Monday 4/1

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:

When spring came, even the false spring, there were no problems except where to be happiest. The only thing that could spoil a day was people and if you could keep from making engagements, each day had no limits. People were always the limiters of happiness except for the very few that were as good as spring itself. -Ernest Hemingway

1.  Discuss Freewrite

2.  Review/Collect Settings:  

*Invite students to read.

3.  Short Story Drafts:  

Activity:  Meet with a partner.  Discuss overall plot line and the "profile" of  the protagonist.  Identify a key passage in which the character's qualities are revealed.

15 mins:  Share

4.  Activity:  Give Sensuality to an Abstract.  Work w/ partner.  Share drafts tomorrow.  Due:  Friday  April 5th.  (1 page)    *See previous post.  

Wednesday 3/20

Do NOW:

Respond to the quote below: 

"A story is a way to say something that can't be said any other way, and it takes every word in the story to say what the meaning is."   Flannery O'Connor

1.  Discuss Freewrite

2.  Handout :  Eudora Welty on the Short Story.

Activity:  Read w/ partner.  Identify important points.  Offer personal insights. 

10 mins:  Share. 

3.  Fiction Powerpoints

4.  Activity:  Giving Sensuality to an Abstract. 

Death, Confusion, Envy, Chaos, Joy, Truth...  Choose and abstract and by creatively employing sensory details, provide "sensuality"......  1 pg w/ illustration.  Due April 1st. 

Setting:  Rough Draft due:  Friday  3/22   Final Copy:  April 1st. 

Tuesday 3/19

Do NOW:  Respond to the following quote:

"I think a little menace is fine to have in a story.  For one thing, it's good for the circulation.  There has to be tension, a sense that something is imminent, that certain things are in relentless motion, or else, most often, there simply won't be a story."  *Raymond Carver

1.  Discuss quote.

2.  Read:  "Eudora Welty on the Short Story"  (Handout)  Read

5 minute written response:  Share.

3.  Fiction Powerpoints

4.  Activity:  Choose an "urban setting";  "paint" a portrait with creative language.  Pay attention to detail!

Monday. 3/18

Free write:  Respond to the quote below:

Eudora Welty said, "Every story would be another story, and unrecognizable if it took up its characters and plot and happened somewhere else... Fiction depends for its life on place. Place is the crossroads of circumstance, the proving ground of, What happened? Who's here? Who's coming?..."

1.  Discuss Freewrite

2.  "To Build A Fire"   Analysis and discussion of sensory details, setting, and conflict

3.  Fiction Power points.    

4.  Work on Setting piece.  Rough draft due Friday.   

Wednesday 3/13

Do NOW:  Describe the street on which you live.  Consider:  sounds, smells, sights, feelings, etc ***Be Descriptive and Creative.

10 mins:  Share

1.  Discussion:  How important is setting in a story?  Why?

2.  Read "To Build A Fire"

Activity:  As you read, compile a list of sensory details. 


Jack London's "To Build A Fire"

http://www.pagebypagebooks.com/Jack_London/To_Build_a_Fire/To_Build_a_Fire_p1.html

Tuesday 3/12

Do NOW:  Write one sentence that succinctly describes the plot of your story.


*Begin class with one Fiction Powerpoint.


1.  Plot Activity:   Collect Writers' plot lines...

Record class' plot descriptions on board.  **Whole Class Discussion:  Collective Evaluation

2.  Analysis:  Why are we writing what we are writing?  What can we learn about ourselves through our art?

**Look for similarities/contrast in plots/patterns of imagery/Narrators/Character Commonalities...


3.  Setting:  Various in importance --  Consider a story in which the setting was of vital importance.  Explain.  10 mins:  Share.  

Activity:  Describe the street on which you live?  What do you see?  Hear?  Smell?  Feel?  

10 mins:  Share.  

Monday 3/11

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:

There's more to the truth than just the facts.  ~Author Unknown

1.  Discuss Freewrite

2.  Ficition Powerpoints

3.  Plot Activity:  Write one sentence that succinctly describes the plot of your short story.

Record class' plot descriptions on board.

4.  Analysis:  Why are we writing what we are writing?  What can we learn about ourselves through our art?

**Look for similarities/contrast in plots...

5.  Setting:  Various in importance

Activity:  Describe the street on which you live?  What do you see?  Hear?  Smell?  Feel?  

10 mins:  Share.  

Wednesday 3/6

10 min write:  Respond to the quote below:

“Every secret of a writer’s soul, every experience of his life, every quality of his mind, is written large in his works.”
—Virginia Woolf

1.  Discuss quote

2.  Powerpoint Presentation

3.  Writing Workshop.  

Tuesday. 3/5

Activity:  10 min write-- Write page 132 of your future autobiography.    Share


PowerPoint presentations:   Fiction in Modern Society.    Critique/Discuss


Short Story Workshop.    Due:  March 8th

Monday 3/4

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:

Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is 

obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't.

Mark Twain

1.  Discuss Write.

2.  Review Narration Development:

**Pause Action

***1st or 3rd Person narrator offers:

--insight  --reveals aspects of character  --reflects view of the world --observes setting  --flashback

3.  Activity:  Students present Powerpoint Presentations:

"Fiction and its relation to American Society"

**Whole Class discussion evaluating each presentation

4.  Workshop:  Rough Drafts    ***Final Copy due March 8th

Wednesday 2/27

Article:  "Get Loose and Set Your Writing Free"

1. Read w/ partner.  Be prepared to comment on selected excerpts.  15 mins:  Share.

2.  Activity:

**Choose a "moment" in your narrative where you can "pause" the action and reveal more of your 

character's thoughts.    *15 mins:  Share with class.

3.   Discuss with partner the basic plot line of your story.  Theorize why you as an artist are writing this

particulare fiction.  Try to gauge possible themes you are generating.  *10 mins:  Share. 

Tuesday 2/26

Activity:

1.  Short Story Drafts:  Share with a partner.  **Select one scene:  enhance/edit/rewrite... **15 minutes:  Explain the significance of the change to class.

Next, **Choose a "moment" in your narrative where you can "pause" the action and reveal more of your 

character's thoughts.    *15 mins:  Share with class.

2.  Discuss with partner the basic plot line of your story.  Theorize why you as an artist are writing this

particulare fiction.  Try to gauge possible themes you are generating.  *10 mins:  Share.  

***Reminders:  Fiction Powerpoints due:  March 1st

                                 Short Story:  Final copy due March 8th  (5-10 pgs typed)

Monday 2/25

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:

“If only there could be an invention that bottled up a memory, like scent. And it never faded, and it never got stale. And then, when one wanted it, the bottle could be uncorked, and it would be like living the moment all over again.”
― Daphne du Maurier, Rebecca

1.  Discuss Journal

2.  Review/Collect Miss Brill Analyses  *(Have students share excerpts of their work)

3.  Short Story Drafts:  Share with a partner.  **Select one scene:  enhance/edit/rewrite... **10 minutes:  Explain the significance of the change to class.

Next, **Choose a "moment" in your narrative where you can "pause" the action and reveal more of your 

character's thoughts.    *10 mins:  Share with class.

4.  Discuss with partner the basic plot line of your story.  Theorize why you as an artist are writing this

particulare fiction.  Try to gauge possible themes you are generating.  *10 mins:  Share.  

Wednesday. 2/20

**Read Inquirer editorial.   5 min write response:  Share.

"Do Now":  Explain the difference between round and flat characters in your notebook.
5 mins - Share.


Activity:  Select any passage from the story.   Describe context.  Analyze significance.   (Take notes for your analysis).  --Work w/ partner: Present to class.

1.  Analyze Character of Miss Brill?  Profession?  Beliefs? Passion?

2.  Identify main conflict.

3.  Explore generation of theme.   How is it achieved?   Consider key passages.

4.   Read /Analyze end.   What can readers surmise?  (Almond cake?)

Tuesday 2/19

Journal:  Respond to the Shakespearean Quote below:

All the World's a Stage

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts...

1.  Discuss Journal

2.  Consider:  Have you ever "listened in" on someone else's conversation?  Even pretend/wish that 

you were a part of someone's life?  Share your thoughts with a partner:  5 mins... **Whole Class

3.  **Review short story genre attributes:  Rough Draft due Thursday  2/21  (25 points)

4.  Introduce:  Katherine Mansfield's "Miss Brill"  

2 page analysis due Monday  2/25

Be sure to address:

Miss Brill's character:  Flat or Round?

Theme?

Narration

Wednesday 2/13

Describe the last lie that you told?  To whom did you lie?  Why?

**Read Shirley Jackson's "Charles".

Analyze short story; relate short story genre elements

Read "Charles" by accessing the link below:

http://mvhs.nbed.nb.ca/sites/mvhs.nbed.nb.ca/files/noteattach/teacher/3768/sh_ort_story_charles_by_shirley_jackson.pdf

Tuesday 2/12

Activity:

1.  With a partner: Identify key components/ aspects of a short story

10 mins:  Share.  ***Preview Flipchart


2.  View video:  Fiction Writing:  5 min write:  Discuss

3.  Read/Profile characterizations?

4.  Consider:  Did you ever lie as a kid?  Explain in 5-7 sentences.

5.  Read:   Shirley Jackson's "Charles"  (Class website link)

Monday 2/11

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:

“Sometimes you wake up from a dream. Sometimes you wake up in a dream. And sometimes, every once in a while, you wake up in someone else's dream. ”
― Richelle Mead, Succubus Blues

1.  Discuss freewrite.

2.  Creating Character Article:  Exercise 2

*Read/Discuss

Activity:  Become a characte in your story.  Consider your "inner life"

Complete:

I want....

I need....

I fear....

I dream....

5 mins:  Share

3.  Read/Profile Characterizations...

Circulate work in small groups...

**Invite students to read to the class.  

Tuesday 2/5

1.  Handout:  "Creating Character"

2 pg summary/ reflection due Friday  2/8
--important ideas
--strategies that will help you
-personal views on creating characters  **Read beginning: Identify main ideas

****Final copy of characterization due Monday  2/11

3.  Profile students' characterizations

4.  View Scene:  La Mama Morta

(10) min write:  Assume point of view of either character and relate your feelings.  

--Share

Activity:  Share charcterization:  Collaboratively generate thoughts that reveal character. 

Monday 2/4

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:

“When people really hate one another, the tension within them can sometimes make itself felt throughout a room, like atmospheric waves, first hot, then cold, wafted backwards and forwards as if in an invisible process of air conditioning, creating a pervasive physical disturbance.”
― Anthony Powell, The Valley of Bones

1.  Discuss Journal

2.  Read/Profile Character sketches.  ****Draft Check  (25 points)

3.  Assign article:  "Creating Character"

--Preview beginning.  HW:  Read Entire Article.  2 pg summary/reflection due Friday:  2/8

Wednesday 1/30

Respond to the quote below:

“Authors can write stories without people assuming that they are autobiographies, but songwriters and poets are often considered to be the characters in their works. I like Michelangelo's vision, 'I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.”
― Criss Jami, Salomé: In Every Inch In Every Mile

1.  Discuss quote.

2.  Work with partner on Characterization Chart:  10mins:  Share

3.  Review Characterization Techniques

4.  View scene:  Philadelphia -- Provide character analysis of protagonist.  

5.  Assign Characterization:  2 pg sketch.  Rough Draft due:  Monday  Feb. 4th  (25 points)

Tuesday 1/29

5 Min Write:  Which literary character are you most like?  Explain.

1.  A wise writing teacher once said:  "There's an inherent paradox embedded in fiction."

What's this mean?  Discuss.


2.  Characterization notes:  *See previous blogpost.



3.  Activity:  With a partner, identify your favorite literary characters.  Examine what character traits make them most memorable.  Make a list of these traits for at least 2 characters

*15 mins:  Share.

Character:    Physicality        Actions     Speech     Thoughts     Others' Thoughts

4.  Profile Characterization Sketch assignment

**Looking Ahead:  Francine Prose:  "What Makes A Short Story"

La Mamma Morta... 

Monday 1/28

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below -

“The reason that fiction is more interesting than any other form of literature, to those who really like to study people, is that in fiction the author can really tell the truth without humiliating himself.”  --Jim Rohn (American author and speaker)

1.  Discuss quote

2.  Review/Collect "Writing Rules" Reflection

3.  Focus Characterization:  Process a writer uses to create and develop characters.

Techniques involve describing: 

--physicality
--actions
--speech
--thoughts
--other characters' thoughts
--direct narrative commentary

Assignment:  Write a 2 page character sketch utilizing all characterization techniques
**Begin Rough Draft......Hint:  Don't be distracted by "plot"

Activity:  With a partner, identify your favorite literary characters.  Examine what character traits make them most memorable.  Make a list of these traits for at least 2 characters

*15 mins:  Share.

Tuesday 1/22

Welcome 11th Graders!!!!!!!!!


1.  Introductions:  Overview of course:


1.  Genre - Short Story     A.  Characterication   B.  Conflict   C.  Plot    D.  Theme

***Conflict fuels plot

2.  "Read like a Writer":  Meticulous scrutiny of diction, syntax, narrative elements


Question:  What is fiction?

Consider Jean Baudrillard's quote:

"Fiction is not imagination. It is what anticipates imagination by giving it the form of reality. This is quite opposite to our own natural tendency which is to anticipate reality by imagining it, or to flee from it by idealizing it. That is why we shall never inhabit true fiction; we are condemned to the imaginary and nostalgia for the future."


10 min Write:  Share.


HW:  1 PG   Formulate your own personal rules of writing.  Provide a rationale.  Due  Thursday.

Monday 1/14

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:

“A friend is one that knows you as you are, understands where you have been, accepts what you have become, and still, gently allows you to grow.”
― William Shakespeare

1.  Discuss Journal

2.  Review final requirements of course:  (Short Story)

3.  Preview intro of  "Sagittarius"  (pg. 106)

Activity:  With a partner, identify passages that portray family's inner relationships and perspectives...

(15 mins)  **Share

4.  Examine details of Sebastian's character:  how is he "humanized"?  Explalin


5.  Preview:  Alice Fulton's  "A Shadow Table"

Tuesday 1/8

Freewrite:  Respond to the following quote:

“Learn from yesterday, live for today, hope for tomorrow. The important thing is to not stop questioning.”
― Albert Einstein, Relativity: The Special and the General Theory

1.  Discuss freewrite

2.  Final Review  "The Briefcase"

3.  Short Story :  Due Monday  1/14...  Brainstorm ideas w/ partner  (10 mins)  **Share

4.  Preview intro of  "Sagittarius"  (pg. 106)  

**Assign reading w/ parnter.   

Activity:  Compose a "case history" of family.  Explore respective relationships. 

Goal:  Determine if this is a stable environment for "children".  

Monday 1/7

Freewrite:  Respond to the following quote:

“People do not seem to realise that their opinion of the world is also a confession of their character.”
― Ralph Waldo Emerson

1.  Discuss Freewrite

2.  Discussion:  Analyze excerpts from  "The Briefcase"  **See previous post for notes

3.  Short Story:  Final Copy due Friday 1/11  (5 - 10 pages)

4.  Workshop

Wednesday 1/2/2013

Freewrite:
Respond to the following quote:

“Why didn't I learn to treat everything like it was the last time. My greatest regret was how much I believed in the future.”
― Jonathan Safran Foer, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

1.  Discuss Journal

2.  Activity:  With a partner:  Craft 5 "Writing Resolutions" for the future  (10 mins)  Share

3.  Review Audition process:

What did you learn about the prospective students?  Their writing?  Assessment of Writing?  

Insight about yourself?  **Whole class discussion

4. Analyze selected excerpts:  "The Briefcase"

pg.  184  "He thought how strange that a political prisoner, marched through town in a line....

pg.  185  "The chef knew nothing of physics.  He understoon chemistry only...

pg. 186  "Five cities east, he now have his name as the professor's...

pg. 187  "If the Earth moved, all it would take for a man to travel its distance would be a stong baloon..."

pg.  188  "After eight months in the new city, the cheff stopped buying his newspapers on the street..."

pg.  189  "A full year had passed, and he paid the widow in coins."

pg. 191  "He begins to say, You are the widow.  But why would he say this?"

pg.  192  "His head is light, and he feels he might float away from the post office forever."

Monday 12/10

Freewrite:  Respond to the quote below:


"...the individual is defined only by his relationship to the world and to other individuals; he exists only by transcending himself, and his freedom can be achieved only through the freedom of others. He justifies his existence by a movement which, like freedom, springs from his heart but which leads outside of himself."
     ~ Simone de Beauvoir, 1948, The Ethics Of Ambiguity, p. 156

1.  Discuss freewrite

2.  Draft Check:  Peer Review/Share

**Final Copy due Thursday.  

3.  Discuss Audition Process.  **Portfolios/Interviews

**Preview:  "The Briefcase"

This story takes place at an unknown time, in an unknown place, with an unnamed protagonist who simply has the will to survive. At one time he was a chef, but because of talking politics, he became a political prisoner to an unknown country. He becomes one of 200 criminals sent to an unknown location, but thanks to his starvation along the journey he is able to free himself of his bonds. Sadly, when his guards see that he is missing, they take a nearby physics professor and command him to join the group of captives. The professor leaves behind his briefcase, which the protagonist uses to take the identity of the guards’ new victim. With the briefcase in tow, the nameless chef takes on the persona of the professor. Over time he sees parts of his his life through the lens of the professor which I thought was quite entertaining. Even to the point of mulling over an assignment found in the professor’s briefcase which instructed his students to construct a proof that the Sun revolves around the Earth. If you want to read it, you can find it in The Best American Short Stories 2009.

Tuesday 12/4

Activity:  Read the quote below:

“About once or twice every month I engage in public debates with those whose pressing need it is to woo and to win the approval of supernatural beings. Very often, when I give my view that there is no supernatural dimension, and certainly not one that is only or especially available to the faithful, and that the natural world is wonderful enough—and even miraculous enough if you insist—I attract pitying looks and anxious questions. How, in that case, I am asked, do I find meaning and purpose in life? How does a mere and gross materialist, with no expectation of a life to come, decide what, if anything, is worth caring about?

Depending on my mood, I sometimes but not always refrain from pointing out what a breathtakingly insulting and patronizing question this is. (It is on a par with the equally subtle inquiry: Since you don't believe in our god, what stops you from stealing and lying and raping and killing to your heart's content?) Just as the answer to the latter question is: self-respect and the desire for the respect of others—while in the meantime it is precisely those who think they have divine permission who are truly capable of any atrocity—so the answer to the first question falls into two parts. A life that partakes even a little of friendship, love, irony, humor, parenthood, literature, and music, and the chance to take part in battles for the liberation of others cannot be called 'meaningless' except if the person living it is also an existentialist and elects to call it so. It could be that all existence is a pointless joke, but it is not in fact possible to live one's everyday life as if this were so. Whereas if one sought to define meaninglessness and futility, the idea that a human life should be expended in the guilty, fearful, self-obsessed propitiation of supernatural nonentities… but there, there. Enough.”
― Christopher Hitchens, Hitch-22: A Memoir

1.  Summarize Hitchens' main points.  Which do you agree/disagree with most?  Why?

2.  Consider the role of decision-making in Hitchen's perspective.

3.  Read/Workshop drafts of short term fiction:  "Rubiaux Rising"

--Identify conflicts (internal/external)

--Consider how the role of setting affects character

Freewrite:  Analyze the quote below:

You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.
Albert Camus


1.  Discuss freewrite.

2.  Consider how this might relate to Rubiaux in the short story.

3.  Review End of "Rubiaux Rising" (Symoblism/Diction)

4.  Activity:  Extend the short story by one paragraph.  10 mins:  Share

5.  Workshop/Draft check:  Short fiction:  Protagonist amidst a disaster; Generation of internal/external conflicts  

Wednesday 11/28

Complete Reading "Rubiaux Rising"

1.  Consider blend of "disaster and tragedy"...  internal/external conflicts

2.  Explore related themes:  "orphan brothers"

3.  Analyze character of Rubiaux

4.  Discuss:  Realm of fiction; Narrative Credibility

5.  Assignment:  Craft short fiction (2pgs) depicting a protagonist amidst a disaster
**See previous blog post for notes.    Begin Rough Draft.

Tuesday 11/27

Read the following excerpt from "Rubiaux Rising".

Rubiaux awakes out of time. In pitch darkness. He scratches his leg where it isn't with his hand that is not there. The water level is now up over the stacked supports, soaking him a good inch. But it has stopped. Prayer has worked, if only partly. But there is something new in the darkness now — breathing, movement. Others. He keeps his own breath steady, feigning slumber, waiting for light to grow in the east.

When he slowly opens his eyes again an hour later he sees them — the unholy menagerie. All down the ledge, crowded near him in awkward proximity, are: a large king snake; two smaller water snakes; four fat nutria; a half-drowned feral cat and two shivering kittens; three pitiful brown rabbits; a soggy raccoon; a dozen Norwegian rats; a clot of huddled mice; along with a teeming mess of spiders, beetles, centipedes, and such. His eyes dart. Theirs do too. All seem to breathe in some strange unison. Waiting a move. Nobody is eating anybody this morning. They share the same fear and confusion — orphan brothers in the storm. 

5 min Write:  Consider how Rubiaux is "orphan brothers in the storm" with all of the insects and animals.  Examine what themes De Jarnatt might be exploring here.  **Whole Class Discussion.

1.  Complete reading short story.

2.  Write a character portrait of Rubiaux.

3.  With a partner, discuss how two  tragedies (War and Hurricane) dominate the narrative.  5 min:  Share

4.  Activity:  Select any passage.  Read to class.  Explain why you chose it and the respective significance.

5.  Discuss:  What can we learn about characterization and setting from this story?

Short Term:  Craft a narrative that focuses on one protagonist amidst a disaster.  Be sure to incorporate internal and external conflict.  

**Begin Draft.