Grades 10/12: Directions for Posting Comment at Schoolsville

Here are some simple directions on how you should post comments at Schoolsville: 

1. Go to the bottom of the blog post and click on the underscored words that indicate the number of comments (to the left of the mail envelope).

2. Type your comment (or better yet, copy and paste your comments from a Word document) in the box that reads "Leave your comment." 

3. Choose an identity by clicking the circle that reads "Name/URL." When you do, a box will open in which you'll leave your first name, the first letter of your last name, followed by a space which will be followed by your section color. For instance I might leave the name "JohnF blue"(John Fiorelli, blue class) if I were a student in the blue section.  Do NOT click the "anonymous" option. 

4. Then click the box to "publish your comment." Your comment will not be immediately posted, but a message at the top of the page should say that "your comment has been saved." I moderate the comments, meaning that I'll check them for their appropriateness before I post them.  

NOTE 1:it's always good practice to compose your comments in a Word document that you can edit (before you copy and paste into the comment box) and then save your responses for printing at the end of the marking period. 

NOTE 2: unless instructed differently, comments should run a minimum of 200 words. 

NOTE 3: sometimes, you'll be given a blog post specifically for your section color, so you must post your comments there, still indicating your initials and section color.

Sophs Summer Reading

There will be two mini-tests next Friday, September 6, on your summer reading: the novel The Great Gatsby; and the drama, A Raisin in the Sun.

#1 Sophomore Journal: Your Favorite Work of Art (Post before Sept. 6)

Tell me what you consider to be your favorite work of art. Please don't limit your definition of art to the "fine" arts, like painting. Please feel free to include the "pop" arts, like music, film, cartoons, or television. 

You might want to use this post as a "warm up" or pre-writing to the final essay that is due Friday, September 13. However, you may choose to write about something else for the final essay, too. 

Complete this blog/journal response before Friday, September 6, so I can post all of your classmates responses for you to read. 

Remember, I recommend that you first write your response in a Word document, save it, and then copy and paste it as a comment at Schoolsville. Eventually, I will collect all of your "blog/journal" responses at the end of each marking period as a graded assignment. 

Be more succinct here than you will be in your essay--write a MINIMUM of 200 words (your essay should be 3-4 typed pages). 

At Schoolsville, you probably want to respond to these questions: 

1. What is your favorite work of art? 

2. Give a brief description or overview. 

3. Why is this work your favorite? How does it make you "think" (appeal to your intellect) and/or "feel" (appeal to your emotions)? Briefly and specifically explain your answers.

To get an idea of how to respond properly to this blog, you may check out the archives for August 2011 and August 2012 and read some of the responses to this blog entry made by the Class of 2014 and 2015. 

The image that you're viewing is of Jamie Wyeth's Portrait of a Pig(currently on display at the Brandywine River Museum in Chadds Ford, PA), one of my personal favorite "works of art." More to come about my thoughts in class. 

#1 Senior Journal--Personal Essay "Warmup" (post before Sept. 6)

Young writers who feel as if they have nothing to say to the world actually do.

You do, too.

In your short 17 or so years on Planet Earth you have already experienced people and events that have molded your image, touched you to the core, or have changed your life.

If you try to deny this, then answer this question--are you anything remotely like the helpless, crawling, bawling, slobbering infant that lay in the crib? Someone encouraged you to walk, talk, and close your mouth when you ate your food. Someone, and some key events in your life, that undoubtedly involved other people, helped you to become the miracle merging of body and soul that is you.

Bet you never thought about it that way.

So here's the journal assignment: briefly (minimum of 200 words) tell us here at Schoolsville about a person or event that deeply affected your life. I think we all can learn something from your story.

I'd like it if you used THIS response (if you wish) as a warmup for your personal essay, your first writing assignment reflecting on the same prompt (650 word limit) that's due September 12. You might want to use this response to write your Common App essay, and if you do, here are the four Common App writing prompts, all asking you to reflect on a personal event, that would apply:

*Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what lessons did you learn?

*Some students have a background or story that is so central to their identity that they believe their application would be incomplete without it. If this sounds like you, then please share your story.

*Reflect on a time when you challenged a belief or idea. What prompted you to act? Would you make the same decision again?

*Discuss an accomplishment or event, formal or informal, which marked your transition from childhood to adulthood within your culture, community, or family.

NOTE: You should NOT respond to the fifth Common App prompt for this personal essay since we will be writing a similar assignment later in the year when we study setting.  Here is that prompt that you should NOT use for this assignment: *Describe a place or environment where you are perfectly content. What do you do or experience there, and why is it meaningful to you? 

If I may use a simple metaphor, consider this journal posting a flexing and stretching of your writing muscles for your final paper.

In sharing your experience, you'll be participating in bettering the human race. That's right. You'll be educating the entire world community here at Schoolsville, a world that could stand to learn that no two people, let alone races, religions, or nations, are exactly alike. The world can learn from your story, or at least begin to develop some much needed emotions of empathy or sympathy. Wouldn't you be interested in reading about how some Afghan teen, his country ravaged by foreign and civil wars, responds to the same writing prompt that you've just been given? Would his paper help you to understand his hopelessness, his fear, his distrust of foreigners?

OK, I'm only pretending that the existence of Schoolsville, or the completion of your personal essay paper, is vital to the future of the human race. But the point of my exaggeration is this: reading what others have to say is important, whether they live on the other side of the globe or in the neighboring cul-de-sac. Understanding them might help us to decide if we want to invade their country or invite them to our Labor Day barbecue.

Communication with others is the first "baby step" in learning how to get along. If we can't "walk in someone's shoes," then at least we should be willing to slip on someone's sandals and wiggle our toes for a spell. We just might learn that everyone in the world is not wearing the same 9 1/2 B's. 

Respond here before Friday, Sept. 6. I will post your responses for everyone to read early Friday morning. The final essay is due Sept. 12. 

To get some ideas, you may review the comments given by former seniors by visiting the archived posts (see August 2012 and August 2012)for this same assignment.

Grades 10/12 Blogging at Schoolsville

Billy Collins, former U.S. poet laureate 

First of all, Schoolsville is your English class blogging site, a required reading and assignment resource just as important as your textbooks. 

It is the place where I'll post your "journal assignments." Journal assignments will be clearly identified by class (soph or senior) with a # followed by a number.

You must respond throughout the marking period to these "journal assignments" as you are instructed at Schoolsville, but you MUST also turn in a printed copy of all of these "journal assignments" toward the end of each quarter for a major "grade." So for each assignment, I strongly recommend that you type your response in a Word document and then copy and paste it into the blog response box. Save the file and add future journal responses. This will keep you organized, protecting your work in case your computer or the blog site crashes.

Also at Schoolsville,  I will periodically give extra reading and homework assignments that are NOT necessarily a part of your writing journal. Complete them as they are assigned and remember the content and lessons for tests and other evaluations.

Sometimes at Schoolsville I will be "on my soapbox" just proselytizing or propagandizing for your edification, enlightenment, and enjoyment.  Sometimes I might post a test review or some schedule for the week.

Since so much is going on at Schoolsville, I would recommend that you visit Schoolsville daily, especially if you miss class.

Does this all sound boring? I don't think so, and you won't, either, when you find yourself periodically checking in here for homework or to see if I'm "quizzing the chandelier" or "reprimanding the air."

You have to read Schoolsville (the poem) to understand those last references. So do it this weekend.

Follow this link to read the Billy Collins's poem, Schoolsville, the imaginary Poetry-town created by a "retired" teacher who finds it impossible to "retire." That teacher could be me in about 8 years (and counting). Be able to talk and/or write about its subject, its narrator, its poetics, and its theme for class on Tuesday.

You should know a little about every author whom we study this year, many of them still alive and writing. Billy Collins,the author of Schoolsville, is a former poet laureate of the United States. Once a title of great distinction (in countries like Great Britain), the poet laureate is a poet officially appointed by a government to promote the genre of poetry. The poet laureate might be called upon to compose poems for state occasions and other government events, like the inauguration of a president.

Collins's poetry is on the humorous side. His fans call it realistic, clever, and accessible; his critics call it lightweight and shallow. Since I've chosen one of his poems to name my blog, I think you can guess on which side I stand.

Read on.

Grades 10/12 Integrity in English Class

One of the pillars of personal values for a St. Mark's student  is integrity. Your integrity is your honesty, your truthfulness, and most importantly, your commitment to the Gospel values.

Integrity is most important in English class for it will provide an honest relationship with me so that I can help you to learn.

So this year, I hope that you resist the temptation to use Internet sources like Sparknotes instead of reading your assigned material.  I hope that you try to formulate your own opinions and questions on your readings instead of using these sites or "borrowing" your classmates' ideas. If you take this course with integrity, you will gain a personal confidence and satisfaction in the joyful struggle of education, which cheating, well, cheats you from enjoying.

So in using on-line sites like StudyWiz and Schoolsville for our class, I trust that you will respond with your own words and ideas, not ones copied or paraphrased from another source. I trust that you will complete your assignments on time when using these sites,  even if you have to sometimes overcome certain technological problems by doing things "the old fashioned way," like calling up a friend to get your assignment and writing out your homework with paper and pen for the next day's class.

I will trust that you embody integrity in all that you do in English class this year. However, for those of you who might lose my trust, penalties for are spelled out in the Student Handbook for acts of dishonesty, like plagiarism. Let's hope that we never need to review those penalties.

Senior Phase 4 Summer Reading for Creative and Critical Writing

During the summer the school made the decision to "blend" the phase four and five creative and critical writing classes in order to make the schedule "work." I think that this will work out well for all of us. More on this when we get back to school.

For now, you might be wondering about summer reading. You phase fours who did NOT phase up should read the summer reading books you had been assigned: All the Pretty Horses and The Things They Carried.

Phase fives who are reading this should check the blog posted below entitled Unless it Moves the Human Heart for a reminder of what you should do.

Any questions? E-mail me at jfiorelli@stmarkshs.net.

SENIORS Phase 5 Summer Reading---Unless it Moves the Human Heart

Roger Rosenblatt, author of Unless it Moves the Human Heart, challenges his students in his writing classes at Stony Brook University to write about "big" topics and universal themes in their prose and poetry so that their works can move the human heart. Because, after all, he says, great works do, and go beyond providing simple, ethereal passing spasms of pleasure.

He's not a snob in his selection of works that are capable of such prodigious work. There's Shakespeare and Joyce and Kafka and Donne and Nobokov, for sure, but there's Jay Gatsby and Harold and the Purple Crayon, too, and many other works of prose and poetry to which he alludes in his book.

Remember, in addition to reading Unless it Moves the Human Heart and In Cold Blood for your summer assignment, you must read one of these other novels, plays, essays, or short stories that "move" us.  

Hearing Rosenblatt read his passionate book's conclusion (click on this link) might move you, too.

For all of you "football" fans who find  your passion on the beautiful green pitch, watch this commercial for the Barclays Premier League. The old fan is not a paid actor, but  86 year-old Billy Ingham, a loyal fan of the Everton football club. The "advert" follows Billy on match day saying goodbye to a picture of his deceased wife before he heads off to see the other love of this life, his Everton Blues. Over a pretty cover of Phil Collins's "I Can't Stop Loving You," a distinguished British narrator tells us "to follow is to love," a universal theme that almost always moves the human heart.