Upcoming Major Work (Essays, Tests, Projects)

Wednesday, Sept. 24:  Personal Essay--First Draft & Peer Response Day (turnitin.com by 9:55)
Wednesday, Oct. 1:     Personal Essay--Final Draft & Peer Response Day (turnitin.com by 9:55)

Catching up--
Friday in class:
Assessment AP essay for All the Pretty Horses. If you haven't already arranged for a make-up, try to make it on Tuesday after school (several classmates will be joining you!).

Week-end homework (well-advertised verbally and in Thursday's post):  be working on the first draft of the personal essay--get at least something churned out.

TODAY IN CLASS
Return to "The Chrysanthemums"--left high and dry for the counselor's visit on Thursday and the timed write on Friday.  SO, we picked up and got to the point of considering who/what Elisa was addressing in her "bright direction" comment.  After thinking, pair-sharing, and a short class discussion (about 3 minutes in 3rd, just a longish minute in 4th), many students seemed to settle on the idea that the chrysanthemums themselves operate as some sort of extension for Elisa--that in sending them off, she is doing the next best thing to leaving the valley herself.  A few people even carried this idea to the notion that the chrysanthemums are something like "children" in that, having nurtured them and given her strong interest in them, it is like sending some small part of herself out into the world.

You might not agree; we didn't have time to explore many points of view here. BUT, "hang on to that thought," whatever it was, because we'll make time for it at the end of the story when we pull all the pieces together.

Last 10 minutes or so of class--A quickwrite: "Discuss the significance of the bathing and dressing scene."  This passage was marked off on the overhead copy as the section beginning "In the kitchen she reached behind the stove . . . and ending with Elisa sitting on the porch--"Her eyes blinked rarely." If you were absent today, please do this on your own, preferably before class on Tuesday!

FOR TOMORROW
Yep, keep working on the paper.  Here are five dimensions or parameters to keep in mind, whatever your actual topic is:

1) the OPENING.
The essay needs to engage the reader straight from the start.  How you do this will vary by topic, but your essay needs to start at a high interest level that genuinely encourages even tired, over-burdened readers of thousands of applications to become focussed on yours.

2) ORIGINALITY vs. PREDICTABILITY.
There is a certain "sameness" that goes with various kinds of experience that does become familiar to readers who have read thousands of personal essays written by 18-year-olds.  You are unique, but the student accounts of various experiences sometimes sound eerily the same.  The best way to avoid that is to focus on small slices of experience; the angle or perspective you choose, and the details you develop, will have a greater chance of being fresh.  As advised with the "mission trip essay," for example, don't try to write the entire narrative; select a much narrower focal point to describe and reflect upon--hopefully avoiding the sameness that too often blurs these essays into the fill-in-the blank template I described in class.

3) INSIGHT INTO THE WRITER
Whatever the prompt, the most important subject matter is YOU.  Readers want to know you better after reading your essay, and this means more than realizing that you had predictable emotions after certain experience.  All strong personal essays amount, in one way or another, to a window into your character and/or "what makes you tick."  So one tip I have is that right now, before continuing tonight, you jot down somewhere the 2 or 3 insights that you would hope your reader gains about you.  I don't mean that your essay should identify or label explicit character traits, but I do mean that after reading a solid personal essay, the reader should be able to recognize some significant aspects of your make-up.

4) DETAILED vs GENERIC
This dimension is related to some of the others, but it focuses on the means of achieving interest, originality, insight, etc. Good writing always needs detail, example, illustration, precise description, etc., to be effective, but sometimes people who can write a powerful, well-supported argumentative essay or literary analysis shy away from the specifics that are needed to "personalize" the personal essay.

5) LIVELY, ENGAGING STYLE
Word choice:  vivid, precise, rich . . . Don't be a walking thesaurus, and I know you want to keep your own "voice," but stretch yourself a bit!!  Sound like you belong in college. :)  (But remember the specificity and details mentioned in #4; you can't just dress up flat writing with fancy words.)

Sentence style:  Remember that varied sentence length usually relies on varied complexity.  Try to balance complex and sophisticated syntax with simpler, incisive, memorable text.  Don't overthink this as you write your first draft, but keep it in mind as you revise.

Figurative language:  Effective use of occasional figurative language is an asset; strained effort or relying on cliches can backfire.  This is also an area to focus on between the first and second draft more than in the first draft.

IN CLASS TOMORROW
The finale of "The Chrysanthemums"!
Some Perrine overview info; "Elements of Fiction" pages assigned
Starter paragraph on the next story