Friday, November 19th, 2010

Writing a Paragraph Analysis— Here’s the information from the book (if you need it) to help you write your paragraph analysis. Remember, these are due on Monday! » In the opening sentence, include the title, author, and subject of the story. » In the body sentences, briefly describe the elements (character, plot, setting, symbols) of the story that reveal the theme. » … 

Tuesday, November 2nd, 2010

We concluded our collection of Vocabulary #4 today, and turned in papers. As far as we’re concerned right now, this was the last BYOV vocabulary for the year. The rest of the time, we worked on odds and ends—2nd Period heard a few words about the nature of dictionaries in general, and took a quick look at the Onmificient English … 

Of Death, and Dances with Same

We’ve looked at the Dance of Death concept in class (or in French, La Danse Macabre) and I thought I’d take a minute and put some extra links here for those interested. It’s certainly not exhaustive, and searching the Web for “Dance of Death” will no doubt provide more. I’ve picked these few for now mostly because of the quality … 

Monday, November 1st, 2010

Both classes began collecting Vocabulary #5 today, and we made it through about number seven or eight, which, by our standards, is pretty respectable. We’ll finish tomorrow, turn papers in, and expect a quiz on Friday. 😐 

Friday, October 29th, 2010

Just in time for the Halloween weekend, 2nd Period read (or, actually, “heard,” I guess) Edgar Allan Poe’s “Masque of the Red Death” with an accompanying slideshow. We talked briefly about how the ideas from the past few days (and even Tom Benecke!) tied into the story, and we’ll solidify those next week. Alas, for 6th Period! An impending Rally for … 

Thursday, October 28th, 2010

In 2nd Period, we turned in “Write Like a Dead Man” sheets, and continued examining the Dance of Death with a quick spin through Hans Holbein’s Dance of Death, noticing the moral lessons that could be “read” in the pictures, as well as our omnipresent hourglass. 6th Period began what 2nd started yesterday, with a brief interruption to get our … 

Wednesday, October 27th, 2010

2nd Period moved on today—leaving Tom Benecke at the movies with his wife (we assume he made it safely, and wasn’t run over by a bus, or didn’t fall down an open manhole) we wandered back to plague-time in the Middle Ages, and looked at some pictures: namely Bruegel’s The Triumph of Death, a cadaver tomb, and introduced the Latin … 

Tuesday, October 26th, 2010

2nd Period completed their discussion of “Contents of the Dead Man’s Pockets” today, talking about the main thematic idea in the story: There are more important things in life besides collecting money and prestige, and oftentimes we have to be shaken around pretty hard before we’re able to stop and look at our lives with a different perspective. This lead, …