at use, and see that it rhymes with ruse, and so it is an A as well. Then I look at side, and see that it does not rhyme with ruse or use, so it is a B. Pride rhymes with side, so it is a B as well. At the end, when I see hypotenuse rhymes with ruse, it is an A. That makes the rhyme scheme ABBA.

It is important to understand rhyme scheme when reading a sonnet. If you pay close attention to the rhyme scheme, it can help you divide the poem into sections which will make it much easier for you to comprehend.

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Let's look at an example of a sonnet from the two most popular sonateers, William Shakespeare and Edmund Spencer. These poets use two different rhyme schemes in their sonnets. Shakespeare uses a ABAB CDCD EFEF GG rhyme scheme, and Spencer uses ABAB BCBC CDCD EE. I will draw lines to show how the rhyme scheme divides the poem into four sections.

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Sonnet 18

William Shakespeare

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Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? (A)

Thou art more lovely and more temperate. (B)

Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, (A)

And summer's lease hath all to short a date. (B)

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Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, (C)

And often is his gold complextion dimmed, (D)

And every fair from fair sometimes declines, (C)

By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed. (D)

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But thy eternal summer shall not fade, (E)

Nor lose possesion of that fair thou owest, (F)

Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade (E)

When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st. (F)

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So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see, (G)

So long lives this, and gives life to thee. (G)

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Sonnet 30

Edmund Spencer

My love is like to ice, and I to fire; (A)

How comes it then that this her cold so great (B)

Is not dissolved through my so hot desire, (A)

But harder grows the more I her entreat? (B)

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Or how comes it that my exceeding heat (B)

Is not delayed by her heart frozen cold, (C)

But that I burn much more in boiling sweat, (B)

And feel my flames augmented manifold? (C)

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What more miraculous thing may be told (C)

That fire which all thing melts, should harden ice, (D)

And ice which is congealed with senseless cold, (C)

Should kindle fire by wonderful device? (D)

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Such is the power of love in gentle mind, (E)

That it can alter all the course of kind. (E)

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Post responses to the following questions on your blog:

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1. Examine the difference between the rhyme scheme Spencer uses and the one Shakespeare uses. Explain the difference. Which one do you prefer? (If you are unable to give a good answer to this question, it is time to come talk to me.)

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2. The rhyme scheme divides sonnets into four sections. The first section is a question asked from one point of view, the second is the same question asked from another point of view. The third section is called the turn. The turn is a shift in focus or the thoughts of the first two points of view. The last section is the conclusion. Use this method to explain the message in each of the four sections of the two poems above.

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3. Choose one more of Shakespeare's sonnets as well as another one of Spencer's sonnets. You can find these all over the Internet. Post each poem on your blog then: a. Label the rhyme scheme like my examples; b. explain the message in each of the four sections like you did in question #2.

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4. Come get an amatuer sonateer form from me, and then complete both sides.

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5. When you have finished, post your completed sonnet on your blog.

SELF-EVALUATE YOUR WORK!

Writing Two (Lit 11)

Your next writing assignment will require you to do some research on a topic of your choice. Completing this assignment responsibly will help you with your senior project research paper when that time comes for you.

This research report will be pretty brief (the usual two pages of double-spaced 12pt Times New Roman), and you will need at least two reliable sources from which you get your information. If you are having a difficult time choosing reliable sources, check out the post titled Taking Research Notes, which will also instruct you on how to get necessary bibliographic information from your sources. When it is time to start writing, you should also review the post titled Citing Your Sources, which will show you how to give credit to the people from whom you collected your research. Students who choose to learn these skills with this piece of writing will have a much easier time when it is time to write your big research paper.

So? What do you research?

I would choose something in which you are interested, but know little about. Researching something about which you are already knowledgeable can be difficult.

Some ideas:

The history of public school in Athens, Ga

The requirements for starting a career in which you are interested

The history of a school you would like to attend

The development of your favorite sport or game

The origins of a law or policy with which you agree or disagree

The posibilities are endless, but you should discuss your topic with me before you start. I do not want you researching a topic that will make this assignment any more difficult than it needs to be.

Here are some examples that may help you out:

Amber Gaines -- Lizzie Borden
Todd Roberts -- How to Run for President
Tony Bolton -- Wilt Chamberlain
Victoria Slaboda -- Geisha (a great example of citations)

A Place on Earth by Wendell Berry p 215 - 328

I am enjoying this book more and more. I have read over 100 pages in the last few days.

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Berry has been concentrating more on Mat Feltner and another character named Old Jack. I like Old Jack more than most of the other characters in the book since he is so crude. He is too old to farm, so he lives in the town's hotel. The woman who runs the hotel is very proper, and Old Jack really gets on her last nerve. In one of the last sections I read, Old Jack missed his life as a farmer, so he plowed up the entire back yard of the hotel. There were nothing but weeds back there, but it still made her "strangling mad" as Berry put it.

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The character, Gideon, who's daughter drowned in the flood has disappeared. As far as anyone knows, he has wandered out into the wilderness, and they do not know when he will return. Mat is also dealing with the loss of his son, who is still listed as "missing" in World War II. The news of president Franklin Roosevelt's death also reaches the citizens of Port William in the last few pages I read. While all this loss is going on, spring is breaking across the region, and everyone is scurrying to get their farms plowed and their tobacco planted. This is especially hard for Mat since his son is gone. Many people in the town are pulling together to help Ida, Gideon's wife, get their farm in working order.

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With the onset of spring, Berry is showing how throughout all the loss the characters are going through, the earth is soothing them by renewing herself each spring. This is not lost on the characters, either. They being farmers are very keen to the earth and her messages.

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I expect the last 175 pages or so of this book to go even faster than the last.

Writing Three (Spring Semester Option)

You will receive three grades for each of your writings (rough draft, editing, final draft. This should give you the best opportunity to produce the best work. You should have your rough draft completed at the beginning of class on March 1, 2007.

Your next piece of writing should focus on your post Classic City High School goals. You should describe the type of career, further education, or whatever you plan to do after you graduate as well as the reasons why you think you would be well qualified for your choice.

If done properly, this piece of writing could turn into a cover letter for a resume, a college application essay, or other pieces of writing employers and schools ask of applicants.

Your rough draft should be two pages of typed double-spaced Times New Roman text. Please let me know if you need help getting started.

A Place on Earth by Wendell Berry p 102-214

This book is getting a little easier to read, but it is still going slowly. The first hundred pages were about just one day in the character's lives, and now I am on page 215, and it is only chapter four. Berry is getting more detailed about a few of the characters that I believe will be the focus of the rest of the novel: Mat, whose son is missing in action in World War II; Jayber Crow, the town's barber; one of my favorite characters, Uncle Stanly, who is the gravedigger and dirty old man of the town, and a new character named Gideon.

Gideon was introduced as the man who works a section of Mat's cousin's farm. Confusing, huh? Anyhow, the entire third chapter three was about Gideon and his search for his daughter who was snatched away in a flood before his eyes. After she gets washed away, he searches through the mud and the flooded valley for her for five days straight, only sleeping for an hour or two when it was entirely necessary. This chapter also chronicles Gideon's wife's actions while he is gone. It was a depressing chapter indeed.

I am enjoying this book because I am a fan of realism. Berry is very good at giving plenty of details so readers can feel what farming life in Kentucky in 1945 was like.

Excellent Work!

The first quarter has been a quick one, hasn't it? I hope the next one goes just as fast so it will be spring break -- although spring break is going to happen before winter is officially over.

You all have been working very hard, and I want to commend everyone on their efforts.

Some work does stand head and shoulders above the rest though:

Analytical Writing -- Kayla Fortson -- Rhythm and Blues
Analytical Writing -- Andrea Coleman -- Reggae

Analytical Writing -- Caleb Pope -- Emo Subculture

Analytical Writing -- Jeff Green -- The Magic of Athens

The Anglo-Saxons -- Scott Graham, Brian Langham, John Kelley, JaLisa Brown, Kevin Jones

The Puritans -- Jesseca Favors

KEEP UP THE GREAT WORK

EVERYONE!

My Analytical Writing: Records vs. Compact Discs

Compact Discs vs. Vinyl Records

Listening to music has changed so much since the first time I used my own money to buy a cassette tape way back in 1985. An addiction started in the music department of K-Mart that day. I was on my way to becoming a music freak; spending most of my money on tapes, Cds and records. That tape, Weird Al’s Dare to be Stupid would be the first of the thousands of tapes, records and compact discs that I would own in my lifetime. While I do not have many tapes anymore, I still have hundreds of compact discs and vinyl records, and I enjoy listening to both.

Digital music has made listening to music a different and oftentimes more convenient experience. With the advent of Mp3 files, the convenience increases because people are able to store more music in smaller spaces. Compact discs are probably still the most accessible way to store music since there are so many Cd players around. People who prefer compact discs have no problem playing their music in their cars or anywhere they may go. These small discs are also much easier to store and travel with since they are about a quarter of the size of a full-size record album. Who has a turntable in their car anyway?

Compact discs also make it much easier to transfer songs into a computer library, an Mp3 player, or another cd. Transferring music from vinyl to a cd or into a computer library is often difficult, and it usually requires additional software. While I have copied some songs from vinyl to Cds to share with friends, I would have much rather used a compact disc. There are times when a song or album is rare, and I only have in on vinyl. In that case, I manually record the song onto a cd with the burner in my stereo (which I don’t think they make anymore), and then I use the cd I made to transfer the music into my computer library or another cd. This stereo component requires special “music only” CDRs, so that is another reason this is more troublesome.

With all the advantages of digital music, I still must say I like vinyl better. Even when I was a kid, I would argue to my friends that records were much better than tapes because there was no need for rewinding and fast forwarding. With records, I could drop the needle directly on the song I wanted to hear without having to find it on a tape. The invention of compact discs took care of the rewinding issue, but they still lack some of the advantages of their granddaddy, the good old vinyl record.

Records are bigger. A bigger disc may be cumbersome for traveling and storage, but the album art really gets its due on a bigger surface. Oftentimes with Cds I am unable to see the entire picture on the front. There is never any problem with this when you are holding a record sleeve. Just think of the art on the covers of The Beatles’ Sergeant Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, or Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the Holy, or Pink Floyd’s Animals; these pieces of visual art were not made for a tiny cd booklet. These larger works of art contribute to a more complete listening experience since I can enjoy the artwork better while I listen.

The sound from records is more pure because they work in the same way as the human ear. Your eardrum is a thin membrane stretched across some nerve endings. The sounds you hear are the amplification of a vibration. Drums are an amplification of a vibration, as are the sounds you hear from a guitar, saxophone, or even the human voice. When one plays a record on his turntable, he is causing a vibration in the needle that is electronically amplified through the speakers, so naturally you are going to get the best and most natural sound. For example, if one were to crank up the volume while listening to a compact disc, the music gets louder. Do the same with a record, and the music gets louder and bigger. The difference is that with a CD, you are turning up thousands of ones and zeros, but with a record you are amplifying actual vibrations.

I, like most music lovers still cherish my compact discs that I have collected over the years. This is especially true when we consider music that was recorded after compact discs were invented. This music was made to listen to on compact discs, while earlier music was made for records. The one exception I can think of is the White Stripes’ Elephant which was recorded on 1950s equipment, and yes, I have the record. I have bought new music on LPs, and there are times when I think these sound better as well, but I have to think Radiohead was invisioning how Amnesiac would sound on a CD, not an LP. I might be wrong.

I have not even gotten into cassette tapes or eight tracks, both of which own space on my shelf. It seems that no format sticks around for too long, though vinyl records reigned for over fifty years. One day this whole argument may be obsolete when mp3s and computer files rule the music world, but until that day comes I will continue getting my hands on as many records and CDs as I can, and I will listen to all of them in their due time.

A Place on Earth by Wendell Berry pages 1-101

A friend gave me this book six or seven years ago, and I am just now getting to it.

Wendell Berry is a very detailed writer. He describes absolutely everything down to the smallest specification. This can get tedious at times, but for the most part I am enjoying this book.

It seems as though Berry wants to introduce readers to every single person living in Port William Kentucky, where the story takes place. It seems that every other chapter is about another person, and it is getting hard to keep them all straight. The novel is set in the 1940s during World War Two.

The main character is a man named Mat (with one "n") Feltner who has just recieved a telegram that his son is missing in action in Europe. I expect the rest of the novel to focus mote on Mat and his family, but the first one hundred pages seem to be more of an introduction. I still have more than four hundred to go.

Writing One

You will receive three grades for each of your writings, which should give you the best opportunity to produce the best work. You should have your rough draft completed at the beginning of class on January 18, 2007.

You will receive a 100 for having a draft that is two double-spaced pages of 12-point Times New Roman. Instead of posting your rough drafts, you should put them in my drop box, and I will print them for you. Failure to have a rough draft on the 17th will result in you getting a late grade for the draft as well as the editing exercise we will complete on that day. Having a rough draft on time will ensure that you receive highest grade you deserve for your work.

Students in Lit 9/10 should submit a piece of autobiographical writing. This does not mean start at your birth and tell us everything up until today. It is much more interesting if you would focus on one meaningful event in your life and explain the many ways it has shaped your unique personality.

Here is an example from Terrell Owens' autobiography.


Students in Lit 11 should submit a piece of analytical writing. To analyze something means to break it into small pieces to understand it better. For instance, if I wanted to learn more about engines, I might take one apart to better understand how it works. Analytical writing is a little different. You may want to analyze the work of your favorite musician or visual artist, or you may want to analyze how a certain political decision affects people.

Here is a good example of a sportswriter analyzing something she notices about college football.

User Agreement

Using a weblog for our classwork will require some parameters for your safety and the quality of everyone's work. First, you should recognize that your work, as well as mine will be published for the entire on-line world to see. This will ultimately make us all responsible for better and more original output than ever before. By visiting other students' weblogs, you will be able to view all their work, and it will also make it easy for me to see who is not making an effort to submit work that is original.

Once you create your own weblog for this class, I will add it to the class blog roll so everyone's work can be accessed from this page. I encourage you to look at your peers' work for ideas or inspiration, but what you submit must be your own. Language Arts lends itself well to this format since you will be asked to respond to the literature and history we study with your own ideas and opinions. There are no right or wrong answers in a Language Arts class, so looking at other students' ideas can help you. It can also create problems if you choose to be lazy.

I will leave comments about your work. These comments will usually instruct you on how you can improve your work. Please make sure you check your comments and your e-mail regularly, and make sure you are finished with one assignment before moving to the next.

Since this weblog will be part of your education at Classic City High School, any activity on your weblog should be considered school activity, even if it is done outside of school. You should feel free to create posts that are not school related, but you should also be sure to refrain from anything that could be considered inappropriate. This includes, but is not limited to: references to alcohol or drugs, violence, or gang activity, foul language, nudity, threats, etc.

Plagiarism is submitting someone else's work as your own. This can be done in many ways: copying work from Wikipedia, classmates, Sparknotes, etc. If you plagiarize your work, you will receive a zero -- no questions asked.

THE USER AGREEMENT:

1. I agree to submit original work to my weblog. I realize I will have the opportunity to view my peers' work, and I will use this opportunity constructively. I understand that if I choose to plagiarize, I will receive a zero for the work in question.

2. I agree to keep my weblog appropriate for Classic City High School. I understand that if innapropriate material were to appear on my weblog, be it from myself or an outside comment, I will be asked to remove it. Failure to do so will result in my weblog being removed from the class roll. I also understand that refereneces to illegal or dangerous activities will be reported since it is the legal responsibility of my teacher.

To agree, post a comment to this message like this: I agree to Siegmund's Weblog User Agreement. I will not add your weblog to the class roll until I receive your message.