The Professor and the Madman

James Murray ("The Professor") and William Chester Minor ("The Madman")

The Oxford English Dictionary is just one of those things, like The Bible, that has always been around. No one stops to think about where it acme from, who the person who wrote it actually was, etc. I don't know if it is just me, but I never realized that it was created with the help of contributors. I guess now that I look back, I realize that thinking one man literally came up with every single definition all by himself is a bit crazy.

However, who would have thought that the title of this book was actually true!? It gives me a whole new appreciation for the dictionary, realizing that a lot of the dictionary that everyone so often takes from granted, was originally created with the help of a crazy murderer. It really makes me stop and think how odd it is that some of the worst people are geniuses when it comes to other things. He was insane, murdered people, yet was unbelievably gifted when it comes to the written language.

Image Grammar

My favorite part of Harry Noden's Image Grammar is the section on parallel structure. Noden titles this chapter, 3, "The Artist's Rhythms." He talks about how you must "listen for the beat" (50). He writes that the "structures give prose a musical quality that adds emphasis and sound to central images" (50). I'm really interested in ways to incorporate music into the Language Arts classroom. During my 10-day unit, I used music to teach rhyme scheme, similarities between poetry back in the day and current music, the difference between tone and mood, and so on. I was actually a bit disappointed in myself for failing to see how grammar could be mixed with music in the classroom. This is one of the very first times I have heard of a non-lame way to teach parallel structure. Haha

On the next page, he talks about the rhythm of repetition. He shows an example from a letter that repeats the same phrase over and over, creating "an echo, a trancelike refrain" (51) This letter was most likely unintentionally using literal repetition. However, then he goes on to refer to Edgar Allen Poe's "The Tell-Tale Heart" and how he repeatedly wrote "but the noise steadily increased" (51).

Noden continues on a few pages later to talk about the music and rhythms in political rhetoric. I took a rhetoric class last year and so I recognized the examples he cited, such as J.F.K.'s Inaugural Address. He writes that these speeches can serve as the best examples of parallel structure in the classroom, and that their rhythms "create the illusion of profundity" (59). I'm not into politics at all, but this actually made me look forward to the possibility of teaching a speech class!

Modern Library Writer's Workshop: Chapter 7

I really liked chapter 7 in Modern Library Writer's Workshop on "Working and Reworking." First, I like that he mentions that there should be as many drafts as are needed when writing. It's something that should be emphasized to students. Many students are taught that one first draft is necessary, peer-editing or editing of some sort should take place, and then they should create a final draft and hand it in for a grade. In this case, students who may not get a good grade after that one first draft and revision are going to begin to think they are poor writers. If we as teachers emphasize that there should be multiple drafts that just keep happening until the piece of writing is what they want it to be, students may realize that there are not just innately "good" writers, and that it takes everyone practice and perseverance. If it's not great the first time, or the second, or the third, just keep writing until it is!

I also loved his "10-percent solution." Koch recalls that Fred Astaire told a young film-maker, "Make it as good as you can. Then cut ten minutes." (174) That really is such great advice that would not occur to me as a perfect way to teach students to cut "wordiness" and redundant points, etc. This ensures that everything is concise and that everything that is in the paper, story, whatever it may be, really is necessary and adds to the piece -- not just makes it the required length assigned.

"Hungry Minds"

The really, really enjoyed the article "Hungry Minds." You always read about all of the different programs done to help out the homeless, but none really seem worth any while to me except the physical fitness ones, where men or women have started running clubs for the homeless. And now, this one, as well. There are so many options for those who are seeking an education. They could go to the library, where all the knowledge they could ever desire is at their hands for free, to educate themselves. Learning to write well, and having an avenue to share that writing and gain insight and praise for it, cannot be found from books. A writing workshop seems like such a fantastic way to help these people out by improving their writing skills, improving their moods, and creating a network of support.

My absolute favorite quote from this article was on the final page:
"The alchemy of writing gives everybody who’s been in the workshop an extra dimension: along with possessing a name and a face, each is also the particular person who wrote whatever. Somehow, writing even a few lines makes the person who does it more substantial and real. In geometric terms, it’s like the difference between being a point and being a plane."
They share this writing at the end with all the parishioners or people from other writing group, and hearing these homeless men and women must have such a profound effect on them. It turns a person who we usually see as a statistic or a stereotype into a real person with stories and hopes and grief and loss.



I'm going to hold onto this article. It seems like it could even possibly be a good way to inspire future students to write by making them see what a great way it is to share your story.

Writer's Workshop: Chapter 4, Characterization

I really enjoyed the activity we did on class this past Monday with the puppets. Each student wrote a short 2-3 sentence story about a puppet they had picked from a bag at random, and then we passed them around and reviewed them based on plot alone. Then each group picked one that they felt was the best and created a skit for it that they presented to the class. My character was Olive Oyl and I had written a short story about how Olive Oyl and Popeye had gotten into a fight because he spends all of his money on spinach and never buys her a new dress, and our group decided that would be an interesting one to make a skit about.

This activity would be such a great way to teach plot and characterization in a classroom. It was also interesting because the next day in my Health and Learning class we were exchanging lesson ideas and adapting them to whichever concentration we are in. A girl who is studying Deaf Education presented a very similar idea because apparently students who are hard of hearing have trouble with reading comprehension, so when things are acted out they become much clearer to them. In Kist's class we tied this activity into Chapter 4 of Modern Library's Writer's Workshop. Stephen Koch writes that characterization is all about the little things, not the big things, that the characters do. The car chases are less important than the everyday actions they do that make the characters easily related to by to their readers.

The author writes that Edith Wharton, who says there is a big difference between "novels of situation" and "novels of characters and manner." The author elaborates on that point, explaining that in the first the characters are created after the situation, while in the second, the events come after the development of the characters. The example he sites as a "novel of character and manner" is The Catcher in the Rye and Holden Caulfield. I have read that novel and remember relating to it so well. I loved Holden's character, and the reason that novel continues to be such an undeniably great piece of writing is because of Holden. I only hope to be able to teach The Catcher in the Rye to my students in the future.

Preparing for my Unit and Pleasure Reading

As I'm forming my ideas and lessons for the 10-day unit I'm going to be teaching beginning November 1st, I'm really starting realize how beneficial the activities we have done in Dr. Kist's and Dr. Pytash's classes are. I'm taking so many ideas from the things we have done in those classes.

I'm teaching my unit on poetry, with an emphasis on Emily Dickinson and Walt Whitman. I've got most of my ideas planned out, but a major concern of mine is what to do if I have allotted too much time for a certain lesson. I wanted to come up with an idea for what to do at the end of class with extra time. When Dr. Kist brought all those notebooks to class and said they were 15 cents at Walmart, I went out and bought a bunch of them. I'm really glad I did now because I decided that I'm going to paste a different Whitman or Dickinson poem in each of them. If there is extra time at the end of the period, I'll pass them out and have the students reply to the poem, or reply to the post of the person who wrote in that notebook prior to them, like we do with our random topic journals at the end of Teaching Literature and Composition most weeks. I won't assign a large grade to it, but it will at least keep the students busy until the end of the period and hopefully strengthen their analysis skills.

I also want to mention that Dr. Pytash really inspired me to begin reading more young adult fiction. First, that class encouraged me to read the Twilight Saga, which I had been given for Christmas, but had been reluctant to read. I loved it, of course. When we had our final assignment at the end of the semester, one of our options was to read a series and write papers on it. I chose to read the Uglies series, and of course, again fell in love with it. I had forgotten how relaxing and stress-relieving it could be to read something for fun rather than because you HAVE to. So this semester, when a professor assigned a Chris Crutcher novel, Staying Fat for Sarah Byrnes, I was psyched to have an excuse to read a pleasure novel as homework. We didn't have to have it read until November some time, but I was so excited, I decided just to read it the second week of the semester. It's so refreshing after the challenging texts I feel like I am always reading for my college courses.

Recitation and Report

I found it really interesting on page 64 how Barbara Finkelstein was only able to find three sorts of teachers in the 1880's: "Intellectual overseer", "Drillmaster", and "Interpreter of Culture." The first one made students memorize material and then punished them for errors. The second one led their students through their lessons in unison. The last one, which it was mentioned she found hardly any of, explained ideas and material. The last one still does not even sound that great to me. It's sad that most students were taught either by being forced to memorize things or by being led in recitation. How boring and pointless!

On page 69, the author talked about how teachers sorted their students by race, gender, class, achievement, etc. All of the things they chose to sort students by are things we would never even think of doing to our students today. The author said that this helped contribute to social inequalities. However, that part does seem sort of relevant to today. There are so many studies that talk about how minorities and those who are economically disadvantaged do worse in school, but many teachers/districts do nothing to help this because they listen to these studies and thus, expect less from those students, as well as fail to challenge them. When no one believes in these supposedly academically disinclined students, why should they believe in themselves?

Only the most wealthy, usually white and male, students made it to graduation because they were the ones with families that could afford the materials and services necessary for the students to excel in school. That just seems so unfair. But again, it's not so far off. Our schools today are punished financially for not excelling on standardized tests, taking away funding. How is less funding supposed to help these students in already disadvantaged districts to do better in school? My first instinct reading these things was to be shocked, but then I really thought about it and some of it seems too familiar. It's not as serious and drastic as it was then, but we do still have a weird race/wealth/success cycle going.