Fitzgerald, ''Bernice Bobs Her Hair'' (online)

The full text of this out-of-copyright story by F. Scott Fitzgerald is available online.

About 24 hours before class, post your agenda item (see the FAQ page) on this story. Then, before class today, respond to 2-4 agenda items posted by your peers. During class, I may call on you to lead a brief class discussion based on your weblog, or I might ask you to share the comment you posted on a peer's agenda item.

Agenda Items

For each assigned reading, choose a quotation that you would be ready to talk about in class if called on. Type the quotation out, and write a line or two about what you would say. In the future, you will post your agenda item on your SHU weblog. For Wednesday, bring three pieces of paper, with agenda items for each separate reading.

Close Reading Diagnostic

Bring a one-page close reading of a specific passage from "Bernice Bobs Her Hair." (There is no Turnitin.com slot for this -- just bring a printout.)

Your high school English teachers rewarded you for using colorful adjectives when you described your own personal reaction to the assigned reading. You got points for summarizing the plot, or for speculating about what details in the author's personal life might have inspired certain parts of the story.

I am asking for something different. I want you to look closely at the actual words that the author used, and use your critical reading skills to discuss a particular passage in detail.

Note that a "close reading" is not a summary of the plot, nor a general description of what passed through your head while you were reading it, nor a statement of why you did or didn't like it.

What should you write about? After you've read the handout on close reading, take a look at Foster chs 1-3.)

Close Reading

A close reading is a careful, thorough, sustained examination of the words that make up a text.

A close reading uses short quotations (a few words or only one word) inside sentences that make an argument about the work itself (rather than an argument about your reactions, incidents in the author's life, or whether things today are different from or similar to the society depicted in the story).

In a close reading, a literary work is not so much a window to look through, nor is it a mirror to reflect yourself. Instead, you look closely at the language the author chose, in order to analyze what the author has accomplished.

Note: Close reading is always re-reading.

RRRR (Read, React, Respond, Reflect)

A four-step process that helps you prepare for a productive class discussion using the SHU weblog system.

We will start out slowly at first, only completing a part of the RRRR process, so that the whole class has the chance to adjust to it. Once we start the full process, for each item or group of items marked as "Text" on the course outline, Read the assignment, react by posting an "agenda item" (see glossary) at least 24 hours before the class discussion, respond to 2-4 items posted by your peers, and reflect on the experience in a half-page essay (100-200 words -- see "reflection paper" in the glossary).

Foster (1-3, 5)

Agenda Item

A short homework assignment, comprising a brief quotation from the assigned text, a non-obvious question or observation, and a contribution to the class discussion (if called on). View the SHU Blogging Tutorial 2 for an introduction to Trackbacks (creating a two-way link).

Rhetoric

Rhetoric -- the use of language to persuade. One of the three most important of the "liberal arts" (those skills that free citizens were expected to have). Classical rhetoric recognizes three main ways to persuade. When persuading, we can rouse the readers' emotions (pathos), appeal to their sense of justice (ethos), or rely upon logic (logos).

Peer Blogging

Recent activity on the blogs of all students in this course. This page will update regularly, though it won't always show the most recent entries. To force an update, post a comment anywhere on this website or the NMJ website.