Category: Frankenstein - AP English Literature & Composition

(S1C21) Frankenstein unit exam + OPF

10/21/2014

Reminder: Be sure to bring your LRJ with you today. I will be collecting these for grading. You have four LRJ prompts to respond to -- for a total of 100 points.

For next class -- (Thu./Mon.)
Between now and November 5/6, when your biotech group project is due, we will be reading Part I of Our Posthuman Future by Francis Fukuyama. Please see the "Posthuman" web page for full resources. You can download the full text of the book below, if you do not have your own hardcopy of the book. Reminder: You may donate your copy of the book to the school for 10 points extra credit.

    DOWNLOAD FULL BOOK: Our Posthuman Future (PDF)

Your first assignment is to read Chapters 1-2 (pages 4-40). You will have a "quiz" on this reading on Thurs.(A3)/Mon.(B1). The quiz will be in a different style/format than you are used to. In preparation for this unit, please read the following unit objectives:

UNIT OBJECTIVES
The guiding questions for this unit concern views of humanity and personhood. We will be evaluating the fiction we read in terms of 21st century real-world applications. The unit will culminate in a reading of Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.

Guiding questions for the unit:
    - What is human dignity? What are human rights? What is personhood?
    - What is human nature? Do we have a right to manipulate human nature?
    - When does one begin to be and cease to be human?
    - When does a person go beyond being human? Or is it even possible?
    - What are the ramifications of today’s biotechnology revolution?
    - What does literature have to say about today’s biotechnology revolution?
    - What can we learn from literature to help us live in the 21st century?

(S1C20) In-class essay & Biotech Project

10/17/2014

Today, after the in-class essay, you will choose/be assigned a biotech issue to research for a presentation that will be due on November 4/5. You should refer the download from the previous blog post for the assignment sheet, which includes all the gory details and expectations for this project. In case you didn't download it last class, here it is again:

    DOWNLOAD: Biotech Research Project Assignment Sheet

You will be given a number. You have five minutes to conduct any trades. The numbers correspond to the following topics:

1. Transhumanism & Posthumanism
2. Designer Babies, Egg Harvesting & “Eggsploitation”
3. Animal-Human Hybrids / Chimeras
4. Human Cloning
5. Genetic Engineering
6. Human Embryo Stem Cell Research & Embryonic Beauty Treatments
7. Selective Reduction Eugenics
8. Neuropharmacology (Psychopharmacology)

Preparing for the Frankenstein unit exam
Next class (Tues-A3/Wed-B1), you will have your unit exam for Frankenstein and all the related topics we've discussed during the unit (not including the biotech material). Download the study guide below to assist you in preparing for this exam.

    DOWNLOAD: Frankenstein unit exam study sheet (PDF)

Please note you will be asked to write a passage analysis of a passage from Frankenstein. In order to prepare to do this, be sure to review the following handout:

     DOWNLOAD: How to Write a Passage Analysis of Prose (PDF)

Frankenstein LRJ's due
I will be collecting your LRJ's at the beginning of next class, before the unit exam. You should have prompts #1-4 complete by that time. You should already have the first three completed. Number 4 "The Criminal Daemon" is due also.

Biotechnology Project Assignments

A3 Class Assignments
1. Transhumanism & Posthumanism: Farrell and Painter
2. Designer Babies, etc: Tull and Bruggemann
3. Animal-Human Hybrids: Scales, Burns, and Nymberg
4. Human Cloning: Fazlani and Buehler
5. Genetic Engineering: Hansen and Andrews
6. Human Embryo Stem Cell Research: Mullinger, Schaffer, and Cordier
7. Selective Reduction Eugenics: Gill and Frohman
8. Neuropharmacology: Gilliland and Burandt

B1 Class Assignments
1. Transhumanism & Posthumanism: Gorczynski and Poch
2. Designer Babies, etc: Buller and McNamara
3. Animal-Human Hybrids: Quehl
4. Human Cloning: Hill and Bayliff
5. Genetic Engineering: Gray and Cusmano
6. Human Embryo Stem Cell Research: Toelke and Stock
7. Selective Reduction Eugenics: Orkwis and Heuker
8. Neuropharmacology: Balogh and Allbright

(S1C19) Frankenstein & A.P. Essay Prompts

10/14/2014

Today in class
We'll be finishing the novel today with our final quiz. Your Biotech worksheets should already be in the dropbox. Next class, after the in-class essay, we'll talk about the second semester research project and you'll be assigned a biotech topic.

Up Next...
We'll soon be reading Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotech Revolution by Francis Fukuyama. I have seven used copies for purchase ($5) if you'd care to buy your own copy. See me.

Preparing for the A.P.-Style Frankenstein Essay -- Tues.
Finally, in order to prepare for the Frankenstein in-class essay, you should download today's in-class assignment: Open-Ended Essay Prompts for Frankenstein (PDF)and complete the assignment, which will be drop-boxed at the end of class. The Open-Ended Prompts are those included on the exams from 1970 up until this year. You will be reading through these prompts and picking three that you believe would apply to Frankenstein. Then you will justify your picks by explaining how you would organize an essay to respond to these.

Please drop-box this assignment by the end of class!

Although I will not let you know which prompts I will be giving you for the in-class essay, I will be choosing the most popular ones that you pick in class.

Preparing for the AP Open-Prompt In-Class Essay
The following download will provide you with some insight on how you might best approach the AP open prompt essay:

DOWNLOAD: The Official AP Scoring Rubric for the Open-Prompt Essay (PDF)

Step-by-step approach to pre-writing
1. Read the prompt carefully.
2. Begin with a thematic statement that is clearly related to the prompt but is not a simple restatement. Get right into the “meat” of your argument.
3. If the prompt is topical, organize by topics indicated within the prompt. If the prompt asks you to analyze elements or techniques, organize accordingly.
4. Summarize your story in THREE sentences! Rather than stating events, focus on the universal truths the author seems to be unveiling through the actions of the story .
5. Consider how the author uses literary elements or techniques to illustrate his/her beliefs. You may need to consider the direction of the prompt here (some prompts say to focus on a symbol, character, etc.) Consider the interrelatedness of some of these literary elements or techniques. (An author’s tone/attitude is often revealed through diction, character choices or motivations, etc.) Shift your language in how you discuss literary elements

(S1C18) The Biotechnology Revolution

10/10/2014

As we finish up Frankenstein, we will be getting into the 2nd quarter research project. The subject: the biotechnology revolution and literature.

As a brief introduction to the ideas and issues we'll be covering after we finish reading Frankenstein, today you'll begin on some basic "overview research" on eight contemporary biotechnology issues that relate in some way to both Frankenstein and Brave New World, the next novel we'll be reading as a class. Download and complete the Biotechnology eWorksheet. Drop-box it before the beginning of next class. We'll be talking about the specifics of the research project at that time.

    DOWNLOAD: eWorksheet -- Intro to Biotechnology Issues (DOCX)
    DOWNLOAD: Biotech Research Project Assignment Sheet (DOCX)

One of the best resources you will use for conducting your research will be the book we're reading next. It's the only nonfiction book we'll be reading this year. You can download the eBook below. You should also explaore all the wonderfully helpful resources on the Our Posthuman Future web page on this website.

DOWNLOAD:
Our Posthuman Future: Consequences of the Biotechnology Revolution (Fukuyama)

For next Tues (A)/Thurs (B)
Finish reading Frankenstein. We will have a quiz over Chapters 19-end.

Looking forward...
Oct. 17/20 -- In-class essay using A.P.-style prompts (grade will be on 2nd quarter)
Oct. 21/22 -- Frankenstein unit exam (grade will be on 1st quarter)
        * LRJ's #1-4 will be collected next Friday for grading

(S1C17) The Doppelganger Motif

10/8/2014

Today we will discuss Chapters 7-12 and your LRJ responses to "The Literary Gothic."

Illustration from Edgar Allan Poe's short story "William Wilson"

The Doppelganger Motif
A doppelganger is a German term, literally meaning a “double-goer,” an apparition or double of a living person. As a literary device, a doppelganger is used to show two different distinct, often opposite, personalities or personality traits. This literary device is used in stories to show internal conflict and the multifaceted nature of a character. Such a figure haunts the Ancient Mariner in Coleridge’s narrative poem (the one quoted by Mary Shelley in Frank.):

Like one, that on a lonesome road,
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And having turned round walks on,
And turns no more his head,

Because he knows, a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread. (lines 445-51)

Interestingly, on July 8, 1822, the English poet Percy Bysshe Shelley drowned in the Bay of Spezia. On August 15, while staying at Pisa, Percy's wife Mary Shelley wrote a letter to Maria Gisborne in which she relayed Percy's claims to her that he had met his own doppelgänger. She writes that, in the early hours of June 23, Percy had had a nightmare about the house collapsing in a flood, and:

... talking it over the next morning he told me that he had had many visions lately — he had seen the figure of himself which met him as he walked on the terrace and said to him — "How long do you mean to be content" — Not very terrific words and certainly not prophetic of what has occurred. But Shelley had often seen these figures when ill.

Obviously, Mary Shelley was interested in the idea of a doppelganger and used it as a literary motif in Frankenstein. This idea of the literary doppelganger can be interpreted in a number of ways:

It can be seen simply as a double, an alternative version of the individual
concerned;
It can be seen as a complement, a version of
the individual that possesses different qualities and thus completes the
personality;
It can be seen as an opposite, a being that
possesses all the qualities that the individual lacks and most abhors.

By the way: An important literary form employing the Doppelganger motif is the psychomachia (we'll discuss this when we read Dr. Faustus), originated by the Greek poet Prudentius to depict "conflict within the soul" or the struggle between virtue and vice within an individual. The psychomachia was particularly important in medieval art and drama, where separate characters were perceived a representing different aspects of a single human personality, so that conflict within the drama depicted the struggle of conscience or the need for integration of the personality.

For Friday (A)/Monday(B)
Complete LRJ#3 (Option A only!) on “The Doppelganger Motif”
Quiz over Frankenstein, Chapters 13-18

Significant Quotations -- II
Although you are not required to dropbox the following eWorksheet, you will be working on it in class and you will likely find it helpful as a way to review this section of the novel and to help you study for the Frankenstein unit exam.

DOWNLOAD: eWorksheet -- Part Two (Ch. 7-12) -- Significant quotations

Albatross -- Allusion of the Day (4)

10/7/2014

The word albatross is sometimes used metaphorically to mean a psychological burden that feels like a curse.

It is an allusion to Samuel Taylor Coleridge's poem The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1798) -- which, in part, inspired Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. In the poem, an albatross starts to follow a ship — being followed by an albatross was generally considered an omen of good luck. However, the mariner shoots the albatross with a crossbow, which is regarded as an act that will curse the ship (which indeed suffers terrible mishaps). To punish him, his companions induce him to wear the dead albatross around his neck indefinitely (until they all die from the curse). Thus the albatross can be both an omen of good or bad luck, as well as a metaphor for a burden to be carried as penance.

The symbolism used in the Coleridge poem is its highlight. For example:

Ah ! well a-day ! what evil looks
Had I from old and young !
Instead of the cross, the Albatross
About my neck was hung.

An "albatross around one's neck" means a burden which some unfortunate person has to carry.

(S1C16) Frankenstein -- part one

10/6/2014

Today's reading and discussion covers Chapters 1-6 and the letters from Robert Walton that precede it.

Close Reading & Passage Analysis
I will be returning your "interrupted passage" worksheet, and we will be discussing some strategies for writing a passage analysis, beginning with the formulation of a thesis statement that directly responds to one of the following prompts:

Tone: Discuss how the letter writer’s style reveals his attitudes toward Victor Frankenstein.
Characterization: Analyze how Robert Walton’s diction, tone, and selection of details are used to characterizes Victor Frankenstein.

In order to respond directly to the prompt for this exercise, follow this format:

1. Through [syntactical/literary device(s)] Robert Walton [action verb] his [tone quality] toward Victor Frankenstein.
2. Mary Shelly uses Robert Walton's [syntactical/literary devices] to characterize Victor Frankenstein as [quality].

Significant Quotations
In order to best understand the exposition and central conflict of the beginning of Shelley's novel, you will be working in groups of 2-3 to discuss the quotations from the eWorksheet below.

DOWNLOAD: Part One -- Significant quotations (DOCX)

Reading for Wed (A)/Thu (B): Chapters 7-12. Prepare for quiz
LRJ#2 for Wed (A)/Thu (B): The Literary Gothic

(S1C15) Allusions in Frankenstein

9/30/2014

In-class activity: Insta-Research
Today in class you will be broken into five small groups to conduct some Insta-Research, quick fact-digging about five different allusions in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. Each group will be assigned one of the following topics:

1. "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
2. Paradise Lost by John Milton
3. The Myth of Prometheus from Greek Mythology
4. Renaissance philosophers: Cornelius Agrippa, Paracelsus, and Albertus Magnus
5. "Lines Written a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey" by William Wordsworth

You will have 10 minutes to conduct your Insta-research in your small groups. Then you will have five minutes to present your topic to the class. Your presentation should explain the reference (give a summary of the work or explain who these people are) and indicate how it is used in Mary Shelley's Frankenstein.

You may use any resources you wish in order to conduct your research. You may want to consult some of the resources listed on the Frankenstein web page on this site, especially the "Introduction to Mary Shelley and Frankenstein."

LRJ assignments for Frankenstein
You will be completing four LRJ entries for the Frankenstein unit. Download the LRJ prompt sheet below.

DOWNLOAD: Frankenstein LRJ prompts (PDF)
DOWNLOAD: Introduction to Frankenstein & The Misunderstood Monster (PDF)

For Next Class: Thurs. (A) / Fri. (B)
The first LRJ prompt "The Misunderstood Monster." Please be prepared to discuss this article in class.

NOTE: The vocabulary quiz -- list A -- and the Euro-geography quiz has been postponed until next class (Thurs/Fri). See the previous blog post (S1Q14) for details.

Reading Assignment:
Quiz over Letters + Chapters 1-6 on Wednesday

(S1C14) Next Up: Frankenstein

9/26/2014

Frankenstein
If you would like your own copy of Frankenstein, you should obtain one and bring it to class by Tues/Wed at the latest. I still have nine used copies in very good shape. See me if you're interested.

For next class: Vocab and European Geography
You will have your first Frankenstein vocabulary quiz (list A words), which will be combined with the Euro/UK geography quiz. The Euro-geography quiz will be exactly the same as the diagnostic quiz I gave you a month ago. Study materials are below

    DOWNLOAD: Frankenstein Vocabulary & Allusions List A & B
    LINK: Frankenstein flashcard deck -- list A

    DOWNLOAD: European Geography Map (PDF)
    DOWNLOAD: United Kingdom & Ireland Map (PDF)

(Retired) Researching Mary Shelley

9/27/2013

Today in Class
You will be getting to know Mary Shelley and some background about Frankenstein today. Download and complete the following eWorksheet. Drop-box at end of class.

    DOWNLOAD: Mary Shelley eWorksheet (DOC)

In order to complete this eWorksheet you should use the recommended websites and other resources available on the Frankenstein page of this website.

    LINK: Frankenstein Page

For Tuesday: Vocab and European Geography
You will have your first Frankenstein vocabulary quiz (list A words), which will be combined with the Euro/UK geography quiz (which was postponed from last week).

    DOWNLOAD: Frankenstein Vocabulary & Allusions List A & B
    LINK: Frankenstein flashcard deck -- list A

    DOWNLOAD: European Geography Map
    DOWNLOAD: United Kingdom & Ireland Map (PDF)

For Thursday
Quiz -- Read Letters + Chapters 1-6