AP Lit: Projects & On Demands & Projects

INDIE BOOK PROJECTS.

We'll start with two project shares.

ON DEMAND.
From there, we complete the On Demand: Discuss Shakespeare's use of a literary device such as allusion, symbolism and characterization to develop a theme of power and control.  15 min.  One powerful paragraph.

We'll use these On Demands as well as our last rounds for an On Demand workshop, focusing on the design of an analytical paragraph.  It will also give us an opportunity to discuss Hamlet.

HAMLET.

Finally, I'd like us to do some rapid prototyping of the character card idea so we can build some congruency.  We'll take a look at considerations we should be giving when staging our "To Be or Not To Be's" and develop a deeper list of criteria i.e. costumes, portrayal, color palette, physical setting, music (I think I'm getting a lot of it here already . . .)

HOMEWORK.

Blog. 3+ Posts.
Req'd Post. How to Read Lit Like a Professor. "When In Doubt . . . Shakespeare . . ."
How might Foster's position on Shakespeare inform our reading of Hamlet and/or our design of "To Be or Not to Be?"

Due. Friday, 2/6

Complete.  Hamlet.

Read/Watch.  (Clips on Google Drive.)

Due. Monday, 2/9

Start Designing.  "To Be or Not to Be"
Dramatic Presentation & One Page Analysis/Justification
Due.  Thursday/Friday after Feb break. 

Humanities: Roots Quiz, Culture & Theme Songs

VOCAB.

We kick off with our Roots Quiz 7.  You are all over this.  Worry not.  Do your best.  And if you are struggling with quizzes, remember that FrankenWord and other vocab work can demonstrate your understanding just as well.

5 MIN PLAYLIST.
You've got five minutes to make the playlist you will carry with you for the rest of your life.  What goes on it?  Make it now.

Here's mine.  This was stressful.


CULTURE.

We've got a way to pull all the culture work you've been doing these past couple of weeks together.

Check Google Classroom for this assignment.


THEME SONG ESSAY.

HMW express the reasons why particular songs serve as our theme songs?

We're going to tackle this essay as we have any of our design work because really, writing an essay is a piece of design.

DEEP.
Discovery. (What song might serve as my theme song? Why? Might it connect to an experience?  Might the sounds relate to me?  What might I focus on?  How might I hook the reader?)
Empathize.  (Consider your reader.  Consider your audience. What do they need to know?)
Experiment.  (Drafts.  Play around with order.  Play around with details.  Make maps.  Make sketchnotes.)
Produce.  (Complete a 1st Submission Draft.  Get Feedback.  Revise.  Reiterate.)

Today we will use a couple of brainstorming & ideating techniques including our 5 Min. Playlist  to help get us started.  Friday, we kick into introductions and thesis statements.


HOMEWORK.

Blog. 3+ Posts
Req'd Post. Drum Kit Post.  (See this week.)


Complete. Culture Graphic Organizer (Google Classroom.)  The new one.

Brainstorm. Theme song essay.

Pop Culture: Sketchnotes & Expectations, Super Bowl Ads

We'll start with finishing our sketchnotes of the guidelines & expectations for this class, sharing them, and getting ourselves on the same page.

From there we'll take a look at this year's Super Bowl commercials, one of the annual pilgrimages most of the US takes into the world of pop culture.



We'll complete this graphic organizer to get a sense of how these ads function and operate, as well as what values they suggest matter to their audience.

This is all leading to our first design challenge: HMW design advertisements for something we love?

Brit Lit CPI: Setting Up Blogs, Sketchnoting Expectations & Best Writing

Today we'll set up our blogs.  This is will be the primary place where you write and share your thinking in class this semester.

For your first blog entry, write the best paragraph you can -- an example of your best quality writing -- in five minutes.  Describe how you spent these past several snow days. Where were you? What did you do?  How did you wrangle with the snow?

After this, we'll be creating sketchnotes of the Guidelines & Expectations in groups of 1, 2 or 3.  The sketchnote should be based on the information in the packet you were given an answer these questions:

What do we need for class?
What will class be like?
How much work will there be?

Next class we dig into our first text: Beowulf and take a look at boasting and bragging and vanity plates.

AP Lit: Hamlet: Designing To Be or Not To Be Continues: Storyboards

Today we take our best, most intriguing ideas for staging "To Be or Not to Be" into the next round of Experiment phase: storyboarding.  You will create at least 4 storyboard panels for the sequence you stage, accompanied by annotations to explain the visuals.

This will lead to determining criteria for our project.  HMW demonstrate our depth of understanding of Hamlet by designing the staging of a single soliloquy?  (I intended to dictate these terms to you folks and then realized this is a great opportunity to talk about what really matters in terms of analysis, synthesis, creativity and showcasing knowledge.)

Then we will On-Demand: Discuss Shakespeare's use of a literary device such as allusion, symbolism and characterization to develop a theme of power and control.  15 min.  One powerful paragraph.

Also, we will share two of our indie book projects.

HOMEWORK.

Blog.  3+ Posts.
Req'd Post.  How to Read Lit Like a Professor. "When In Doubt . . . Shakespeare . . ."
How might Foster's position on Shakespeare inform our reading of Hamlet and/or our design of "To Be or Not to Be?"

Watch/Read. Rest of Hamlet by Friday/Monday. See Google Drive and e-mail for clips.

To Be or Not to Be.  Due Tuesday/Wednesday after break.

Humanities: FrankenWord, LNG & Teen Culture/Music Culture

Hey!  We have school today!

Remember improv?  Let's do a little of that this morning.  I've got an idea.

VOCAB.

We'll start with FrankenWord.  Take any root from Roots 7 and combine it with a Root from any other list to create a brand new word that relates to . . . wait for it . . . music and/or culture.

Remember the FrankenWord expectations.
Word.
Definition & Part of Speech.
Used in a Sentence that Shows What the Word Means.
Visual.

LNG.

From there, we will LNG because we missed out on it yesterday and we are trying to get game on with it.

MUSIC CULTURE/TEEN CULTURE.

Finally, there will be time to complete/refine our music culture/teen culture work.  Three graphic organizers are due.  One on Leader of the Pack, one on Summertime Blues, and one on a song about teen culture of your choice.  (It might be one from the playlist.)

HOMEWORK.

Blog.  3+ Posts.
Req'd Post: My Heart Like a Kick Drum.  If your life  -- your self -- was a drum kit, what would it look like?  Double bass?  Bongos?  Set of toms?  Take a look at clips below for inspiration.

Neil Peart from Rush.

Art Blakey.

The famous "Amen Break" from G.C. Coleman (this has been sampled a TON.)

Buddy Rich & Gene Krupa

and Joe Morello who is crazy rad and I only heard about because of this rad teacher

Then doodle your life as a drum kit.  Actually draw it out.  Check out Mr. Ryder's here as an example.

And explain your thinking.  You might want to look at the anatomy of a drum kit.  Learn a bit about the parts and pieces and most certainly the names.

Mr. Ryder's would be super simple.  One kick drum.  One snare.  One hi hat.

• Snare. Sharp. Quick.  Super flexible & can make a lot of different sounds.  It's a lot like how he's involved in a lot of different things.  Goes anywhere.
• Hi hat.  Punctuation and that snap that goes underneath everything else.  It's my brain.  Never quite stops.  Sometimes it's constantly going because of a pedal.  
• Kick drum.  Boom.  Thud.  Right in the chest.  I love that feeling.  I love when I get hit by an idea or an experience and lands right in the center of my being.  And I hope I can create experiences for others that do that as well, whether it is in the classroom or on stage or on social media.

Teen Music/Teen Culture.  Complete the three graphic organizers.  Look on Google Classroom.

Vocab.  Roots 7 Quiz & Product (FrankenWord counts!)
Due. Thursday 2/5

Humanities: Teen Culture, Teen Music (Days 1 & 2)

Welcome to insane weather event 2015 . . . 

On Monday -- remember Monday?  What a day  . . . .

LNG.

On Monday, we started with an LNG from Mr. Brackett.  We spent time examining student samples and talking about what works and doesn't work in an LNG.  

Then you could choose any article from the Bangor Daily News that isn't about Snowmeggedon or sports to complete your LNG.

AYUHYALL: Teen Culture, Teen Music.

Our design challenge we are sharing with our friends in South Carolina:  HMW design lyrics that show others what it means to be a teenager today?

First Step: Analyzing Songs for Cultural Content

We took a look at "Summertime Blues" by Eddie Cochran and extracted the cultural components that surface in there as they relate to teenage culture.   We used a Notice/Wish/Wonder strategy to kick it off.

We uncovered economic systems in the paychecks, language in the slang, and girls and friendships in the social groups.  We also talked about how challenging it can be to label and categorize culture because some things seem to cross over several components.

This is the graphic organizer we used to keep track of this all.

Homework:  Select another song from the playlist OR a song of your choice by a young artist about teen culture and analyze it for cultural components.  Complete another copy of the graphic organizer.  Use the sample to help guide your thinking.

TODAY!

ROOTS 7.  We start there.  Grab 'em.  Quizlet.  Explore.  Dive in.  Get our heads in the game.

Second Step:  Analyzing Songs for Poetic/Lyrical Devices

In order to better create our own, we have to figure out how others crafted their music.  We'll look at the tools a lyricist can use to shape a story, thoughts and feelings.  

We'll look at "Summertime Blues" and "Leader of the Pack" to see how song writers of early rock and pop did it -- and see if the tools they used show anything about their culture as well.

Let's put our ideas here today.

Created with Padlet

HOMEWORK.

Blogging: No blogs this week.  We start with Q3 Week 1 next week.

Teen Music/Teen Culture Analysis:  Complete an analysis of both the cultural components AND the poetic devices of another song from the playlist OR of your own choice so long as it is by a young artist and about TEEN culture.  Use the graphic organizer provided.

You Should Have a Collection of Three Graphic Organizers Completed.

1. "Summertime Blues"
2. "Leader of the Pack"
3.  Song of Your Choice
We will be assessing these for understanding of culture as ability to analyze lyrics

DUE: Monday, Feb 2nd