Students were asked to get out their Annotated Works Cited and we corrected them in class. Each student exchanged papers with a colleague. The instructor went over various items, such as the correct way to capitalize titles in MLA, whether underlining or italics were correctly formatted, whether there was a one-inch margin or not, and other various criteria. Students corrected the papers and returned them to their colleagues.
Next the instructor introduced Langan. She told students to make regular progress on the chapters and that she would record how many chapters had been done each week. She said students had to do the entire book by the end of the class.
We took a short break and then she distributed the written research paper assignment sheet. We read it in class and put notes on the accompanying table.
We worked with the thesis statement and looked to Lester for help with writing a thesis statement. The instructor advised that only a tentative working thesis was needed at this time. Later, she explained, students would have to introduce an original thesis statement. She explained ways students could add originality to their papers, citing an example of a student who worked at Merck and a student who did a paper about bats. Each of these students were able to bring in originality by observing their surroundings or making a field trip and interviewing experts.
The last item on the agenda was to go over the poetry assignment. Students were to bring criticism for their genre. The instructor recorded which students had this assignment.
The instructor pointed out the three poetry links on the Links section of the blog. She went through the assignment and showed students examples of the completed assignment. A few students kept the assignments and are returning them next week. Those students are: Kenia, Aruna, Diana, and Shalia.
Three students volunteered to have their poetry presentations for March 6: Jennifer, Kenia, and Humberto. These students should email their presentations to the instructor by March 4 so the instructor can photocopy them for the class the next day. Students can, of course, elect to make their own copies if they wish.
Next week:
Make corrections on Annotated Works Cited. Be sure summaries are written for each source (annotation). Bring two copies to class.
Continue to add sources to the Annotated Works Cited. This is part of the research process for the paper.
Do a chapter or two or three in Langan.
In Lester, read Ch's 1 & 2.
Work on the poetry assignment by a) reading the criticism, b) doing research on the genre, 3) locating a poem or mp3 reading of the poem.
