This week was crazy. To be completely honest, I was pretty distracted this whole week in my classes due to it being homecoming week. I didn't get home until 8 or later all week because of float building, mock rock practices, and other homecoming festivities. I was sleep deprived and anxious for the events of the weekend, but I still made it though and found a way to get some learning in there too!! At the very beginning of the week, we presented our thoughts about the paintings we analyzed. It was interesting to see what everybody had to say about the paintings they chose, especially hearing the reason that each group was drawn to the painting they chose. Listening to the presentations really reflected the theme of how art tells stories. The rest of the week, we really focused on two things- looking for elements of fiction in literature, and revising our creative writing. Personally, I didn't get very far into analyzing the short story I'm reading for the element of fiction I chose, so I focused a lot on revising my creative writing. I decided which piece I wanted to revise based on what felt the most important to me, and I spent a good amount of time writing about why I chose that piece to revise as opposed to actually revising it. I also found this website that had a lot of helpful tips about revising papers that I will more than likely use for reference throughout this year. Thank you, internet!
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This week seemed like it flew by, but in that short amount of time, I felt that I learned a lot about art and poetry. I'd like to start by saying initially the poem we analyzed this week, Elegy in X Parts, made me feel somewhat upset and a little uncomfortable. Suicide is a very sensitive topic for me to discuss and hear about, and although it should not be a topic that is taken lightly, I feel as though often people talk about it jokingly or in a light manner, which bothers me. Besides that, I found the poem to be very interesting. I really enjoy analyzing poems and finding more meaning for them. I learned that the fragmented structure Rasmussen used was intentional to give the poem a more fragmented attitude. It painted a clear picture in my head of what it would feel like to lose someone to suicide; to be left with a racing mind and regrets of what you should've done but didn't know you had to do. I also really enjoyed watching the TED talk about art telling stories. The woman delivering the talk was so enthusiastic about art and it made me really happy. I thought that her imagination was really beautiful to come up with such creative stoies about somewhat simple paintings that caught her eye for just a little longer than usual. A quote that resonated really well with me was "Our DNA tells us to tell stories." I reflected on that quote for quite a while because basically all I talk about all day is like telling a story- whether it be a funny moment that happened earlier in the day or something simple like what I had for breakfast, it's still really a story. Our whole lives revolve around stories, which is why literature is such an important tool to connect to other people. I'm excited for the upcoming week to move on to new things (even though I enjoyed the poem of the week, discussing it every single day kind of made me want to do something else) and for all the homecoming excitement! I'm wearing footie pajamas to school tomorrow with no shame!! Woo! This week was a little wild, even though I feel like every week during the beginning of the year is wild. I found out that I'm on Homecoming Court, I may or may not have patellar tendinitis and haven't run many practices this week, and I learned some neat stuff in AP Lit!! Here are those things: When discussing what we learned this week, someone wrote on the board, "how to properly put out grease fires." This was a helpful fact to learn for future reference (always good to know some kitchen safety tips!), but at the same time it doesn't really have to do with AP Lit--or does it? Putting out a grease fire could viewed in a more metaphorical way as dealing with a stressful situation. Approaching a situation in a different way (like how you DON'T use water to put out a grease fire like you would to put out a regular fire) can often lead to a better solution. On the opposite side of the temperature spectrum, we also discussed literature using an iceberg as a visual metaphor. We can look at stories just as they're given to us, but understanding literary concepts and diving deeper into the meaning of the story will give us an even greater understanding of the bigger picture as opposed to just the tip of the iceberg. We created some of our own visual metaphors to dive deeper into our summer reading books as well- my group created a puzzle based off of the quote from HTRLLAP abut "puzzling readers" and added symbols to represent the chapter "Is That a Symbol?" I really enjoyed walking around the room and looking at how other groups represented their chapters visually. I found an acrticle about another topic we discussed, which was stories versus literature and what sets them apart. www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/21/literary-novels-_n_3790198.html Well, I'm at a loss for ideas on how to wrap this up, so I will just close by saying it is ridiculously hot outside, my laptop is burning my legs, and I'm sweating. Thanks for listening. Well, this week went pretty well, but getting back into the swing of things has ben extraordinarily hard for me this year. I'm not sure if has to do with being a senior and everything around me is changing, adjusting to a new schedule as well as working at school, or trying to re-learn how to balance school work, sports, family, and friends who are now in college and having completely new (and frankly, super interesting and exciting) experiences. I am also writing this in the middle of the night; not because I forgot about it, but because I was taking kind of an emotional break which led to me putting off all work.
Yikes, it looks like I need to pull myself together ASAP. So, even though at the time it may have felt like I didn't really learn a lot this week, there were actually a lot of new things I learned. The first, for example, was to write in the third person for the "myself as a reader/writer" section of my weebly page. It felt sort of uncomfortable at first, but when it was explained that it was supposed to be kind of like an "about the author" section that you'd find in the back of a book, it all made so much more sense! It'll definitely take some getting used to, but I think I can learn to roll with it. Also I am unsure if I'm supposed to be writing these blog posts in the third person as well, but hopefully not because I am continuing to write this from my point of view, but I will correct the mistake next week if I need to. I also learned that I am more capable of being a better reader than I thought I was. We talked about our reading rates- mine was not very big, but it was enough to convince me that I really could finish a book in less time than I thought it would take me. Also, reading only 20 minutes a day doesn't seem that bad at all. Even with my crazy schedule, I can TOTALLY replace 20 minutes of Twitter time with 20 minutes of AP Lit reading time (which is definitely a better thing for me, hands down). I really enjoy reading but I never take the time to do it, so hopefully breaking it into smaller chunks like this will help me a lot more with the motivation aspect! I'm glad I learned this tool. Now, since these posts were explained very briefly after the bell had already rung on Friday, I don't remember if there was another aspect to this blog, so I'm going to improvise on this first one and add in some goals for the upcoming week. First of all, I really don't want to be up this late again this week, or any week for that matter. This is an important week for me cross country-wise as well, so I am setting the goal of going to bed at 10 for the rest of the week. Next, I really want to get back to nomal and adjust with my new schedule. School, practice, shower, homework, sleep. That can't be too hard now, can it? I just really would love to be able to get my stuff done on time. I definitely do not want to fall into the bad habit I had last year with APUSH and saving all of my homework until the end of the week before test day. BAD IDEA!!! Well, to wrap this up, I think there was also a component about adding a photo but I also do not remember what the criteria for said picture was. So, here is a picture of one of the cute, encouraging sticky notes that I found hanging around the school this week. I appreciated their cute little wisdoms and encouragements. So, here's to 265 more days of senior year that I hope will be filled with a lot of learning, reading, joy, and growth (and hopefully less writing blog posts in the middle of the night). :-) |
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