We also went through critical lenses. That section was more confusing and complicated than any book we've read so far but I suppose it had to be done. How much of it I remember come exam time is a hazy question. If the quiz we took was any indication of my learning ability, we're looking at a weak 2 on this AP test.
Next, Fifth Business. I know a lot of people I talked to about it enjoyed it, and I can see why but I don't feel the same. It wa an interesting book and it offered some surprising ideas. The fact that it was an actual novel and not a play or poem was also a nice reprieve but I didn't find it as profound or though-provoking as others. Maybe I'm looking at it all wrong or maybe we just have different opinions. It was and is bearable but I really hope Ms. Holmes points at some big Ah-Ha! that makes this book more thoughtful to me.
These blogs continue, weekly and I think when I do them they help. Open Prompts are starting to come more naturally and flow more smoothly and Closed Prompts are also becoming less of a pain. I absolutely do not consider myself prepared for the AP exam but I'm sure by the time it rolls around there will be a little mre confidence somewhere.
Jason, You make it seemed like you hated every minute of having anything to do with Frankenstein. Besides the writing style, you do enjoy the discussion the writing dos bring out, right? I mean we talked about Life, death, playing God, responsibility, and guilt. That is probably why it took so long to discuss Frankenstein.
ReplyDeleteCritical Lenses is not about just learning about the different techniques and just be done with it. The purpose is to apply it to the different readings we do. It helps us analyze the writing and helps with going deeper in a piece.
I see what you mean when you talk about how it was a a profound piece. In other works, we had that moment where Ms. Holmes would tell us something that would make us go, "Oh my, I never would have thought about that in a million years". For instance, when we read the American Dream, it was the moment when we learned how Grandma may have hired the American Dream to kill everyone, which was absolutely mind blowing.
Overall nice job Jason!
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ReplyDeleteI can't really blame Mary Shelley for her writing style given she published frankenstein in the early 19th century, but I concur that this was also not my favorite book. What else didn't you like about it? Specifically what about it compared to other books you have read? Is it just because you found it hard to connect with the the themes of an older book, or could you just not surpass the language?
ReplyDeleteWe talked also about literary eras. What are your opinions on those? I,e, favorites, least favorites etc.
I thought fifth business was an interesting character analysis. Perhaps it's purpose was to function more as a means of psychological characterization than a profound social commentary like The American Dream or something, I dunno. I enjoyed discussing the characters. I found them incredibly interesting especially when we paired them with their archetypes.
What do you think you need to work on the most to get ready for the ap exam?
Jason,
ReplyDeleteYou do a good job of acknowledging everything we have done in class so far from AP practice to works of literature. You start to discuss whether you enjoy something and almost accomplish going into specifics to help demonstrate reprocessing, but you never got quite far enough. For example, how was the critical lenses unit confusing? What kind of surprises did Fifth Business contain?