Wednesday, July 28, 2010

Midnight on Wednesday evening, July 28th


The following two essays comprise Essay Packet #1. These two essays are due to be read by Tuesday, August 3.
A question and comment for each essay is also due on Tuesday.

"Are we Worthy of Our Kitchens?"
http://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/are-we-worthy-of-our-kitchens

"The Magic of the Family Meal"
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1200760,00.html

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

Tuesday, July 27th, 2010


Below is a copy of out of class essay assignment #2, assigned today in class.

English 20, Sections 3
Summer 2010
Course Theme: The Significance of Home
Instructor: C. Fraga

Out of Class Essay Assignment #2
• Assigned: Tuesday, July 27
• Rough Draft (optional): If you wish to submit a rough draft, it must be submitted no later than Tuesday, August 3.
• Due: Thursday, August 5
• Essay must follow MLA format exactly.
• Essay must be typed and double spaced.
• Essay must have a minimum of five sources on the Works Cited page. You are welcome to use the Internet for sources, but at least one of your sources cannot be found on the Internet (for example, use a book, view a film or documentary, conduct an interview, etc.)

Essay Prompt:

• For this essay, you will first select a group of people from another culture, religion and/or country OR a particular time period in a group of people’s lives that you are genuinely interested in finding out more about.
• You will then conduct research in order to discover and then write about at least three significant ways in which persons from this culture/country/religion (or someone in a particular situation) must adapt to home, whether it is a new home, a changed home, etc.
• You will then begin by writing a thesis that is assertive and debatable.


For example, imagine that you selected the adaptation of the Hmong once they arrive in the US. After conducting some research, you decide to present information on male and female roles in marriage, religious practices and diet as the three areas of adjustment you feel are most significant and would make the most interesting reading.

Your thesis might read something like the following:

Hundreds of Hmong people immigrate to the United States every year and face many difficult challenges, particularly in the areas of religious practices, changes in diet and male/female roles within a marriage.

• I highly encourage you to consider your academic major or an area of personal interest when selecting the three areas or issues. For example, if your major is early childhood education, you may find it particularly enjoyable to pursue the acclimation of young immigrant children; if you are an economics major you might want to explore employment struggles/strengths of new immigrants

• Likewise, when selecting an overall topic, I encourage you to consider your academic major or an area of personal interest. Some topics that students have explored in the past or topics that have been suggested during a class brainstorming session are:

1. transition from having a home to being homeless
2. transition from serving in the military in combat (or not) and then returning to civilian life.
3. transition from being single to being married
4. transition from being married to being divorced
5. transition from living at home to living away from home
6. transition from being incarcerated to being released
7. transition from being in a long term relationship to losing one’s partner to death
8. transition from having children living at home to experiencing an ‘empty nest’



(An essay that asks students to address a topic such as this one would be difficult to complete in less than five pages, approximately.)

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

Tuesday, July 20th, 2010


Tomorrow we will view a documentary film, "Daughter from Danang." Below is a brief synopsis of the film as well as discussion questions. After viewing the film tomorrow, we will discuss the questions and prepare for the in-class essay on Thursday.

SUMMARY OF FILM:
This documentary often upsets the viewers’ expectations of happily-ever-afters. It is a riveting emotional drama of longing for home, grappling with identity issues, and witnessing the personal legacy of war.
To all outward appearances, Heidi is the proverbial “all-American girl”, hailing from small town Pulaski, Tenn. But her birth name was Mai Thi Hiep. Born in Danang, Vietnam in 1968, she’s the mixed-race daughter of an American serviceman and a Vietnamese woman. Fearing for her daughter’s safety at the war’s end, Hiep’s mother sent her to the U.S. on “Operation Babylift”, a Ford administration plan to relocate orphans and mixed-race children to the U.S. for adoption before they fell victim to a frighteningly uncertain future in Vietnam after the Americans pulled out.
Mother and daughter would know nothing about each other for 22 years.
Now, as if by a miracle, they are reunited in Danang. But what seems like the cure for a happy ending is anything but. Heidi and her Vietnamese relatives find themselves caught in a confusing clash of cultures and at the mercy of conflicting emotions that will change their lives and their definition of home forever. Through intimate and sometimes excruciating moments, Daughter from Danang profoundly shows how wide the chasms of cultural difference and how deep the wounds of war can run--even within one family.
Winner of the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the 2002 Sundance Film Festival.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS---THINGS TO THINK ABOUT

1. One reviewer describes the film as a “gut-wrenching examination of the way cultural differences and emotional expectations collide.” Would you agree this is an accurate description? Why or why not? Explain specifically.

2. Were there parts of the film that made you feel uncomfortable? If so, what were those parts and can you articulate why they made you feel uncomfortable?

3. Heidi acutely feels that she has been rejected by two mothers: her birth mother who gave her up and her Tennessee mother, whose cold, untouching demeanor drove a wedge between them. How does this fact impact Heidi and what she ultimately experiences when she returns to Vietnam?

4. The film is considered a very powerful one by many other small filmmakers as well as many reviewers. In your opinion, what makes this an effective or ineffective film?

5. What preconceived ideas about home are proven inaccurate after viewing the film?

6. In an interview with the filmmakers, they admit that when they decided to film Heidi’s return to Vietnam, they assumed that the reunion would be a healing story, a kind of full circle coming home. The war in Vietnam was long over and they felt they could create a film that would ease the collective pain that is still connected to the war. Instead, what they did discover?

7. Some viewers have condemned Heidi for representing an aspect of American culture that they believe is selfish and individualized. What do you think and feel about Heidi’s reaction for the family’s request for money?

Monday, July 19, 2010

Monday, July 19, 2010


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYyR-Uj72bA

Above is a link to a two minute and 39 second video featuring Chitra Divakaruni, author of the prose poem, "Leaving Yuba City." Please view it before class tomorrow.

Sunday, July 18, 2010

Sunday, July 18th, 2010


Good evening...
I am posting a copy of the out of class essay assignment #1 that I assigned last Thursday.
Stay cool in this amazing valley heat!
And.......... for those of you who are reading this, if you write down the name of the current poet laureate of the United States along with three facts about this person, along with your name, and submit it to me on Tuesday, the 20th, you will receive 5 extra points on the score of your NEXT quiz in class, quiz #3. :-)



English 20 Summer 2010…………………………………………….Instructor: C. Fraga

ASSIGNMENT: OUT OF CLASS ESSAY #1
• Assigned: Thursday, July 15
• Rough Draft due, typed & dbl. spaced (optional): no later than Wednesday, July 21
• Due: Tuesday, July 27

Please select one of the prompts below and write an interesting, informative, well
supported analysis response.
Requirements:
• Must be typed and double-spaced and have a title.
• Must follow MLA format and documentation exactly.
• Must use a minimum of five outside sources. These will, of course, be listed on your Works Cited page.
Since the purpose of this course is to strengthen your exploratory, expository and analytical writing with an emphasis on utilizing research and reading skills…AND because the theme for this course is the significance of home…I offer you a selection of three different essay prompts that each require you to carefully and deeply examine the theme of home in a particular genre. It is my intention that you will be drawn to one of the three enough so that you are motivated and even excited to conduct your research and write the essay.

Prompt #1:
For this essay you will research the theme of home as it is found in children’s picture books. After perusing several picture books, you will select a minimum of six to discuss, analyze and review for their success (or failure) in presenting the theme of home, through both words and illustrations. In your analysis, be sure to consider the intended audience.

Prompt #2:
For this essay you will research the theme of home as it is found in song lyrics. After perusing and studying many song lyrics, you will select a minimum of six songs to discuss, analyze and review for their success (or failure) in presenting the theme of home.
In your analysis, be sure to consider the intended audience.

Songs/Lyrics you may NOT analyze (please)! ☺:
“Home” (Chris Daughtry)
“Sweet Home Alabama” (Lynyrd Skynyrd)
“Home” (Michael Buble)
“Can’t Take me Home” (Pink)

Prompt #3:
For this essay you will research the theme of home as it is found in three different films (OR at least three episodes from a television series). You will discuss, analyze and review each film (or episode) for its success (or failure) in presenting the theme of home. In your analysis, be sure to consider the intended audience.
************************************************************************
IN ORDER TO ADDRESS ANY OF THESE THREE PROMPTS FULLY AND ADEQUATELY, YOUR ESSAY SHOULD BE AT LEAST 5 PAGES IN LENGTH (approximately)

Phrases you may NOT use in your title or anywhere in your essay:

There’s no place like home.
Home sweet home.
Home is where the heart is.
Home means different things to different people.

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Thursday, July 15th


Hello!
Poetry Packet #3 consists of two prose poems.

"Flies" by Donald Hall
(if you google the above just as it is written, you will find the complete poem in the second posting.)

"Leaving Yuba City" by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
(I will provide a copy of this for you in class on Thursday, the 15th of July)

Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Wednesday, July 14th


POETRY READING PACKET #2 (four poems)

“Taking my Son to School” by Eamon Grennan
(do a google search of the above poem exactly as it is written above. The first posting will be a commencement speech give by Mr. Grennan. Open this and you will see the poem right at the beginning of the speech. Focus only on the poem, not the speech)
************************************************************************************
"One Home”
By William Stafford
Mine was a Midwest home—you can keep your world.
Plain black hats rode the thoughts that made our code.
We sang hymns in the house; the roof was near God.

The light bulb that hung in the pantry made a wan light,
but we could read by it the names of preserves—
outside, the buffalo grass, and the wind in the night.

A wildcat sprang at Grandpa on the Fourth of July
when he was cutting plum bushes for fuel,
before Indians pulled the West over the edge of the sky.

To anyone who looked at us we said, “My friend”;
liking the cut of a thought, we could say “Hello.”
(But plain black hats rode the thoughts that made our code.)

The sun was over our town; it was like a blade.
Kicking cottonwood leaves we ran toward storms.
Wherever we looked the land would hold us up.

*************************************************************

“Where Children Live”
by Naomi Shihab Nye

Homes where children live exude a pleasant rumpledness,
like a bed made by a child, or a yard littered with balloons.
To be a child again one would need to shed details
till the heart found itself dressed in the coat with a hood.
Now the heart has taken on gloves and mufflers,
the heart never goes outside to find something to do.
And the house takes on a new face, dignified.
No lost shoes blooming under bushes.
No chipped trucks in the drive.
Grown-ups like swings, leafy plants, slow-motion back and forth.
While the yard of a child is strewn with the corpses
of bottle-rockets and whistles,
anything whizzing and spectacular, brilliantly short-lived.
Trees in children's yards speak in clearer tongues.
Ants have more hope. Squirrels dance as well as hide.
The fence has a reason to be there, so children can go in and out.
Even when the children are at school, the yards glow
with the leftovers of their affection,
the roots of the tiniest grasses curl toward one another
like secret smiles.

**********************************************************************
“To a Daughter Leaving Home”
by Linda Pastan
(please google the poem and you will find it on PoemHunter.com)

Tuesday, July 13, 2010

First Day of Class, July 13th, 6 pm


Hello! I have just heard from a student that she could not access the David Whyte poem, "Arrivals."
If you are having trouble, just go to Google and type in:
"Arrivals" David Whyte

The first posting that is listed is the poem. Click and read!

If anyone has trouble after trying that (I just checked and it really does work!) email me, please!

ALSO! Below are copies of three handouts you received in class today:
1. Reading Packet #1 (3 poems)
2. Unacceptable Errors
3. Oral presentation

****************************************************************************************************************************
English 20, Summer 2010
READING PACKET #1—THREE POEMS

What Came to Me

I took the last
dusty piece of china
out of the barrel.
It was your gravy boat,
with a hard, brown
drop of gravy still
on the porcelain lip.
I grieved for you then
as I never had before.

(Jane Kenyon)


Coming Home at Twilight in Late Summer

We turned into the drive,
and gravel flew up from the tires
like sparks from a fire. So much
to be done—the unpacking, the mail
and papers…the grass needed mowing…
we climbed stiffly out of the car.
The shut-off engine ticked as it cooled.

And then we noticed the pear tree,
the limbs so heavy with fruit
they nearly touched the ground.
we went out to the meadow; our steps
made black holes in the grass;
and we each took a pear,
and ate, and were grateful.

(Jane Kenyon)

Arrivals
(find this poem by David Whyte by accessing the link below)
http://www.davidwhyte.com/english_arrivals.html
********************************************************************************************************************************
UNACCEPTABLE ERRORS


In English 20, students should already be very proficient in word usage. We do not have time for grammar lessons. (I will, however, provide short ‘mini’ lessons when I feel they are warranted.) The following errors that are commonly made on student papers are considered unacceptable.
1. Any assigned homework submitted with an unacceptable error receives no credit.
2. For out of class essays, each unacceptable error takes ten points off your final earned grade. You may correct unacceptable errors and receive the points back if you choose to revise. In class essays that have unacceptable errors CAN always be corrected to earn back the points lost.

1. there – place Put it over there.
2. their – possessive pronoun That is their car.
3. they’re – contraction of they are They’re going with us.
4. your – possessive pronoun Your dinner is ready.
5. you’re – contraction of you are You’re not ready.
6. it’s – contraction of it is It’s a sunny day.
7. its – possessive pronoun The dog wagged its tail.
8. a lot – always two words I liked it a lot.
9. to – a preposition or part of an
infinitive I like to proofread my essays carefully.
10. too – an intensifier, or also That is too much. I will go too.
11. two – a number Give me two folders.
12. In today’s society Instead use “Today” or “In America” or “Now” etc
13. right(s)/write(s)/rite(s) rights are a set of beliefs or values in which a person feels entitled: His rights were read to him before he was arrested for stalking Dave Matthews. Writes is a verb indicating action taken with a pen, pencil or computers to convey a message: Michelle writes love letters to Dave Matthews in her sleep. Rites are a series of steps or events which lead an individual from one phase in life to the next, or a series of traditions that should be followed: The initiate began his rite of passage ceremony at the age of thirteen.
***********************************************************************
An accumulation of the following errors can affect your grade, but not one error, ten points down. The number depends on how serious the error is, and how often you make it. Some do not slow up the reader as much as others.

• Misuse of the word “you”. You must actually mean the reader when you use the word “you”.

• Avoid use of contractions in formal expository writing. (can’t, shouldn’t, didn’t, etc.)

• Agreement of subject and verb. Both must be either singular or plural.

• Fragmented sentences, comma splices and run-ons. Be sure to proofread your papers carefully before turning them in.

You will not pass English 20 if you cannot write an intelligent sentence in correct English.

*******************************************************************************************************************************
English 20—Section 3
Summer 2010
Instructor: Catherine Fraga

Oral Presentation Assignment

The Significance of Home
Assigned: First day of course

Due: The last day of course, August 19th

For this assignment, please select an article, observation, photograph, painting, collage, film, song, poem, essay or anything else that offers some message or reflection on the theme of home. It could have a personal meaning for you, but it does not have to.
After you have selected your “item,” write a minimum of one page about the item. Include a brief description of the item and a detailed explanation of why you chose this item; include a thoughtful commentary. Proofread carefully for unacceptable errors as well as other proofreading mistakes.
On the day of presentations, please do not read your essay to the class, but simply summarize the main points aloud to the class. The presentation usually takes only a few moments. You will submit a copy of the essay only to me.
As the semester progresses, you may get ideas for your presentation from our readings, the films we will be viewing, or from class discussions.
Remember that you will not received this short essay back nor will you receive any credit for the assignment if there are ANY unacceptable errors present.
Please do not take this assignment lightly. It is worth 100 points.

Monday, July 5, 2010

July 5th, 2010--Monday evening


Greetings. Those of you who are reading this blog already, all FIVE OF YOU!--hope your 4th of July holiday weekend was spectacular! I am posting the Grade Roster that I mention in the course outline. You will also receive a hard copy on the first day of class next week. Have a most lovely week.

ENGLISH 20, SECTION 3
SUMMER 2010
PROF. FRAGA

GRADE ROSTER—1515 pts. possible

QUIZZES—25 points each—125 points total (most likely unannounced)
#1_____#2_____#3_____#4_____#5_____

IN CLASS JOURNAL WRITING-50 points each—200 points total
#1_____#2_____#3_____#4_____

IN CLASS ESSAYS—100 points each—200 points total
#1_____#2_____

OUT OF CLASS ESSAYS—200 points each—400 points total
#1_____#2_____

QUESTION & COMMENT HOMEWORK—30 points each—90 points total
#1_____#2_____#3_____

TAKE HOME TEST ON THE UNWANTED—200 points total
______

GROUP WORK—50 points each—200 points total
#1_____#2_____#3_____#4_____

FINAL/ORAL PRESENTATION & BRIEF ONE PAGE PAPER—100 pts. total
_____

How to assess your final grade earned: Divide the points you earn by 1515 to find the percentage.
Then see chart below.

100-95=A Example: 1309 pts. earned=86.4 %=B+
94-90=A- Example: 1400 pts. earned=92.4%=A-
89-85=B+ Example: 1237 pts. earned=81.6=B
84-80=B
79-75=B-
74-70=C
69-65=C-
64-60=D
59-0=F