Seniors--First Test review

I told you that I wouldn't clutter up my teaching room with trite motivational posters, but sometimes I get pretty tacky at Schoolsville.

This is everything that we covered so far. In some way, you'll be asked to recall and/or apply your knowledge of EVERYTHING.

So please make sure that you have everything in your notes and folder to STUDY. It would be best to go over things with another student in case you need to copy notes or a handout that you missed. If you missed a number of days of class, you should have seen me to get information that we covered in your absence

Here's EVERYTHING that you're responsible for:

Fiction notes

notes on The Born Writer

The Lucid Eye in Silver Town (Updike) and notes, esp. how Updike is a "born writer"

Vermeer (Jay's favorite) vs. Degas (painter of the ordinary vs. painter of the beautiful)

notes on scene, summary, and description

Fish Cheeks (Tan), Notes of a Native Son (Baldwin), Big Russ (Russert) and notes/quotes

regarding what makes good storytelling

scene from The Sun Also Rises and notes (scene vs. summary)

scene from Pigeon Feathers (scene vs. summary)

Old Man at the Bridge and notes (scene, dialogue in developing character)

Garden State (dialogue in developing character)

Seinfeld episode (dialogue—interesting "ordinary" conversation seems interesting and funny)

Patricia, Edith, and Arnold and notes (scene, interesting dialogue to make an ordinary story and characters seem interesting and more special)

notes on effective dialogue (see your handout on writing an effective scene)

terms/definitions: fiction, scene, summary, mimesis, selection, iceberg theory of Hemingway, aspects of the Born Writer


Test format (tentative, esp. part E)

a. definitions
b. True-false (read them carefully--any one thing that is false makes the answer false)
c. fill-ins (lists, etc.)
d. short answers

e. applied knowledge (you'll be given a reading and asked to answer applying principles that we have studied)