Unicorns, Chaucer, and Long Sleeved T-Shirts

Today marked the release from the prison we knew as "Essay Writing". We kicked off the class by handing in our Renaissance Essays, and flew straight into discussing our Lit tees. We have the go ahead from the higher ups to wear these shirts every Lit-Friday, so that's pretty rad!

We concluded our shirt discussion by agreeing to think up our favourite quote -- be it from a poem, or simply something characterizing Lit class as a whole -- which we will incorporate into our tees. If you could put Saturn in water, it would float. We also seem strongly in favour of using the poets in a Word-Art spelling of "LIT 2013" or something similar. It's still being confirmed, so worry not if you disagree right now. Just be sure to speak up so you are heard!

We then reviewed the History of the Restoration, and wrapped up class by reading "The Age of Pope". We almost started Gulliver's Travels... but didn't quite make it to there. Oh well, four days for that before the next class!

WHAT'S FOR HOMEWORK

- Read Jonathan Swift's Biography (p. 372)
- Read Gulliver's Travels and answer Reading Check Questions 1-5 (p. 373-380, reading check on 380)
- Enjoy the three day weekend

Last one standing

Attention lit students! Today, we have started our day with fun time of "final stand" a game where everyone stands up and last one to stand is the winner... (no way). So basically Mrs. Loconte was to ask us historical questions based on the recent chapter we read and if we don't answer, we have to sit down. Eventually, everyone "died off" except for Bethany and Rachel. In the end, they BOTH win and they get bonus mark as their prize! What a fun way to start our day! Rest of the class we read, "To the Ladies" by Lady Mary Chudleigh and analyzed her terrible marriage and her quite bold/rebellious characteristics of the poem. Then we compared this poem to the speech from "Taming the Shrewd" and mostly noticed the differences between these two literary works. "Taming the Shrewd" focused the point of  BEING obedient to husbands while "To the Ladies", it was rather vice versa.  Well we have no homework other than our essay due on Thursday! Make it good! 

Interesting fact: In "Edward Scissorhands", Johnny Depp only spoke 169 words in the complete movie. 

How Many Children Does Mrs. Loconte Have?

Today’s class began with a very small number of people and a very large number of interruptions. As most of you know, (I hope, or else your observation skills are very poor indeed) today was grade 7/8 day. Thus, for the first twentyish minutes of class we got to observe Mrs. Loconte as she was introduced to the grade 7/8s and answered many repetitive questions. However for the majority of the class it was just me, Bethany, and Mrs. Loconte so it really wasn’t that big of a deal. Together the three of us worked our way through a portion of the poem Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum by Aemilia Lanyer. In her poem she presented an agreement as to why the original in commit by Eve was really not to be blamed on females. Her arguments included: 1. In giving the fruit to Adam, Eve was really jut expressing her love to him and had no way of seeing the end result of her actions. 2. The serpent betrayed Eve and therefore all females. 3. Eve was ignorant of what the serpent had plotted. 4. Adam is really to blame because he, after all, is the stronger sex and he had much more of a chance to get to know God than Eve ever did. 5. Adam actually heard the command directly from God whereas Eve had not. 6. Adam should have known better and reprimanded Eve for taking the fruit instead of accepting it. 7. Eve was created from man, therefore all the evil in her derived from him. 8. It was man who crucified Jesus not women (Pontius Pilate let Jesus be killed even though his wife urged him not to). 9. Women have to go through pain to bear the men so they should be fairer. In essence, those are the reasons for Eve’s case that we gathered from the portion of the poem that we read. It was quite a good read and I hope you guys who missed it will read it some other time! Armadillos are the only animal besides humans that can get leprosy. Weird. Pretty soon after we three had concluded with Lanyer’s poem, Kimberley joined us and then so did Joon. For the rest of the class we mostly discussed the possibility of getting lit t-shirts made. Mrs. Loconte recorded all of our ideas which I’m sure that she will share so I’m not going to write them all here. But think about it over the weekend!

Homework

·        Read The Restoration on page 348

·        Read the short biography on Lady Mary Chudleigh on page 354 and then read her poem To the Ladies on page 355

·        Read the biography of Samuel Pepys on page 358, read The Diary of Samuel Pepys on pages 359-365, and do the Reading Check questions on page 365.

Have Fun!

Renaissance – Done

Well, we've completed the test (except for Coral).  Gadsby by Ernest Wright is over 50,000 words and does not contain the letter "e".  All we have left is the essay.  Keep in mind that you cannot write your essay on any of the topics you wrote on the test.  Happy writing.
Homework:
 - Complete the handout on the literary history of the Restoration and 18th century

Bipolar Bromance

Hi Guys!

So today we made the wise choice of doing review and pushing back our other activities to friday. For review we made a list with columns , if you wish to continue this list it was; Title and Author, Type of poem, Aspects of the Period, Devices, Quotes, Importance. It has been proven that short bursts of studying repeated frequently are much more effective than one long session. I also have the list of all the things that will be on the test, incase you've misplaced your own. SO here we are!

Renaissance History
Whoso list to hunt (150)
Sonnet 67(156)
The passionate shepard/ the nymphs...(162)
Sonnet 30,116,29(169)
The Elizabeathan age (261)
Of Studies (259)
The Jacobean age (263)
A valediction (266)
Holy sonnet 6,10(269)
Meditation 17(271)
Easter Wings (274)
To his coy mistress (276)
Tribe of Ben(281)
On my 1st daughter/son (283)
Song to Celia(284)
To the virgins..(288)
When i was young and fair (292)
On his blindness(303)
Paradise lost (305)
Pilgrims progress(319)
17th century (322)

I know it's a lot but don't get overwhelmed! We know our stuff , good luck errybody!

Something to peruse, not amuse, so don't abuse

Where's my Muse?!

PP

Question

Mrs. Loconte, I was wondering if you could possibly post all of the poems that will be on the test. I kind of forget which ones we did and didn't seeing as there were a lot!

Just an idea

Okay,
Is anybody interested in a Carver Lit 12 shirt? (Its totally okay to say no!)
If we could create a logo and or quote and be allowed to wear it like the PE department has sweaters/hoodies  , I for one think that might be a novel idea.
Of course, I would have to get the admin's approval, but as I said, its just an idea.
Feedback please.

Mr. Test

Only a week left till the big test! So better get studying and not leave this till the last minute! 

And thus today ended another class of Lit which was very sad because we lost two days previously due to our long weekend, but I think everyone enjoyed that 5 day off! Everyone entered the classroom and we started talking about miscellaneous subjects, such as how our class seemed to be segregated, the first documented of the word Nerd was from Dr. Seuss in 1950 from his book If I Ran The Zoo, from the boys and the girls. Brought us back to our old days of when we didn't sit next to the boys or girls. Then we had a short discussion about our last week hotly questionable topics, and concluded that those questions are always nice to ask but we don't really have an answer for them. We got a marble!!! We then went over the rest of Paradise Lost and then read John Bunyan and Pilgrim's Progress. And ended another class of our grade 12 Lit.

Oh and a heads up just for the people who are in Pre-Cal 12, we might be having a math test on Wednesday , so just a heads up. 

Study! Study! Study!

Homework: 

Read The Celestial City pg 322 and do the reading checks 1-5 

Attempt to finish The Paradise Lost Review Sheet 

If anyone forgot what is going to be on the test 

History /10

Quotes-provide both the author and a explanation /20

Literary terms /5

Multiple Choice of the Growth of the English Language /10

2 Essays (about 400 words) 

The entire test is /65

So study hard!!! and good luck everyone!!! 

Blinded by Pride

We began our last class of the day today by sharing our Renaissance and 17^th Century Poetry Assignment. We had a good mix of choices, including carpe diem and regret poems, sonnets (Holy and not), and responses to poems. It was a good time for us to display our creativity and rhyming skills. We also received a marble for our work!

Once our poetry was read, we talked about the unit test and a take-home essay. We established that both would be assigned for the end of November (see below for exact dates).

Following this brief side track from literature (although related and very important), we read Milton's On His Blindness poem. The only part of the human body that has no blood supply is the cornea in the eye -- it receives oxygen directly from the air outside the body. We found it challenging to think about what Milton was telling us through his use of Biblical reference and his own thoughts. We eventually concluded that though our talents may be stripped from us, it is all to the glory of God and we can still serve Him, even if we can't see it right away.

We then moved on to Paradise Lost. We discussed the questions, especially the confusion regarding Question One. It was mentioned that the "beginning" of the epic may not refer to the beginning of this book -- rather, that this entire book was the beginning (first out of ten books). We continued reading after the questions, and finished up to line 124.

Thus concluded our Literature class for November 6th.

HOMEWORK:

 - The Unit Test on the Renaissance is currently set for Thursday, November 22nd. This date is subject to change, depending on how far along we get in the coming classes.

- The take-home essay will be due on Thursday, November 29th. This date is not subject to change, as we have already read almost all the topics given out (refer to the sheet titled "Take Home Essay" for page references and topics).

- Read Paradise Lost and do the questions up to and including #24 (this means, you can stop reading once you have answered that question, at line 191).

Awkward...

Seeing as I forgot to post an interesting fact here's another post from me. The fingerprints of koala bears are virtually indistinguishable from those of humans. So if you're ever in a jam grab a koala and use its fingerprint instead of yours!

Importune Me No More

After stating off the class on an unfortunate note (no marble after a homework confusion), the class began to quickly pick up as we briefly discussed the readings from the previous class The Tribe of Ben and Ben Jonson. We then went over Jonson’s poems On My First Son and On My First Daughter. These poems sparked and conversation about love. Can love vary in amounts or is love just love? Does love grow with time? Is it possible to love two people the same but show it in a different way? Even with the insights of Mr. T or questions were unresolved. Oh well, some things in life must remain a mystery. We also read Song: To Celia by Jonson which introduced us to poetry of compliments though we thought it was more of a form of worship. Next we read and discussed Elizabeth I’s poem When I Was Fair and Young which began an interesting discussion again. This too was unresolved seeing how Queen Elizabeth I is no longer alive and we cannot ask her what she meant when she wrote this regret poem. We decided that we would like to study the poem Salve Deus Rex Judaeorum in full which Mrs. Loconte said we could do at a later date. Among other things we had a debate about the use of a rhyming dictionary, Mrs. Loconte’s English students succeeded in bumping up their test marks, we recognized the need to learn more about bibliographies especially in text citation, and we watched as Rachel gracefully missed her mouth as she took a drink of water. Just a day in the life of English Literature 12 class. We concluded our class by reading the biography on John Milton and, without fail, were assigned homework.

Homework:

·        Read the beginning of Paradise Lost and due questions 1-8 on the handout.

·        Finish Renaissance and 17^th Century Poetry Assignment due Tuesday