Good luck on the essay. It is unfortunate that the Internet was iffy this morning. I am not feeling well this evening, so we will not have class tomorrow. We will start Half the Sky Monday, March 5, 2012. For homework, find an article that speaks to the author's mission or plan for the book which is now a movement.

Write a short response, 250 words or a page. Post it here and respond to a student's post. Make sure you include their name.

I am looking forward to reading your work. Saturday is the Empowering Women of Color Conference at UC Berkeley in the Pauley Ballroom. There is a conversation with Angela Davis and another activist, Grace Lee Bog, Friday evening, March 2. The lecture is free, the conference nominal. For information visit https://ewocc.wordpress.com/workshops/ and for the Friday lecture https://ewocc.wordpress.com/grace-lee-boggs-and-angela-davis/

Essay 1 taking its theme from Mighty is due Thursday, March 1, before class. Bring the essay and all support documents electronically tomorrow so we can assemble the Essay Portfolio together. Pull all your related cyber-assignments from the blog and put them in a folder, along with the essay, the IPS, the outline, peer comments and essay with Microsoft Comment.

All essays are submitted this way. We spoke in class about revisions and how we preserve the history of the work chronologically, that is, the most recent essay is always on top and then we work our way backwards in the writing process.

The Order:

1. Final Draft of Essay

2. Initial Planning Sheet (IPS)

3. Outline

4. Peer Review Response to Discussion Questions

5. Peer Review using Microsoft Comment

6. Cyber Assignments connected to Mighty

7. They Say Assignments connected to Mighty

8. Freewrites if this applies, to Mighty

9. Reading Logs

Notes
Assembly Workshop

We will assemble the essay tomorrow in class. Bring all work in on a flash drive or via email or both.

Hopefully we will complete the assembly and send it off as well. If not, the essay is due by class Thursday morning. I will check off each students portfolio before you send it in tomorrow. Even if you haven't completed it, we can do a mock up with what you have completed up to that point, so bring it in electronically. NO PAPER COPIES except with reading logs, which I will accept this one time only.

I showed students an example of a portfolio on-line from another class.

Submission

Students are emailing their essay portfolio to me: coasabirenglish1A@gmail.com

Freewrite

How does Leymah throw away or give away her power? How does she get it back? Is she stronger or weaker for the exchange? What is the cost? (be detailed and specific).

1. Share drafts & planning

2. Homework -- finish essay. We meet here on Monday, Feb. 27.

Today in class we wrote an introductory paragraph together. We didn't finish. Its topic was courage. We started the assignment with an outline. I hope the activity was fruitful. Students were told to bring in at most an introduction, however, if you can finish the essay, bring that in--we realize it is a fast draft.

The more polished draft is due next week. I will explain what I mean by essay portfolio with examples in the morning. IPS is Initial Planning Sheet. It is a handout. Type your response to it.

Start looking for the book you plan to read on your own. Our next book is Half the Sky and then we will be working on the Social Entrepreneur Essay. The Book Report Essay is before the SE essay is due. The SE essay is the final essay for the class.

If you'd like to see assignments, do a search on the blog. I have taught Half the Sky before and the SE essay is a staple with me.

The Essay Assignment

Today students received 5 handouts. Bring in a completed Initial Planning Sheet and an outline to share.

We will look at writing the introduction tomorrow. The completed 3-4 page essay is due Thursday, Feb. 23 for a peer review. Final draft is due Feb. 27. We will meet in A-232. Bring the essay electronically.

Your notes from the book are also due with the paper. This and the paper are due Tuesday, Feb. 28.

You will submit the essay electronically as a portfolio which will include: the final draft, the peer review and draft, the IPS and outline, reading logs. The paper will be attached and pasted. We will practice this on Monday, Feb. 27. We will meet in A-232 on Feb. 28 as well to submit the essays. Bring everything electronically.

The essay is 3-4 pages, not including a works cited page. It is to be double spaced, 12 point font, 1 inch margins on all sides. Include a header justified left with the student's last name and page number, beginning on page 1.

There will be three (3) citations in the essay, 1 per page: a free paraphrase, shorter citation and a block quote.

The essay should be at least 90 percent original writing. The bibliography and/works cited should include: a book review, the film, and the memoir. Students do not have to find anymore sources, this is enough to write a great essay.

Cyber-Assignment Book Review Post

Students who posted their summaries without the citations, that is, short quote, free paraphrase and block quote (1 citation per paragraph), are okay.

If anyone did not post their work during class. Refer to the initial request and use citations.

Today in class we practiced citing a broadcast review and an online review using Hacker.

Homework

Homework is to think about what you'd like to explore in an essay about Leymah's tale. We will articulate this next week. I suggested students look at areas in Leymah's life like choices she made that she regrets. List them and then perhaps explore 1-3 of these.

Another potential area of exploration would be Leymah the mother and the personal sacrifices she made to "mother her nation."

One could look at Leymah as the flawed heroine and what that means when the goddess has feet of clay.

Leymah as a work in progress and what that means, re: how she learns from her mistakes and does better.

How is Leymah like her mother who teaches her through her inaction, not to stand up for herself in an absive domestic situation? She is a product of her environment.

Look at friendship as a theme and what this means for Leymah's survival.

Visit dianahacker.com/rules and start the exercises on Research. Register first and then start, if you haven't already. You will find the exercises helpful.

Cyber-Assignment

Post the 3-5 Essay Questions here which take their topics from Mighty.

Freewrite Cyber-Assignment

1. The Day After V-Day. Reflect on V-Day or the Day After and what comes up given Leymah's story. Eve Ensler is the playwright who started V-Day. See http://www.vday.org/about

2. Homework--Develop 3-5 essay questions re: Mighty. Post.

3. Bring in a published review of the book, Mighty, electronic is fine. Read the article before class. The article needs to have been written by a journalist or scholar. The New York Times is a good source, as well as Newsweek, Mother Jones, The Atlantic, New York Review of Books ( http://www.nybooks.com/ ), The LA Times, The San Francisco Chronicle, indymedia.org, Democracy Now!(a news magazine http://www.democracynow.org/) The Huffington Post (an on-line news source http://www.huffingtonpost.com/ )

This would be a great opportunity to use the COA library article database. Some of the sources above cost money to use, however, at the COA Library website, one can use these source free of charge on and off campus. All you need is the password and sign-in code. Get from the librarian if you missed the orientation.

The freewrite in the morning will be to write a three paragraph summary of the article using: 1. short citation, 2. a free paraphrase, 3. a block quote.

4. In groups students will write one part of a three part essay: thesis, antithesis, synthesis.

5. We will talk about the essay due in a couple of weeks and planning.

Cyber-Assignment

1. Read Hacker: Summarizing & Paraphrasing

2. Choose a section (a few paragraphs) in Mighty to summarize.

3. From the same section, chose 1 sentence and write both a 1. Literal and 2. Free paraphrase. Use the same sentence for both.

Post here.


Homework:

Continue reading and doing exercises in Hacker: Rules for Writers. Editions 5, 6, and 7 are fine. See below for sections. Also, visit the website: dianahacker.com/rules

Bring Diana Hacker, Rules for Writers to class in the morning.

Today in class we practiced citing using: a block quote, a short in-text citation and a free paraphrase.

Post the work here. It will lose its formatting (smile).

Homework is to complete the book. Tomorrow we will continue practicing citing using introductory remarks to give the citation context. Students can use the same arguments used today.

As I wandered through the class and read student work, I noticed that some citations had nothing to do directly with the signal phrase. The signal phrase gives readers the back story and lets us know what is coming.

The way one knows when to use a quote is when the writer says it a lot better than we could say it. A good citation is a powerful tool in writing.

For those who have Hacker look at the section: Research Guide: 50b Keep track of source materials (5th Edition 397), 50c Summarizing without plagiarizing (398-400), 52 Avoiding plagiarizing (402), 52a Cite quotations and borrowed ideas. (403-404), 52b Enclose borrowed language in quotation marks (404), 52c Put summaries and paraphrases in your own words (405), 53 Integrating Sources (406-413); 54 Documenting Sources (413-422).

Look at exercises at: dianahacker.com/rules and click on: Electronic Research Exercises -- E-ex 54-1 through 54-3 (422)

Homework for the weekend is to complete the book: Mighty. Students have until Wednesday, but those who finish the book will sit together in the class. I apologize to those students who couldn't find us yesterday. There were handouts. Ask me for them. If you want a review of what the librarian said come to my office hour or ask me next Thursday.

Today in class we also practiced locating evidence for an argument: Though Leymah was weak, she gained power from helping those who were weaker still.

We started out by stating that we'd have to define what we mean by "weak" and located numerous examples from the text in the following categories:

Types of Weakness defined:

1. emotional/psychological: 85 definition

2. physical 52

3. entrapment 41

I also shared with students three categories of argument: claims of value, claims of fact and claims of policy. Most arguments fit one of these types.

Next week we will practice using signal phrases, paraphrasing and block quotes. The reading logs are not due until students turn in their essays.

They Say Templates re: Starting with Others Are Saying (23-28)

In groups students chose one of the rhetorical moves to respond to. First fill in the blanks and then develop your own moves per the model.

Post here.

Cyber Assignment 1

Post your arguments re: Mighty.

Today we had a library orientation with Professor Steve Gerstle. Write a brief response to the orientation (250 words min.). Note what your learned about libraries and research. What was new information and what reinforced previous knowledge?

Talk about the library databases online and your experience using them.

Talk about how you plan to utilize the COA Library and Library Services. Have you ever used the library databases off campus?

Today we reviewed They Say (19) and shared responses orally on the chapter and what each of us annotated.

Homework is to complete Exercise 2 (41), post and bring a copy to class to hand in. I'd like students to post the They Say, I Say, assignments and give me a copy to check off and where appropriate comment.

Give me copies of the previous They Say exercises as well. Students can bundle them and turn in on Thursday when we meet in A-232. I only want They Say exercises, not all cyber-assignments.

Post Exercise 2 (41) , here. The article referenced is in the section of the book called "readings."

Students also shared their arguments with each other and their answers to Exercise 1 (40). We will share the answers to Exercise 2 on Thursday, Feb. 9 (Kathleen's birthday).

Read Section 2 in Mighty. We will probably complete the book next week. Start thinking about essay topics and questions you'd like to explore. I often let students articulate their essay questions; however, I ask the class for input.

Next week we will practice identifying and using signal phrases. We will also practice using block quotes, free paraphrases and shorter citations.

Essay plans will be due February 21 (handout), outline February 22, fast draft February 23, polished draft Feb. 27.

Cyber-Assignments

Post the in-class summaries on Leymah Gbowee and the counter argument to her belief. Make sure if you worked as a group to list all the names of the writers in the heading.

Homework is the complete Exercise 1 (40). Post and bring to class to share.

Tomorrow we will share arguments and practice integrating citations: paraphrases, direct citations and longer quotes into the prose.

If your group didn't finish, you can complete the assignment tomorrow in class.

Recap of homework for the weekend. I apologize for the confusion.

Homework is to read up to and including Chapter 10 in Mighty. Make a list of 5 arguments from the reading up to this point. Bring into share.

Her arguments cover a wide variety of topics such as domestic violence, empowered women, relationships: parent and child, adults, siblings, education, war, poverty. . . . An example of an argument which is implied, not stated is:

1. Leymah shows her audience that one can be brave and weak at the same time.

Another argument on the same topic: Weakness

2. Many of the more powerful actions in Leymah's peace movement come from those society calls weak, so weakness can be a source of strength.

More Reading

The other assignment is to read They Say Part 1 (19-51). We will do the exercises next week. We didn't get a chance to talk about Exercises 1 & 2 (28-29). We will do this next week as well.

Library Orientation

We have a library orientation Wednesday, Feb. 8 at 9 AM. We will meet in the Library not the classroom.

Today in class we completed the freewrite from yesterday that I posted too late. Many of you were probably asleep. Homework is already posted.

We talked about the image of war that Leymah paints with her pen and person. Now that you have seen the video, think about the Leymah there, versus the Leymah we meet in Mighty.

We talked about how vulnerable women are, even super women like Leymah to violence in war, the war in some homes and the war in the streets. How terrible when the war at home is worse than the war in the streets.

We spoke of predators and victims and laughingly recalled the back stories for Superman, The Incredibles and the family in the film Sky High-where a child of super hero parents didn't seem to have super powers. I love the Batman Begins movie for that reason. Batman is a human being who has learned to channel and capitalize on his innate capacity for greatness. I think Leyman does the same.

Announcements
1. Daisy Bates: First Lady of Little Rock premieres nationally on ITVS Channel 9, 10 p.m. (check the local listings)

2. 22nd Annual African American Celebration through Poetry is Saturday, Feb. 4, at the West Oakland Branch Library, 1801 Adeline Street, Oakland, CA (510) 238-7352. It is free and open to the public. The theme is great black women. There is an open mic at the end of the featured program.

3. Classmate Keith has a radio show: www.asfanradio.com, facebook.com/asfanradio, www.twitter.com/asfanradio, www.ustream.tv/channel/a-s-fan-radio

The show broadcasts ever other Thursday, Feb. 2, 2012, 8-10 p.m. (October-February). When A's Spring Training happens the show broadcasts every Thursday March-October.

Cyber-Assignment: Reflection on Discussion Groups

Homework this evening is to reflect on the Literature Circle Discussion format: How does the dialectic process help students go deeper into the material? How has this process affected how you approach written material? Why is this dialogue necessary to true understanding whether the discourse is with a group of classmates or with with pen in hand--the conversation taking place as one reads actively?

What worked well today . . . yesterday? What didn't? What needs to change to make the process work better next time?

Homework for the weekend is already posted below.