APELC Class Notes
APELCers, we discussed a little the imminent synthesis essay you’ll complete on Thursday and Friday, free-response 3. I misspoke myself when I told third period we’d have six timed-writings this semesters; we’ll only have five, and you’ll complete the fifth on the last day of the semester. (We’ll begin revision conferences the second day back from winter recess.)
We also discussed the Buckley piece today and talked about why we don’t complain. This commentary was written almost fifty years ago, and you all seemed to agree that things haven’t changed much; rather, you observed that as our dependence on technology has increased, our apathy has also increased. Two notable exceptions I mentioned were the incredible turn-out for the 2008 presidential election and the rise of the so-called Tea Party. Please familiarize yourself with the latter; it’s too important a movement to dismiss, as some pundits initially suggested we should.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, we began yesterday and today with a visit from Mr. Gutman, one of our new counselors, who spoke to you about post-secondary planning. Many of the resources he showed you, I have (and more) on the “Pride Time” page. Remember that if you use the page and encounter any broken links, please let me know so I can fix them.
After Mr. Gutman left, I went over some final considerations for your revisions. I reminded you that you need to attempt to define concepts of “worth”, “opinion”, and “democratic values”. I instructed you that your examples must be as specific and detailed as possible, that generalities won’t do. And I reminded you that your paper must be personalized; that is, since you’re expressing your opinion, it’s appropriate and desirable that you speak in the first person, and even that you include personal experiences in the public sphere to inform your essay. However, you must avoid crass, baseless evaluation.
The organizational scheme I recommended for those struggling for an approach was simple: Touch on values and opinion in your introduction before you state your thesis, develop and clarify these ideas in your first body paragraph, and apply these ideas in your second and third body paragraphs with your analysis and evaluation of public opinion by various figures in popular media. Of course, be sure that you actually answer the prompt.
As we’ve been focusing on public opinion and democratic values (and responsibilities), I encourage you to read and think critically about these two relevant stories: “Michigan employee with blog on gay student takes leave of absence” and “Rick Sanchez fired from CNN”. I mentioned the first in class, the second broke as I was talking about the first.
Finally, and this is more for fourth period, I showed part five of The Story of English during third since so much was time left over from having less conferences, and I showed it the second hour of fifth while I conferred with writers rather than trust remaining students to focus on the Buckley text for Monday. It’s broken in to parts itself for upload, and it informs the discussion we had over Black Vernacular English:
For those interested in the rest of the really excellent series, it begins here:
Work hard this weekend, and I’ll see you Monday.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, yesterday and today we processed “The Equity of Inequality” and I conferred with students over their revisions. Students synthesized their reading of Will with other texts including the Declaration of Independence and “What Is an American?”, and some students were able to apply these ideas to their revisions.
Class attitudes toward about equal opportunity were mixed. I asked: Do all Americans enjoy equal opportunities? In fourth period, most students, not all, answered in the affirmative; the opposite was the case in fifth period; and third period was too ambiguous to assess clearly. I also asked if we needed for some in society to fail so that others might succeed, if we needed “losers” so that we could also have “winners”, if we needed winners at all, and what it meant to win.
The ultimate question implied in the text and our discussion, though, was “Are we free, that is, do we act volitionally or consciously in the world and are thus responsible for our own successes and failures, or are we determined, that is, are our actions merely the result of prior causes over which we finally have no control?”
We talked about recession and the distribution of wealth of wealth in America, hot topics this election cycle, and I encouraged you to investigate recent census data concerning them. I did some of my own searching; you should read the following to help you understand these issues and their implications:
- “Recession rips at US marriages, expands income gap”
- “Census finds record gap between rich and poor”
- “Income Gap Widens in America”
I also mentioned a couple of audio texts from the Planet Money Blog at NPR that highlighted two ideologies getting a lot of attention from media: Socialism and Libertarianism. I really encourage you to engage these two pieces, which may help clarify what it really means to be an adherent of each of these economic and political worldviews:
- “Is The U.S. Moving Toward Socialism? A Socialist Weighs In”
- “‘What We Can Smoke And Who We Can Marry’: Libertarianism Explained”
Libertarianism is often associated, perhaps unjustly, with the so-called Tea Party movement, but the latter label, as the name for a political movement, defies easy definition. You might listen to this interview with Kate Zernike, who recently published a book on the subject: “‘Boiling Mad’: A Tea Party Origin Story”.
It’s really important that you become familiar with the current political and economic zeitgeist kids if you hope to be informed when you officially become part of this democratic experiment. Whatever your ideological leanings, please take time to read and listen.
See you next time.
APELC Class Notes
Today, APELCers, I summarized and reviewed key concepts and vocabulary I’ve presented to you since the beginning of the school year, and I conferred with students over their free-response revisions.
I’ve mentioned Lady Gaga’s speaking out against our military’s “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, and I’ve been meaning to post a link, so here it is: “Recording artist Lady Gaga speaks at rally “.
Also, I mentioned the following video in class last week of Sarah Palin fans being interviewed while waiting in line to meet and have the former Alaska Governor and Vice-Presidential candidate sign copies of her book. The audio on my workstation has been giving me trouble, so I wanted to post the clip here:
I don’t post this as an expression of my own political values or to be critical of Sarah Palin. Rather it’s an object lesson of the dangers of uninformed, uncritical thinking, the type of which we’ve been discussing in relation to your most recent free-response essay. Keep in mind the design considerations of the editors (decidedly left of center) who put this text together: It’s likely that those who were able to answer the interviewer’s questions intelligently were cut from the final piece. And understand that this type of poor, unwarranted evaluation exists on both sides of the political divide.
See you next class.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, yesterday and today we processed, quite capably, I think, the Declaration of Independence. I believe our effort on the document continued to reveal the possibilities of the alternate relationship among logos, ethos, and pathos I’ve argued since re-introducing you to the terms. Because of the time I deemed important to dedicate to working with the document (still far too little in my estimation), some revision conferences had to be pushed to next week, and I’ll confer with those students affected on Monday.
Very importantly, while I conferred with writers in the second hour of each period, other students began their first official note review over our work with the charter document. The process will seem tedious at first, but it’s a vital class component, and should help students practice developing ideas and theses, and synthesizing texts with others throughout the year. In this way critical thinking will become recursive, and class content, holistic. The note review should be completed for Monday, when I’ll collect the notes and review from one class. Also check your class page for two reading and question and answer assignments for Monday, that will themselves serve as the seed for a new note-set and review.
As we finished our definitions of fundamental class concepts this week, that last being ideas about language: what language is, our assumptions regarding grammar, syntax and attendant issue, et cetera, Emma, Derussa, and I shared some some informal discussion about animal “language” during lunch on Wednesday. Emma mentioned a TIME article she’d recently come across, “Inside the Minds of Animals”; the New York Times ran an interesting article about language in particular in 1995, “Chimp Talk Debate: Is It Really Language?. I argued that while animals do demonstrate communicative ability, they don’t possess language, as such, and I’d encourage curious students interested in this topic to read over the “Animal language” entry at Wikipedia.
Relatedly, I also argued the limits and criticisms of “Evolutionary Psychology” and its criticisms. You might read these articles, too: “Why Do We Rape, Kill and Sleep Around?” from Newsweek, and “A brainwave for catching a criminal?” from The Guardian.
Finally, you might examine this book review by linguist John McWhorter (several of whose books you’ll on my shelves): “Don’t Believe the Hype About Aborigines, Yiddish, or Ebonics”.
Have a fine weekend, kids.
APELC Class Notes
Juniors and seniors, while I conferred with some students yesterday and today others processed the Declaration of Independence. We finished (for now) definitions of fundamental language concepts (far later than we should have), and on Monday I’ll summarize all of the key concepts I’ve offered you since the beginning of the year that’ll continue to inform our inquiry.
My enumeration and our discussion of the fundamentals of language reminded me of a recent story from Manhattan about a mild professor of literature and her showdown with corporate fascists: “Grammar stickler: Starbucks booted me”; news of this brave woman’s struggle even went global. Of course, this story highlights the problems of the popular assumptions most people have about language, and really delineates the matters of taste of the presumed preachers of high culture and the objective understanding of those who actually study language as it is spoke. See commentary at the Language Log’s: “Gricean bagel rage”; and more apt analysis at The Economist: “Does “a bagel” imply no butter?”.
We’ll get to the heart of the Declaration of Independence next class.
APELC Class Notes
Today, APELCers, we reviewed your recent timed essays to the second free-response prompt. Student work suffered, I observed, for various reasons, among them a misreading of the prompt, a reliance on tired “Everybody wins!” assessment of reality, a dearth of engagement with the political and historical zeitgeist of our times, and a confidence in too-established assumptions. That’s a very rough distillation of what I saw in students’ papers and what we discussed together.
Coincidentally, a favorite example that appeared in students’ work has an opinion that’s getting some media attention: “Lady Gaga to lead rally against military’s ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’”.
Check your class page for your reading homework, and prepare for your conferences. I’ll give you the last dedicated lecture material on language (although we will be reading more about various linguistic topics as we proceed), and we’ll finally get to the Daniels and Algeo articles I asked you to attend some time ago.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, yesterday and today we concluded our discussion of the Bush text, and from your own identification of logoi and analyzed their relationship to ethoi and pathoi. After that activity, things got contentious with my enumeration various understandings of grammar from the oft-referenced “Grammar, Grammars, and the Teaching of Grammar” by Patrick Hartwell, published in College English in 1984. If you’re curious about Hartwell’s credentials, try this this memorium from a page dedicated to his memory.
The issue of grammar is one of my favorites to discuss with students, because the actualities of language challenge and force reconsideration of long-cherished beliefs. (See my notes on National Grammar Day from 2008). Such discussion usually courts controversy (“DEA wants to hire Ebonics translators”), which is generally productive―recall Ellie’s assertion in fourth period the other day that offense, or at least conflict, breeds progress.
If you’re brave enough, and you still don’t believe me (and thousands of linguists, anthropologists, philosophers, sociologists, psychologists, and neuroscientists and their research) about the nature of grammar, you might read this fairly short and simple student paper about grammar, and pedagogy in particular, from the online publication Intertext at Syracuse: “The Systematic Teaching of Grammar:A Critique”. And if you really want to see a grammar (a description) of a language, or a language variety, challenge yourself with the grammar (grammar 1 from the list) of Black English Vernacular.
Oh, we had a timed-writing today, too.
We’ll discuss grammar more on Monday, and we’ll also try to determine what a democratic value is.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, yesterday and today we finished examining the Bush text. I pointed out a few more logoi for you, but then broke you into groups so you could properly process the text on your own: You were to frame, proof, and evaluate it according to the (updated) How to Process a Text handout on your class page. Next class, a representative will present some his or her group’s findings for the class. Keep in mind that the identification of various logoi is not an end in itself, nor is inferring the ethoi or pathoi they effect. Rather, it’s to identify big ideas and decide how the former three inform the speaker’s text and motivate audiences to physical, measurable action.
As an addendum, during its discussion, one group mentioned the recent proposed (and canceled) Koran burning, a natural topic relevant to the text we’ve been looking at and the events of the day. I informally polled each class about the limits of its speech-tolerance, but the results were vague. Was this a free-speech issue? An issue of taste? Of offense?
I thought of this famous quotation from Evenly Beatrice Hall, which often enjoys use when first amendment disputes arise, to think about: “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it.” Would you defend, to the death, the right to burn the Muslim text? Here’re two opinions to consider:
- “If Terry Jones burns the Koran, he’ll also set fire to America’s identity”
- “Pastor Terry Jones, as right as John Brown”
I also asked if deleting a Koran existing on my hard drive, say as a .pdf or even .mp3 audio version, would be the same as burning an actual bound copy. The former are physical things. What do you think? How do you apply your reasoning to other religious texts? To any other books?
This also engendered the (essential, existential) questions: “What is a ‘thing’? What makes a thing what it is?” What’s the difference, for example, between a book and the ideas it contains or the ideas that inform it? If I burn a book, do I destroy its ideas? And further, what’s an idea? Can one destroy an idea?
See what you can come up with for next class.
APELC Class Notes
Juniors and seniors, today we met in the liberry to polish your first free-response revisions for submission. That’s it. We’ll complete the Bush text next class.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, for the first several minutes of class yesterday and today we talked over some last minute considerations for your revisions and cover sheets. Then I asked you to review the initial comments on How to Take and Review Notes before we began processing the speech by our former president.
As we read, watched, and listened to the text of President Bush’s speech, I pointed out as many logoi as I could (and and they weren’t only schemes and tropes) and I prompted you to consider how these choices effected or created ethoi (common ground and common values) and what pathetic effects were achieved. You began to see this alternate relationship I described among logos, ethos, and pathos, how the first is foundational in rhetorical text and how the three can’t really be separated. You also saw how many logoi can be operative in one utterance or series of utterances, how they pile on top of and work together to maximum in well-crafted text.
We’ll complete this next Tuesday and Wednesday; remember that on Monday, you’re to meet me in liberry computer lab 1 for final questions, clarifications, and peer-edit of your free-response revision and cover sheet. Review the links I left on Wednesday’s notes regarding embedding quotations and using ellipses.
A last word: Do not put off revision and cover sheet work until Sunday afternoon or evening; rather, honor the hard work and thought you’ve put into your papers so far.
See you Monday.
APELC Class Notes
Yesterday and today, I reviewed alternate ways of understanding and applying logos, ethos, and pathos, and I tried to clarify the use of the examples of organization I offered you in the handout. I also showed you ways to introduce and outroduce your essays using highly evaluative, contextualizing language. Again, I recommend that you use my examples only as guides and not to imitate my style.
I enumerated free-response revision submission requirements and details (which are also listed in your course outline), but I’ll post them here too. This’ll be the only time I post them all year, but I’ll remind you of them as you turn in subsequent revision work―it’s tedious to repost them every time, and it takes the onus off of you to be responsible for learning what I expect in your work. Here they are:
- Writers must have conferred with me over their initial paper to submit a revision.
- Papers must be typed and formatted according to MLA style guidelines—use the template (under Class Materials on your class page)—and should be no less than two and half and no more than three pages long.
- Papers containing more than four obvious errors in conventions and usage for consultative, written, academic English or violations of MLA style will lose 7% from the final grade.
- Papers must be accompanied by a cover sheet (under Class Materials on your class page) detailing its writer’s revision process.
- Cover sheets are to be attached to the revision, former on top of the latter, with one staple, horizontally, in the upper-left hand corner.
- Writers who did not confer with me over their initial drafts or who chose not to revise their essays must still submit a cover sheet, blank except for name, date, title, and initial score, “I choose not to revise timed-writing X” in number 4, and signed.
- Revision scores will replace initial in-class scores if merited.
I failed to communicate the information about embedding quotations and bracketing ellipses I emphasized with third and fourth period to fifth, but here’re some worthy resources that will benefit everyone. Read these pages carefully:
- “Email Grammar and Style: Quoting Properly” from the Pedagogies page at Romantic Circles hosted by the University of Maryland.
- “MLA Formatting Quotations” from the MLA Style page at Purdue’s Online Writing Lab.
For our purposes, even though it’s no longer required by the MLA but it’s not incorrect, I’m requiring the use of brackets around any ellipses you use when quoting another speaker’s text. Also, I prefer you not end a clipped quotation with bracketed or any ellipsis.
You have a bit to do kids. Get to it. Please don’t wait until Sunday evening to commence working on the template or to begin your cover sheet. And be mindful of conventions. Don’t let all your hard work and thought go to waste because of carelessness or sloth.
Remember to print and bring the speech text next class. (I didn’t mention this to third, so if others of you would remind any peers you know in that class, I’d appreciate it.)
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, I apologize for my absence Thursday and Friday and I’m sorry for these late notes, but I appreciate your patience. I left instructions for you to read the Algeo handout, compare Algeo’s ideas to those you encountered in the Daniels text, and answer all of the questions on the former as part of your notes. After this, I asked you to work on organizing at least the three body paragraphs of your revision. You were also encouraged to read your self-selected texts with any time left. (If you don’t have a book yet, please choose one soon and bring it every class day.)
Those that had conferences with me should expect to meet with me on Tuesday or Wednesday when we return from the long weekend.
Best.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, because of the bell-schedule yesterday and today, I was forced to rush through fundamental concepts, alternative ways of looking at and using logos, ethos, and pathos. Of course, I would’ve liked more time to elaborate, but I wanted to offer the organizational scheme for your revisions. Timing was not my friend, and I was only able to share the handout I created with third and fourth period; I’ll go over the arrangement with fifth and also review it in more detail with third and fourth next time.
I know some are skeptical of this way of means of understanding these ancient proofs, but I think it’ll prove productive and useful.
See you soon.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, as much as we could in the time we had, we discussed the Ayad text and I conferred with some of you over your free-responses. During the class discussion, I asked you several divergent questions that went beyond what you were instructed to answer initially, and I encouraged you to think of your own as you read from now on. These are level 3 questions and can be specific to a text or may be broader essential, existential questions.
I also challenged some of your interpretation and your ideas in a way that can be frustrating because I often engage in reductionism frequently leading to reductio ad absurdum.
Finally, I handed out a text about language for you to work on by yourselves, and which we’ll discuss later in class. See your class page for details.
I’ll see you next class.
UNOFFICIALLY. Please let me know if you’ll be attending one of the information sessions I’m conducting tomorrow (Tuesday) evening or the evening after (Wednesday) for those interested in traveling with me and several other Dorados across Europe at the end of this school year.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, yesterday and today I began conferring with writers over their free-responses to the Downe text. While I worked with individuals, pairs examined and identified schemes and tropes in the correspondence under scrutiny and continued to highlight the Ayad text.
I regularly listen to BBC World Service Documentaries, and this week I downloaded “Cutting the Lifeline to Honduras”. You might find it interesting especially as it relates to opportunity, immigration, and separation, three issues presented in John Downe’s letter to his wife and children.
A VISIT. It was nice to see former APELCer Marie Clymer, currently of Wellesley, who came by fifth period for a brief visit and who I put on spot by asking her to share a little of her experiences at and advice for college. Thanks for coming by Marie.
APELC Class Notes
Fourth period APELCers worked with the Downe text the first hour of the period and an analytical essay by Layla Ayad. I hope third and fifth period were as successful; the notes left by the sub seem to indicate so, but I’ll see for myself on Friday.
I look forward to first revision conferences over the next two days. You’ll be surprised what we can accomplish in five minutes if you’re prepared.
NOTE. I was stunned to see that the three-dimensional apple puzzle that was on the northeast bookshelf had been taken apart and hastily stuffed behind some (poorly) reorganized books. It seemed silly that students would think I wouldn’t notice this and the other obvious disturbances to the room. I’m not sure which period was responsible, but I will find out and mete out consequences.
APELC Class Notes
APELCers, today I asked you to add to your notes with definitions of discourse, speech and text event, and parts of the rhetorical triangle. I attempted to use Barack Obama’s inauguration speech as an example text that we could frame with the rhetorical triangle, but it was too distant in the past for most of your memories, so I took out a standby from last year which most of you knew (if not liked), Katy Perry’s “Hot N Cold”. (It wasn’t my favorite either, but it worked for our purposes.) The question of audience came up: Who’s the intended audience of the song, a nameless subject in the song itself or the general listening public? I’ll say something of private and public text next time we meet.
Students also began to sign-up for revision conferences. There’re still many of you that need to choose a slot, and they’re limited now. I’ll leave a copy of the sign-up sheet on the extra computer cart where you can sign-up for what times that remain.
I’ve asked you also to select a text for outside reading. Any non-fiction book should do, but here’re two reading lists that might help you make a decision if you’re coming up empty:
- The Modern Library list of the 100 best nonfiction
- Sue Silverman’s list of contemporary literary nonfiction
I’d like you to have made a selection by the end of the week, and I’d like to you to bring the book with you to each class meeting. See me if you have any questions.
APELC Class Notes
Yesterday and today, APELCers, we asked and answered questions “The History Teacher”, by Billy Collins, and we went to the bookstore where you were issued your textbooks. I offered you several definitions of and commented on rhetoric, which helped you clarify the prompt of timed-writing 1. I returned your timed-writings to you, and you began to examine and assess your work. We’ll continue this on Monday.
Have a fine weekend.
APELC Class Notes
Juniors and seniors, we reviewed different levels of questions we can create when approaching a text critically today and yesterday, and I offered some examples for a favorite piece of mine, Edward Hopper’s Automat.
Fourth period set creating their own questions for the piece, and third and fifth periods created their questions over other texts in the room. We didn’t get to them all, but we may have some time next class. I’ll hand back your papers then, too.
Please be sure to have your IDs with you because we’ll head to the bookstore and get out texts for the year.
See you soon.