Sunday, 21 March 2010
Saturday, 20 March 2010
Capello's Team Talk
Fabio Capello has clearly expressed his dissatisfaction at the conduct of certain members of the England squad... here's what he had to say as captured live on candid camera!!
Post your thoughts/ attempts to transcribe the clips...
Members of my class are expected to transcribe their one of the performances in its entirity as well as writing an overview of its C.A.P. (in 250 words) which is due in Thursday's lesson.
Post your thoughts/ attempts to transcribe the clips...
Members of my class are expected to transcribe their one of the performances in its entirity as well as writing an overview of its C.A.P. (in 250 words) which is due in Thursday's lesson.
Wednesday, 3 March 2010
Extension for Essay Excellence!
Do your conclusions lack coherence? Do your quotes stick out like a sore thumb? Do you find planning a pain?
Well, why not try MR KNIGHT'S ESSAY SKILLS EXTENSION?!
That's right folks: starting from tomorrow, Thursday 4th March, I will be running an afterschool extension class focussing on ESSAY SKILLS. I will be focussing particularly on ELLA2B and how we can write essays analysing representations of speech in literature, but these classes (which should hopefully be quite light hearted as we're all in need of a bit of a laugh at the end of the day) will be helpful for every essay you ever write thanks to the emphasis on skills ahead of content.
The classes will take place every Thursday after school and run from 3:15-4:15pm. They will be held in Room S07 (First Floor in New Sixth Form Building) and are OPEN TO EVERYONE on the course. So come along, bring a friend, and prepare to pick up some MAD SKILLS (as I believe the young people say)!
Well, why not try MR KNIGHT'S ESSAY SKILLS EXTENSION?!
That's right folks: starting from tomorrow, Thursday 4th March, I will be running an afterschool extension class focussing on ESSAY SKILLS. I will be focussing particularly on ELLA2B and how we can write essays analysing representations of speech in literature, but these classes (which should hopefully be quite light hearted as we're all in need of a bit of a laugh at the end of the day) will be helpful for every essay you ever write thanks to the emphasis on skills ahead of content.
The classes will take place every Thursday after school and run from 3:15-4:15pm. They will be held in Room S07 (First Floor in New Sixth Form Building) and are OPEN TO EVERYONE on the course. So come along, bring a friend, and prepare to pick up some MAD SKILLS (as I believe the young people say)!
Saturday, 23 January 2010
Tech-knowledge-y for Teaching Othello
I'm currently away for two weeks but that doesn't stop me doing a bit of teaching on Othello, thanks to the twin wonders of my own carefully crafted worksheets and the miraculous internet. Not only can I keep in touch thanks to this beautiful blog, but there are also a fair few resources available online to help with the study.
For starters, there are plenty of online versions of the entire text of the play. A good place to start would be this version I found on Project Gutenberg (a fantastic site featuring thousands of online texts for free, provided they are out of copyright). This is especially helpful as you can search for all the occurences of a particular word (such as "black") and see all the different contexts it is used in and which characters use it.
But hey, somebody's already beaten us to that as there's also this concordance for all of Shakespeare's works (though you can search by individual play and even by character as well). A concordance counts up and brings together all usages of individual words in a particular piece of writing and is a great way to look at which words are important in a particular character's idiolect.
Finally, there's also Sparknotes' No Fear Shakespeare series which provides a "modern translation" of the entire play which you can look at side by side with the original. Now, this is great for understanding what the hell is going on in the play if you're struggling with a particularly knotty bit of Shakespearean language, but it is far from perfect and does not give an accurate presentation of how the characters really speak to each other, which, after all is what we should be focussing on for ELLA2. However, carefully considering these shortcomings could be an excellent way to start thinking specifically about representations of speech. If the translation doesn't give the full force of Shakespeare's original, what is it exactly about the original that has such power?
On a slightly different note, I thought this article from today's Guardian might be of interest either for our thoughts about Achebe or just for general interest considering the terrible recent developments in Nigeria.
That's all for now, and I look forward to some enlightened Othello discussion when I return.
For starters, there are plenty of online versions of the entire text of the play. A good place to start would be this version I found on Project Gutenberg (a fantastic site featuring thousands of online texts for free, provided they are out of copyright). This is especially helpful as you can search for all the occurences of a particular word (such as "black") and see all the different contexts it is used in and which characters use it.
But hey, somebody's already beaten us to that as there's also this concordance for all of Shakespeare's works (though you can search by individual play and even by character as well). A concordance counts up and brings together all usages of individual words in a particular piece of writing and is a great way to look at which words are important in a particular character's idiolect.
Finally, there's also Sparknotes' No Fear Shakespeare series which provides a "modern translation" of the entire play which you can look at side by side with the original. Now, this is great for understanding what the hell is going on in the play if you're struggling with a particularly knotty bit of Shakespearean language, but it is far from perfect and does not give an accurate presentation of how the characters really speak to each other, which, after all is what we should be focussing on for ELLA2. However, carefully considering these shortcomings could be an excellent way to start thinking specifically about representations of speech. If the translation doesn't give the full force of Shakespeare's original, what is it exactly about the original that has such power?
On a slightly different note, I thought this article from today's Guardian might be of interest either for our thoughts about Achebe or just for general interest considering the terrible recent developments in Nigeria.
That's all for now, and I look forward to some enlightened Othello discussion when I return.
Thursday, 3 December 2009
Friday, 20 November 2009
“Deliberate cruelty is not forgivable” (Setting H/W does not come under this heading btw!!)
Scene 10- The Real Climax
HERE ARE THE NOTES THAT YOU NEED TO ADD TO YOUR COPIES OF THE PLAY AS HOMEWORK... THIS IS NOT AN EXHAUSTIVE LIST SO OBVIOUSLY ADD YOUR OWN ANNOTATIONS AS WELL!!
OH AND DONT FORGET TO REVISE FOR THE NEXT GLOSSARY QUIZ ON MONDAY 23rd NOV.
LEXIS
STAGE DIRECTIONS: Scenes 7-10 all take place on the evening of Blanche’s birthday; progressively later (chronological = naturalistic theatre)
Blanche is described as being in ‘a mood of hysterical exhilaration’ at the outset of the scene; this is an explicit indication of the climactic scene which is about to ensue
“Spectral” (relating to a ghost; apparition); BLANCHE’s sanity is called into question once more (cohesion- Scene 9- “I don’t want realism”)
GRAMMAR
BLANCHE’s grammar breaks down in the middle of the scene: “But I have been foolish- casting my pearls before swine!”
The repetition “Oh” is as though BLANCHE is responding to physical blows (cohesion- scene 1?) as STANLEY’s declarative utterances undo her pretentions
Once again (cohesion) there is clear antithesis between the two character’s lexicon:
STANLEY is predominantly colloquial (“Huh?” “Yep”)
BLANCHE elevated register (“beau”, “Biscay boulevard” and “gentleman” “cultivated”)
PHONOLOGY
Opening STAGE DIRECTIONS: BLANCHE is described using sibilance “somewhat spoiled... Scuffed silver slippers” ; antithesis calming sound which contrasts with Blanche’s agitated state
Ambiguity: STANLEY:“Uh-huh” and BLANCHE: “Oh” the sheer contrast between the two is made evident by these phatic utterances
Ellison: STANLEY “You left th’ phone of th’ hook”
DISCOURSE STRUCTURE
Despite BLANCHE’s bizarre monologue, her duologue with STANLEY is suprisingly regular at first; characterised by completed adjacency pairs; STANLEY is in a cooperative mood due to imminent arrival of his child (“amiably” “happily”- SD’s)
BLANCHE begins to break adjacency pairs as STANLEY undresses; impinging on her personal space (“...privacy”); signal to the audience that theirs is still a fractious relationship
HERE ARE THE NOTES THAT YOU NEED TO ADD TO YOUR COPIES OF THE PLAY AS HOMEWORK... THIS IS NOT AN EXHAUSTIVE LIST SO OBVIOUSLY ADD YOUR OWN ANNOTATIONS AS WELL!!
OH AND DONT FORGET TO REVISE FOR THE NEXT GLOSSARY QUIZ ON MONDAY 23rd NOV.
LEXIS
STAGE DIRECTIONS: Scenes 7-10 all take place on the evening of Blanche’s birthday; progressively later (chronological = naturalistic theatre)
Blanche is described as being in ‘a mood of hysterical exhilaration’ at the outset of the scene; this is an explicit indication of the climactic scene which is about to ensue
“Spectral” (relating to a ghost; apparition); BLANCHE’s sanity is called into question once more (cohesion- Scene 9- “I don’t want realism”)
GRAMMAR
BLANCHE’s grammar breaks down in the middle of the scene: “But I have been foolish- casting my pearls before swine!”
The repetition “Oh” is as though BLANCHE is responding to physical blows (cohesion- scene 1?) as STANLEY’s declarative utterances undo her pretentions
Once again (cohesion) there is clear antithesis between the two character’s lexicon:
STANLEY is predominantly colloquial (“Huh?” “Yep”)
BLANCHE elevated register (“beau”, “Biscay boulevard” and “gentleman” “cultivated”)
PHONOLOGY
Opening STAGE DIRECTIONS: BLANCHE is described using sibilance “somewhat spoiled... Scuffed silver slippers” ; antithesis calming sound which contrasts with Blanche’s agitated state
Ambiguity: STANLEY:“Uh-huh” and BLANCHE: “Oh” the sheer contrast between the two is made evident by these phatic utterances
Ellison: STANLEY “You left th’ phone of th’ hook”
DISCOURSE STRUCTURE
Despite BLANCHE’s bizarre monologue, her duologue with STANLEY is suprisingly regular at first; characterised by completed adjacency pairs; STANLEY is in a cooperative mood due to imminent arrival of his child (“amiably” “happily”- SD’s)
BLANCHE begins to break adjacency pairs as STANLEY undresses; impinging on her personal space (“...privacy”); signal to the audience that theirs is still a fractious relationship
Wednesday, 4 November 2009
Mr Knight's set - homework. (And handy jpegs of the glossary)
Just to clarify...
Homework this week on Things Fall Apart is to re-read Chapters 12 and 13, looking for interesting language features, and write SEVEN sentences explaining how Achebe uses SEVEN DIFFERENT linguistic techniques to affect the reader (and specifying what the effect on the reader is). If you cannot find seven features you would like to comment on in those chapters, look back further in the book.
You should use the Glossary of linguistic terms which Mrs Metsaranta gave you a photocopy of to help with identifying techniques. Below are scans of the glossary in a nice high res so you can download them if you're feeling particularly technologically inclined (which I'm not - hence my attempts to edit html ending in these strangely alligned images.)
Homework this week on Things Fall Apart is to re-read Chapters 12 and 13, looking for interesting language features, and write SEVEN sentences explaining how Achebe uses SEVEN DIFFERENT linguistic techniques to affect the reader (and specifying what the effect on the reader is). If you cannot find seven features you would like to comment on in those chapters, look back further in the book.
You should use the Glossary of linguistic terms which Mrs Metsaranta gave you a photocopy of to help with identifying techniques. Below are scans of the glossary in a nice high res so you can download them if you're feeling particularly technologically inclined (which I'm not - hence my attempts to edit html ending in these strangely alligned images.)
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