Jessica Sumpter
English 484
April 15, 2008
Response Question
TSW 460-504
In Chapter 12, Teaching Poetry Writing, Beth Neman overviews various strategies of teaching poetry. I read this chapter in preparation for my unit lesson project, and I have the same question now that I did when I started the project. What is the best way to organize a poetry unit? I think there are basically two ways to organize a poetry unit. One, make a list of all the poetic techniques and conventions, like metaphor and rhyme schemes, and then pick out poems that express those techniques. Or two, you can choose a set of poems to teach first, and then teach the techniques as the come up in the poems. Which is more beneficial?
April 12, 2008
April 11, 2008
Response Question TSW 375-402
Jessica Sumpter
English 484
April 2, 2008
Chapter 10
In Chapter 10, Teaching the Rhetorical Analysis Neman discusses the topic of whether or not to teach students to include evaluative responses in analysis. The concept of evaluative comments is still a new one to me, and I have trouble distinguishing between evaluative and non- evaluative comments. Aren’t all comments evaluative to one degree or another? Neman only gives one example concerning The Scarlet Letter that I feel was very obvious. What strategies are there to teach our students to recognize evaluative comments that are more sophisticated than “I thought it was interesting”?
April 10, 2008
Response Question TSW 403-459
Jessica Sumpter
English 484
April 10, 2008
Response Question
Chapter Eleven
In Chapter Eleven, Teaching Narrative Writing, Neman overviews a variety of techniques and strategies to teach students. It would be impossible to teach all of that information in one unit without losing the students completely. There are two ways to handle the information. One, by choosing what you believe to be the most important, aspects of narrative writing and teaching those, probably through assigned readings which highlight one technique or another. Or two, assigning readings that cover as many of the different techniques and strategies as is appropriate for the unit, and cover the techniques used in the assignments in a close reading. Which technique would be better?