Tuesday, September 11, 2007

 

English 201 A/B 8-9 M-Th, and 1-3 MW

Greetings students!

We've been meeting now for over a month and it's about time I got this conversation blog going so we can be in touch with one another in ways the classroom setting doesn't allow. Here, I will recap assignments given in class, as well as, post assignments exclusive to the Internet, which you will post then respond to each other by certain due dates. You can also ask questions about assignments here. I will be reading the blog comments at least once, maybe twice a day, so it is a good place to contact me along with the email address: professorwandasposse@gmail.com.

Why don't you send me an email now and say hi, so I can create a group for English 201 A/B so I can do an email blast when necessary. If you don't have an email account, gmail.com is a great place to sign on or yahoo.com or hotmail.com. These servers are all free and you can retrieve your mail while at the college or any public library. I would suggest using your name as your address so friends and I know who you are more readily.

I will also post announcements for weekend activities, just in case you have a little time, plus other campus activities.

We have finished our American Culture archives. I plan to post photos here of the presenters for that session and for the one on Hip Hop culture.

Homework for this week was to read the East Bay Express Article, Too Short, Career Counselor. Visit http://www.eastbayexpress.com/2007-09-05/news/too-hort-career-counselor/. Students were to respond to the argument posed here: Will Too Short make a good career counselor, in a 250 word essay.

Students were also to identify 5 arguments and their support from the Holler. I believe I told students they could write in the book.

I gave an example. Dyson's style of writing is pretty easy to scan. He puts his argument at the top the paragraph, most often as the topic sentence then uses the supporting sentences to flush out the claim.

We had fun listing all the slang terms students had identified for homework last week in the 1-3 p.m. class. We also had a pretty involved discussion in the 1-3 p.m. class about Chapter 1 and inferences students drew from Dyson's earlier comments about male sensitivity evidence which appeared in the references to tears.

Both classes are not doing exactly the same work at the same time, but by week's end we're in the same place.


Lecture topics this week:


Sabir: Talking Points Sept. 10-15

1. What is a thesis? It’s role in the essay drama. How to develop a thesis or invention strategies: topical invention, three-part thesis statement, other ideas (Hacker, Skwire and other sources)

Review sentence types (Hacker)

2. What is an essay? (Hacker and other sources)

Review types of essays. The role of planning. Why is documentation important. (Handout)

3. What is the difference between grammar and mechanics. Why is grammar important?

4. Audience. The role of peer support.

5. The writer’s voice is a blueprint.

6. Tools for the writer. (Skwire)

7. Summary, annotation, and other ways to engage the text, like highlighting or tabs, in other words: Digestion, discourse and other culinary forms (Handouts: How to Mark a Book)

Comments:
After reading Eric K. Arnold's article/story on the famous rapper/ pimp Too Short, I have some nice things to say about Too Short and why he should become a career counselor at Youth Uprising. People say all that he's good for is being a pimp and making crude music, but he slips positive messages and life lessons in between the odes to getting head in a Cadillac. Most kids who listen to his music don't have first intentions on learning about these values, so them hearing it would have never have happened if Too Short wasn't around, because he is not like most rappers. To say that things from the past or bad things he may have said about a girl should prevent him from helping the community is just plain ignorant. He makes the kids edit bad words that they use from his songs, cleaning up his "past spills". He refuses to cus at all while inside the building, more for himself rather than to prove something. All of the kids really like him as well, because he is so rich that it's obvious that he's doing it for the love and not the money. He gets kids off the street, saves their lives, and gets them learning. When he talks to the pretty older girls nowadays, he doesn't address them as if they were a prostitute. He mainly gets kids to stop selling drugs, fighting, and living in the streets in poverty. These reasons are why I believe he is meant to be a career counselor.
 
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