CYCLE 11 - DAY 5 - SEMESTER 1 Exam Review; Day 1

For today, I asked you to prepare study notes for four of the stories, your choice. Though these notes do not yet need to be exhaustive, they should be substantive and indicate that you have given serious thought to the stories, using the double-sided exam review handout I gave you last week.

I then passed out a sample 12-sentence paragraph that we reviewed together. All groups noticed that the thesis statement was simply too long to be useful. Two groups rewrote the thesis to make a better one.

Here are a few samples, some better than others:
Look for how to streamline the words for clarity. This is great practice for the exam.

• Even though Fiver is physically unscathed, he has indeed sacrificed more, helplessly slipping into a death-like trance, having his own personal journey to the Black Rabbit of Inle, and losing the ability to connect with the warren.
• Although Fiver is unscathed in the battle, Bigwig rightly says Fiver suffers more than he because of Fiver’s death-like trance during the raid, the cold he experiences similar to El-ahrairah, and his inability to interact normally with the other members of the warren.
• Fiver mentally sacrifices more than Bigwig physically does because he follows in El-ahrairah’s footsteps by falling into a trance, meeting the Black Rabbit of Inle, and losing his ability to relate to others.
• Bigwig rightly says that Fiver sacrificed more mentally by sinking into his helpless trance which ends up having the same consequence as El-ahrairah’s visit to the Black Rabbit of Inle; he no longer relates to others and can’t function in the warren.

Then I broke you up into small groups. In your small groups, I asked you to do the following:

1. Identify a story (not Watership Down) that you all worked on.
2. Identify an interpretive question to be asked about that story.
3. Collectively create a thesis to answer that question.
4. Subject that thesis to the "five questions" test and refine it accordingly.
5. If time allowed, talk through the remainder of the 12-sentence paragraph.

REMEMBER: All thesis statements must: (memorize this for the exam)
· Be arguable
· Be based in the text
· Be focused
· Be provable with evidence from the text
· Must answer how or why

Your thesis statements. Subject these to the 5 standards every thesis must meet. Again, some are better than others here. Which ones need serious work? Which ones do the job but lack style? Which ones work well?

Why is the town in Rivera’s short story, “Zoo Island” called Zoo Island?
The town is called Zoo Island because the Hispanics living in it feel like (1)animals being observed in a zoo, (2) are isolated from nearby towns, and (3) they are living under the control of a farmer (much like a zookeeper).

Why does Sponono consistently behave badly?
Sponono’s continuous bad behavior is a consequence of his faulty definition of forgiveness, his unwillingness to change, and the principal’s tolerance of Sponono’s horrific behavior.

Is Miriam's age significant to the story?
Miriam’s young age influences Mrs. Miller to be manipulated, lenient, exploited, permissive, generous, unreasonably kind, entranced. (Pick 3)

Why does Sponono want to work in the garden?
Sponono wants to wants to work in the garden because it makes him feel important.
Gives him responsibility
Keeps him out of trouble
Allows him to be close to the principal, his father figure

What is the meaning of the name “Zoo Island?”
The name Zoo Island given to the community by Don Simon, symbolizes that the farm is separated from the rest of the world, is under the watchful eye of the “white people,” and keeps workers captive until a new job opens up elsewhere.

Is Miriam a figment of Mrs. Miller's imagination? Miriam, while different than Mrs. H.T. Miller, is indeed a figment of Mrs. Miller's imagination, a younger version of Mrs. Miller, because they have the same name, they both want the same things, and, cannot be found by anyone but Mrs. Miller. [This is saying that only Mrs. Miller can find Mrs. Miller, and there's something to that, if you take it on a deeper level, but that's not really what you meant here.]

HOMEWORK
Add another story to your study notes.
Review Unit 1 Vocabulary.
Bring your Junior Great Books and "The Village Watchman" short story to class tomorrow.

Tomorrow's activity: we will create a list of "essential quotes" for as many of the short stories as we can.