Final Grammar Practice

Put commas where necessary.

The man in the long black coat stood somberly in the corner.

Robert is a warm gentle father.

People who obtain a college degree tend to earn more money than those that don't.

Langston Hughes who was a poet during the Harlem Renaissance wrote poetry that was concerned with racial pride and social justice.




Put commas, colons, and semicolons where necessary.


The weather this week may include hailstorms sun showers and overcast skies.

I am eager to read a number of books this summer The Ministry of Bad Taste by Jonathan Franzen Wolfe Hall by Hillary Mantel and Vernon God Little by DBC Pierre.



Are the following sentences grammatically correct?  If not, fix them.

Most lions at night hunt for medium sized prey, such as zebra.

Many students graduate with debt from college totaling more than fifty thousand dollars.

Though not eligible for the clinical trial, John was still able to gain access to an experimental drug.

Final Exam Study Guide

Here is your final exam study guide.

Grammar Review

Use the following document to review grammar.

IXL Info

11H English IXL Grammar Work

username:  firstnamelastname651 ex: laurentarantino651

Password: 1234

Complete the following under Grade 10

KK1 U2 W3 K3 C3 B1 B2

These are the modules we did and that you will be responsible for on the quiz.

They cover the following:
-MLA Citations
-Misplaced/Dangling Modifiers
-Commas with Essential vs. Non-essential info
-Parallel Structure
-Commas, Semicolons, Colons

Gatsby Quote Analysis

https://docs.google.com/a/capeelizabethschools.org/document/d/11ZnOMHcqRNOBG6n-zcW9XmmrQB1mLkbyUUn8sJP17O8/edit?usp=sharing

Satire Examples

Modest Proposal: Texting and Driving
http://hhslitandcomp2014.blogspot.com/2013/12/modest-proposal-texting-and-driving.html

Satire Descriptor

Here is the product descriptor for the satire.  It will be due on Monday, 6/8.

Gatsby Ch 4 and 5

Here are some review questions on Chapters 4 and 5 of Gatsby.

Resume Help

Click on the following link for guidance on how to craft a resume.

Great Gatsby CH 1

Here is a document on CH 1 of The Great Gatsby.

Grammar Practice

Here is a document for review of commas, colons, and semicolons.

The Great Gatsby Full Text

Here is a link to a full text, online version of The Great Gatsby.

TTTC Reading Assessment Practice

Explain the significance of the following quotations.  How do they highlight a key theme or idea from the book as a whole?  Where does the quote come from - in other words, what is the context?

"In a way I wanted to stop myself.  It was cruel, I knew that, but right and wrong were somewhere else.  This was the spirit world."


"But you can't say that.  All you can do is tell it one more time, patiently, adding and subtracting, making up a few things to get at the real truth.  No Mitchell Sanders, you tell her.  No Lemon, no Rat Kiley.  No trail junction.  No baby buffalo.  No vines or moss or white blossoms.  Beginning to end, you tell her, it's all made up.  Every goddamn detail--the mountains and the river and especially that poor dumb baby buffalo.  None of it happened.  None of it."


"Because late that same night he borrowed a pistol, gripped it by the barrel, and used it like a hammer to break his own nose."


"Then he burned the two photographs...He realized it was only a gesture.  Stupid, he thought.  Sentimental, too, but mostly just stupid.  Lavender was dead.  You couldn't burn the blame."


Symbolism:  Characters as symbols.

Consider how the men in the Alpha company function as symbols.  How does Azar function as a symbol in the book?  What sort of man does he represent?  Think specifically about the situation with Bobby Jorgensen at the end of the book to help you.

What does Linda symbolize?

TTTC - Rhetorical Analysis Practice

Examine the last paragraph on pg. 143 in "Speaking of Courage" and answer the questions that follow.

1. Describe the primary purpose of this paragraph.

2. In the beginning of the paragraph, O'Brien writes, "he took pleasure in the steady sounds of the engine and air conditioning."  Reflect on the "steady sounds" and how/why these may be a comfort to Bowker.  How do these "steady sounds" connect to his constant driving around the lake?

3. Through Bowker's eyes, O'Brien describes how the town "looked as if it had been hit by nerve gas, everything still and lifeless, even the people."  What does this perspective suggest about how the war has affected how Bowker views the world?  Be specific.  Think about his specific choice of words here and what they mean.

4. O'Brien repeatedly uses personification in this paragraph.  Identify some examples of personification and the significance they have on the paragraph's tone and purpose.

5.  O'Brien uses the adjectives brisk and polite twice at the end of the paragraph.  To what purpose?  Consider the connotations of these two words and their particular significance.



Now read the following paragraph from later in the chapter, on page 150.

A good war story, he thought, but it was not a war for war stories, nor for talk of valor, and nobody in town wanted to know about the terrible stink.  They wanted good intentions and good deeds.  But the town was not to blame, really.  It was a nice little town, very prosperous, with neat houses and all the sanitary conveniences.


Think about these two paragraphs together and how they exemplify the theme of this chapter.   How do these paragraphs explain Bowker's suicide?

Research Based Synthesis Essay

Click here for the product descriptor.

TTTC - "Sweetheart..." Discussion Questions

“Sweet Heart of the Song Tra Bong” Discussion Questions

1.  In “Sweetheart of Song Tra Bong,” how does O’Brien set us up for Mary Anne’s transformation?  What clues does he drop along the way?

2. O’Brien uses many items as symbols.  Identify one tangible item that could be symbolic.  What might it represent?

3.  Find a specific quote from the chapter that illustrate Mary Anne’s change. What does the quote specifically signify about the nature of Mary Anne’s change?

4. Identify and discuss one theme that comes up in the story.  Remember that a theme is a big idea that transcends literature and suggests something about real life.  For example, a theme from the first chapter could be that our emotions (fear, shame, regret) have a tangible weight that we must carry.

5.  Reread the cave scene.  What has Mary Anne become?  Make a list of all of graphic imagery (visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory) from that scene.  What feelings do these images conjure up?

6. Reread the last paragraph of the story and analyze its rhetoric:

            But the story did not end there.  If you believed the Greenies, Rat said, Mary Anne was still somewhere out there in the dark.  Odd movements, odd shapes.  Late at night, when the Greenies were out on ambush, the whole rain forest seemed to stare in at them—a watched feeling—and a couple of times they almost saw her sliding through the shadows.  Not quite, but almost.  She had crossed to the other side.  She was part of the land.  She was wearing her culottes, her pink sweater, and a necklace of human tongues.  She was dangerous.  She was ready for the kill.

What is the impact of this final paragraph?  What choices does O’Brien make to create a certain effect? 

Think about DIDLS:

-What details does he include or exclude?

-What images does he create?

-Identify one or two specific word choices that have significant connotations. 

-What is the language like?  Does he use any figurative language?  To what effect?

-What is the syntax like?  Does he use repetition?  Meaningful juxtaposition?  Long sentences?  Short sentences?  Meaningful punctuation?

How do all of these elements contribute to the tone (attitude towards the subject) and the mood (feeling) of this final paragraph? 

The Things You Carry - Final Revision

As you put the finishing touches on your writing piece, consider the following:

-What dominant impression have you created of this particular role in your life?  How have you considered DIDLS (details, imagery, diction, language, and syntax) in creating this impression?

-Do you want to show more than one side to this role?  If so, have you done so?

-What choices have you made about how paragraphs are set up?  Look back at TTTC for models.  Do you have some paragraphs that focus on tangible items and some that focus on intangible items, or are the two mixed together?  Does each paragraph focus on something specific, and does it begin and end with a deliberate image, detail, or idea?

-How have you begun your piece?  How have you ended it?  What impression does your beginning and ending create?

-What are your sentences like?  Have you made active choices about punctuation (dashes, commas)?  Have you made active choices about sentence length?

-Have you proofread your essay for spelling, capitalization, punctuation, comma usage, and all of the other conventions on your glossing sheet?

-Does your piece have a title?

-Do you have a proper MLA style heading?

-Have you double spaced?

A True War Story

Read the following article from the New Yorker, "The Scene of the Crime", about a true war story from Vietnam.

As you read it, consider ways in which it relates to what O'Brien tells us a true war story is.

The Things You Carry

Think about yourself as an individual or as a member of a group (student, daughter/son, team member, member of your family, etc.).  If you are thinking of yourself as part of a group, you may highlight what other members of the group carry as well. Then think of the following:

- What do you carry? Make a list both literal and figurative (emotions, experiences, responsibilities).

You may consider

What do you carry every day in school?

What do you have to bring to work or to practice?

What things do you carry that are very visible to the world?

What things are more hidden?

What things are totally invisible, that is, abstract or symbolic?

What do others make you carry?

What things do you carry that you'd like to put down?
What specific memories do you have that are associated with this role in your life?

For example, I might think of my role as a mother. Then, I will think about the physical things I carry in this role and the emotional/figurative/symbolic things I carry (like sleep deprivation, responsibility for someone else's life, shameful memories that involve accidentally letting my son role off a bed, etc.)

Using Chapter 1 of TTTC as a model, write a 1-2 page essay in which you articulate the things you carry. You may choose to write in the third person (he/she/or they if you are thinking of yourself as part of a group). Your essay should have a mix of the literal and figurative. All items should have a clear purpose. Think of the rhetorical strategies O'Brien uses in his writing and try to emulate these strategies. Consider how you will begin and end your piece. Examine how he begins and ends certain sections of this chapter as a guide.

Due date: Tuesday, 3/7 on turnitin.com for period 2
Wednesday, 3/8 on turnitin.com for period 4

Citation Clarifications

Use this citation for the graphs in the packet.  Remember to indent any line after the first.  I can't get the indenting to work correctly here, so please just adhere to the proper indenting format.

Lopez, Mark Hugo. "Youth Attitudes toward Civic Education and Community Service        Requirements." Graph. The Center for Information and Research on Civic        Learning and Engagement 2002.

I also gave you some other misinformation.  I won't penalize you for not updating the following in this essay, but I just don't want you to be confused and/or have incorrect information going forward.


-If you are citing in text for a work that doesn't have a known author, within the parenthesis, put the shortened version of the title of the work in quotation marks if it's a short work such as an article, or put it in italics if its a long work like a book.

ex: ("Volunteer Work")


-If you are citing in text for a work with more than one author, you do need to provide all the authors' names.

ex: (Stukas, Snyder, and Clary)


I'm so sorry for the confusion this morning.