Tuesday February 23, 2010

Please review your vocabulary. The quiz Friday will be a matching list.

In class for Tuesday and Wednesday. Using your book, please respond to the content questions.

Monday February 22, 2010

Note the following background information for your reading of The Devil's Arithmetic by Jane Yolen. This is the break assignment. Please contact me with any questions.
I apologize that the images and descriptions are not coordinated, but you should easily be able to put them together.







map of concentration camps; please note location of Auschwitz, where the characters in the book have been sent.

Passover: The eight-day festival of Passover is celebrated in the early spring, from the 15th through the 22nd of the Hebrew month of Nissan. It commemorates the emancipation of the Israelites from slavery in ancient Egypt. And, by following the rituals of Passover, the Jewish people have the ability to relive and experience the true freedom that their ancestors gained.


Seder meal / Passover supper: note the following. Remember the novel is framed around the celebration, the interior being Hannah / Chaya's time travel to the schtetl in Poland and her being taken to Auschwitz witht the others. The Seder is an intergenerational family ritual prescribed according to Jewish law and based on the interpretation of the Biblical verse commanding Jews to retell the story of the Exodus from Egypt.

The rituals and symbolic foods
associated with the Seder evoke the twin themes of the evening:
slavery and freedom

The six symbolic items on the Seder Plate are:

1. Maror and 2. Cnazeret : Two types of bitter herbs, symbolizing the bitterness and harshness of the slavery which the Jews endured in Ancient Egypt.
3. Charoset; A sweet, brown, pebbly mixture, representing the mortar used by the Jewish slaves to build the storehouses of Egypt.
4. Karpas; A vegetable other than bitter herbs, usually parsley but sometimes something such as celery or cooked potato.
5. Z’roa; A roasted shankbone, symbolizing sacrifice.
6. Beitzah; A roasted egg.


entrance to the gas chamber: this is the last image that Hannah / Chaya sees. Why is she able to cheer up her two companions, knowing that only darkness awaits?

camp identification tattoo- note how Hannah's grandfather reacts when she inks one on herself; how does her attitude eventually change?

The characters in the novel speak Yiddish. Note the following and the words that commonly show up in English that come from this language.

schtetl- a small village in Eastern Europe

bagel - ring shaped bread product
blinz - a thin pancake often filled with fruit or cheese
kvetch- to complain
maven- an expert
putz- a foolish person
schlep- to walk heavily, to trudge
tchochke - little knickknaks
chutzpah - the quality of stepping over the bounds of good behavior
gelt- money
meshuga- crazy
nosh- snacks
schnoz - nose
tush- buttocks
glitch- a problem
klutz - clumsy
kosher- proper or correct
mench - literally a man, but someone who displays upstanding qualities
schmooze- to converse casually so as to take advantage of a social connection
zaftig- full figured

Homework due Wednesday: if you did not finish writing out the similes for the poem Willow and Ginko, please finish. This is counting as a test grade. Make sure that after you write the simile, you explain in your own words, its meaning.

In class: we are collecting the novel The Devil's Arithmetic by Jane Yolen from the library.

The book is to be read by the Monday after the break.

Tuesday February 9, 2010

Homework due today: one pun!
Vocabulary quiz on Thursday, with the exception of any student leaving for break early. Your quiz is Wednesday.

In class work: applying poetic language to a poem.

Monday February 8, 2010

This week's vocabulary based upon The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes

QUIZ THURSDAY FEBRUARY 11

1.galleon- noun- A large three-masted sailing ship with a square rig and usually two or more decks, used from the 15th to the 17th century especially by Spain as a merchant ship or warship.

2. claret-noun and adjective- first: a dark red wine from Bordeaux, France; Second: in the poem it refers to the dark red color of his coat

3. to plait- verb- to braid, especially of hair

4. ostler- noun-one who takes care of horses, especially at an inn

5. stirrups- noun- A flat-based loop or ring hung from either side of a horse's saddle to support the rider's foot in mounting and riding

6. casement- noun- A window sash that opens outward by means of hinges.

7. tawny- adjective- A light brown to brownish orange.

8. cascade- noun- A waterfall or a series of small waterfalls over steep rocks.

9. to snigger- verb- a stifled laugh or giggle

10. to writhe- verb- To twist, as in pain, struggle, or embarrassment.

11. rapier- noun- A light, sharp-pointed sword lacking a cutting edge and used only for thrusting.

A broad area of open land, often high but poorly drained, with patches of heath and peat bogs.

12. moor- noun- A broad area of open land, often high but poorly drained, with patches of heath and peat bogs.

Friday February 5, 2010

Vocabulary quiz today.

We are reading The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes, as an example of onomatopoeia.
If you are absent, make sure you have carefully read the poem

The Highwayman

The wind was a torrent of darkness upon the gusty trees,
The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
The road was a ribbon of moonlight looping the purple moor,
And the highwayman came riding--
Riding--riding--
The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn door.

He'd a French cocked hat on his forehead, and a bunch of lace at his chin;
He'd a coat of the claret velvet, and breeches of fine doe-skin.
They fitted with never a wrinkle; his boots were up to his thigh!
And he rode with a jeweled twinkle--
His rapier hilt a-twinkle--
His pistol butts a-twinkle, under the jeweled sky.

Over the cobbles he clattered and clashed in the dark inn-yard,
He tapped with his whip on the shutters, but all was locked and barred,
He whistled a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter--
Bess, the landlord's daughter--
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

Dark in the dark old inn-yard a stable-wicket creaked
Where Tim, the ostler listened--his face was white and peaked--
His eyes were hollows of madness, his hair like mouldy hay,
But he loved the landlord's daughter--
The landlord's black-eyed daughter;
Dumb as a dog he listened, and he heard the robber say:

"One kiss, my bonny sweetheart; I'm after a prize tonight,
But I shall be back with the yellow gold before the morning light.
Yet if they press me sharply, and harry me through the day,
Then look for me by moonlight,
Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though hell should bar the way."

He stood upright in the stirrups; he scarce could reach her hand,
But she loosened her hair in the casement! His face burnt like a brand
As the sweet black waves of perfume came tumbling o'er his breast,
Then he kissed its waves in the moonlight
(O sweet black waves in the moonlight!),
And he tugged at his reins in the moonlight, and galloped away to the west.

He did not come in the dawning; he did not come at noon.
And out of the tawny sunset, before the rise of the moon,
When the road was a gypsy's ribbon over the purple moor,
The redcoat troops came marching--
Marching--marching--
King George's men came marching, up to the old inn-door.

They said no word to the landlord; they drank his ale instead,
But they gagged his daughter and bound her to the foot of her narrow bed.
Two of them knelt at her casement, with muskets by their side;
There was Death at every window,
And Hell at one dark window,
For Bess could see, through her casement, the road that he would ride.

They had bound her up at attention, with many a sniggering jest!
They had tied a rifle beside her, with the barrel beneath her breast!
"Now keep good watch!" and they kissed her. She heard the dead man say,
"Look for me by moonlight,
Watch for me by moonlight,
I'll come to thee by moonlight, though Hell should bar the way."

She twisted her hands behind her, but all the knots held good!
She writhed her hands till her fingers were wet with sweat or blood!
They stretched and strained in the darkness, and the hours crawled by like years,
Till, on the stroke of midnight,
Cold on the stroke of midnight,
The tip of one finger touched it! The trigger at least was hers!

The tip of one finger touched it, she strove no more for the rest;
Up, she stood up at attention, with the barrel beneath her breast.
She would not risk their hearing, she would not strive again,
For the road lay bare in the moonlight,
Blank and bare in the moonlight,
And the blood in her veins, in the moonlight, throbbed to her love's refrain.

Tlot tlot, tlot tlot! Had they heard it? The horse-hooves, ringing clear;
Tlot tlot, tlot tlot, in the distance! Were they deaf that they did not hear?
Down the ribbon of moonlight, over the brow of the hill,
The highwayman came riding--
Riding--riding--
The redcoats looked to their priming! She stood up straight and still.

Tlot tlot, in the frosty silence! Tlot tlot, in the echoing night!
Nearer he came and nearer! Her face was like a light!
Her eyes grew wide for a moment, she drew one last deep breath,
Then her finger moved in the moonlight--
Her musket shattered the moonlight--
Shattered her breast in the moonlight and warned him--with her death.

He turned, he spurred to the West; he did not know who stood
Bowed, with her head o'er the casement, drenched in her own red blood!
Not till the dawn did he hear it, and his face grew grey to hear
How Bess, the landlord's daughter,
The landlord's black-eyed daughter,
Had watched for her love in the moonlight, and died in the darkness there.

Back, he spurred like a madman, shrieking a curse to the sky,
With the white road smoking behind him and his rapier brandished high!
Blood-red were his spurs in the golden noon, wine-red was his velvet coat
When they shot him down in the highway,
Down like a dog in the highway,
And he lay in his blood in the highway, with the bunch of lace at his throat.

And still on a winter's night, they say, when the wind is in the trees,
When the moon is a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,
When the road is a gypsy's ribbon looping the purple moor,
The highwayman comes riding--
Riding--riding--
The highwayman comes riding, up to the old inn-door.

Over the cobbles he clatters and clangs in the dark inn-yard,
He taps with his whip on the shutters, but all is locked and barred,
He whistles a tune to the window, and who should be waiting there
But the landlord's black-eyed daughter--
Bess, the landlord's daughter--
Plaiting a dark red love-knot into her long black hair.

Thursday February 4, 2010

Today we are finishing up hyberbole and reviewing onomatopoeia, that is how words immitate sounds in the natural world.
Tommorow we'll review the poetic elements that we covered this week.
There will be an assesment on Monday.


REMINDER: FRIDAY IS YOUR VOCABULARY QUIZ

Wednesday February 3, 2010

Keep reviewing your vocabulary for Friday's quiz.

So far we have reviewed alliteration, assonance and personification. Today we'll finish up the similes and metaphors. In class, we'll look over hyperbole examples and you'll draw your own.

Tuesday February 2, 2010

Homework due: alliteration exercise from yesterday. Be prepared to share your personal examples.

In class work: simile and metaphor practice.

Review your vocabulary. Quiz Friday!