Class November 12, 2010

We started off class today by having a competition to see who could finish the Scarlet Letter crossword puzzle first. After the competition, we opened up the Scarlet Letter vocabulary document that Ms. Flournoy emailed to us. The class was instructed to pick ten words they did not know from the list and guess the meanings of the words. After we guessed the meaning of the words, we looked up the real definitions for the words and compared our definition to the real definition. We got into partners and wrote down definitions of the words our partners looked up. We finished class by fixing seven sentences that had grammatical errors in them. The homework for the weekend is to read chapters 16,17, and 18 in The Scarlet Letter.

I thought it was interesting how you are sometimes able to guess the meaning of a word just by looking at it. During class we guessed the meanings of ten words ,and I was surprised that I was able to correctly guess the meanings of some of the words. Knowing Greek and Latin roots would help you immensely in figuring out the meanings of many words. The ability to figure out words by looking at them reminded me of the movie Akeelah and the Bee. In Akeelah and the Bee, Akeelah is memorizing roots of words in preparation for a big spelling bee competition. By memorizing the roots of words she is able to spell and figure out the meanings of numerous words. Akeelah is able to guess the meanings of words just by looking at them similarly to what we did in class. This skill would be a very useful on standardized tests, such as the PSAT and the SAT.

The new vocabulary word that applies to today’s class is bout.

Sample sentence: In class, there was a bout to see who could finish the Scarlet Letter crossword puzzle first.

Thursday the 4th

Last thursday we began class after reading chapter 3 and 4 from The Scarlet Letter, this was one of our first times to do independent reading for this book. Chapter three is titled Recognition, In this chapter, Hester is standing when she see's a man (which we figure out to be her husband) walk into the town. She is later questioned by Governor Bellingham and other people in the town. They want to know who the father of the child is, but she will not reveal who it is. In class we discussed why she is trying to protect who the father is, because if she would reveal who it is she would receive less punishment. It is also revealed in this chapter that the baby is a girl. The chapter ended with, "It was whispered, by those who peered after her, that the scarlet letter threw a lurid gleam along the dark passage-way of the interior.", This passage helps show the supernatural aspect of Hawthorne's writing.

In chapter 4, titled The Interview, We find out the husband of Hester. They had been married in the UK when they immigrated into the colonies. He was supposed to meet her there but she didn't. Roger Chillingworth seems like a very inteligent man, whoever he did spend some time in the wilderness before arriving in the town. He has a mysterious, dark part of a personality. We will see how his character unfolds in the book.

When I think of some of the characters in this book they remind me of silhouette because of Hawthorne's dark and light writing style.

Although this is a well-known word contradictory is my word of the day. Because Hawthorne's writing is very contrasting and he shows dual nature, good and evil, and dark and light

Monday, Nov 1

This Monday we began reading The Scarlet Letter. The handout we got was a copy of the first chapter of the book. We read it then analyzed the basic themes, such as light and dark imagery and individual versus society. The first ideas we discussed were the contrast between the rosebush and the prison door, and the irony of the prison being one of the first buildings made in the colony. Afterwards, we started reading Chapter 2 as part of the homework.

The reading was a lot like the Minister's Black Veil and had the same dark and supernatural imagery and themes. The vocab word we discussed in class was liminality, referring to the "rite of passage" Hester experiences in her story.

An example usage of the word is: Medical interns experience a term of liminality when going through their first year of medical school.

Tuesdays Class by Alexis Vitenas

On Tuesday we discussed Nathanial Hawthorne, and we took notes on a power point on his background and beliefs. We learned that Hawthorne was a dark romanticist whose works explored the idea human nature and that he was concerned with the inner truths of our hearts. After discussing Hawthorne, we discussed chapter two of The Scarlet Letter and pointed out the light and dark imagery. We also talked about the townspeople’s view of Hester, but in particular we looked at the women’s critical views toward her. After discussing the chapter we looked for reviews that had been written during the time of The Scarlet Letters Publishing. As an addition to the class discussion I have found a review of The Scarlet Letter that connects to what we have been learning about.

http://ibiblio.org/eldritch/nh/loring.html

This review goes into greater detail about the transcendentalists and their views in relation to the novel. It also explains what we discussed about Hawthorne’s exploration of human nature.

The new vocab word is Malefactress. It is found in chapter two of the scarlet letter.

Hester Prynne was seen by her puritan contemporaries as a malefactress because she had committed adultery.

october 12, 2010

In the day prior to this class period, we had been assigned to read, analyze, and answer the questions of the document, "From Resistance to Civil Government" by Henry David Thoreau. Today, we discussed what the main theme was, and went over questions we faced while reading the document. The main idea we settled on was a collaboration of the class thoughts. We decided that the document really was emphasizing the point that when individuals come together in a government, there is some sort of a corrupt force and it is very important for every individual to focus on their own paths. We also said that according to Thoreau, there is no true government unless the individual is thoroughly respected. While trying to go deeper into this idea of a group of people coming together and once together, losing morals, we branched off into an idea from the novel, To Kill a Mockingbird. What we used from that novel was the idea of, mob mentality. Mob mentality is best explained as when a people come together as a group, they lose individual morality, and conform to the morality of the group. This is how Thoreau describes the government, while his message is that our true righteousness is in our individual selves despite the beliefs of the group.

My thoughts on our this document start with thinking back to what I knew about Henry David Thoreau. In previous classes, we had established that he was a Transcendentalist. Knowing that Thoreau was a Transcendentalist, I also knew that the tree things his life really revolved around was God, nature, and this idea of individual self. Knowing this really helps because I can now grasp that Thoreau, through out this document, isn't always commenting literally, but figuratively. From within his jail cell, Thoreau says, "I saw that, if there was a wall of stone between me and my townsmen, there was still a more difficult one to climb or break through, before they could be as free as I was". Thoreau is not saying that he is more free then those men under the law, but in essence of life. I understood that Thoreau meant that even though he is trapped in jail, he is more free because he has broken out of the group of alikeness, he has achieved enlightenment. I also started thinking about how this discussion really brought us back around to the beginning of the year when we were talking about Will McLean, and Lennie and George, and how they were all against society. I thought it was interesting how we went back to that drawing which was so familiar from our first unit, of the lone large stick figure faced by a series of smaller stick figures compiled into a large mass on the other side. I think it is really important to take note that the one person standing alone is very large. Seeing this really supports Thoreau's claims of of the strength of an individual, he says, "...for a single man can bend it [government] to his will".

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

On October 13, we discussed Transcendentalism and began talking about self reliance and going beyond the range of human experience or belief of powers. We learned a lot about Transcendentalism and the major writers during that time including Emerson and Thoreau. We went into depth with the differences between these writers. We discussed how Emerson was interested in Nature and was a thinker, whereas, Thoreau was interested in Walden, about simple things of life, and was a Doer. These two writers differed, however they both surpassed the human experience. I think that the handout called Transcendentalism, which explains Transcendentalism and the dissimilarities between Thoreau and Walden, is very helpful because it went into depth about each individual and the topic.

My thoughts during class were that Transcendentalism is a very interesting topic and that it is fascinating to learn about such an extraordinary subject. Before today, we had studied the Brook Farm which gave us a broader view on the topic and gave me a great introduction to what Transcendentalism really is. Transcendentalism focuses on living close to nature as this handout mentions that, "They strongly felt the need of intellectual companionship and interests (Brook Farm) and placed great emphasis on the importance of spiritual living." I think that this quote portrays the main thoughts and interests of a Transcendentalist, even though the whole subject goes into greater depth. In class, I tried to imagine being a Transcendentalist and really being one with nature. This brought the class and I to really think about how we never really see how great nature is, even though it is such a significant part of life and the whole environment, we never take the time to really appreciate it. I had never been introduced to Transcendentalism before this class and I think it is a remarkable topic that helped my learning process.

Thursday October 21, 2010

On thursday in class we reviewed our vocabulary terms for the upcoming quiz. We were placed into groups of two and given three words to define in a sentence and draw a a picture. This activity was fun and helped the class have visual representations to understand many of the words. Personally I can still remember that Kobayashi easting one hundred hot dogs is not a hyperbole. We had no homework on thursday except prepare for the vocabulary quiz on Friday.

Because we were learning these new prefixes and suffixes, i wondered to myself why we learn vocab. On the website line below it talks about the reason of why we study vocabulary and strategies to expanding our vocabulary. Things i thought that were important from this article were that vocabulary opens new doors. It talks about how without vocabulary we present ourselves as being not intelligent. I thought this would be important because it the years to come we will all most likely be taking college visits and interviews. Expanding our vocab, will be important if we want to be accepted in our first choice colleges. Also a way to learn new vocabulary is to either read, and search words you dont understand; or use the "elementary style." The author of the website says the elementary style is by using the vocab book we use. I think you are reading this post it would be useful to read this website.

http://www.exforsys.com/career-center/english-vocabulary/importance-of-strong-vocabulary.html