Interdisciplinary Freshmen

Freshmen: you need to obtain a copy of David Eggers' What is the What. It is available in paperback. The Old Town Hall Bookstore in Norton has graciously agreed to offer the book to us at a 30% discount. It is available now (1-3). Wheaton students are enjoying their long vacation, so please call for store hours. 

You can read some of the reviews here:

http://www.amazon.com/What-Dave-Eggers/dp/1932416641

Seniors: North Korea

Watch (at least) the first chapter of the following Frontline program: "The Baffling 'Hermit Kingdom'" (10 minutes). Note the parallels, some indirect, some literal, between Orwell's 1984 and modern North Korea. 

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/kim/view/

Congrats, Mrs. Kefor

I would like to congratulate my wife, Kristine. Her classroom lessons are profiled in the new book "Writer to Writer". Since she is humble, I figured I would acknowledge her achievement via Keforia. I am proud of you, Kris!

Writing and Visual Imagination: 12-21

Post your individual progress report and your 8 literary term quotes here.

Seniors: Propaganda Projects

Seniors: Please post the statement that you plan to argue for in your 1984 Propaganda Project. It's first post, first serve; there will be no duplicate statements. Choose something interesting or daring. Post your name, the names of any group members, and your statement in quotes or italics. If your post contains any abbreviations, errors or misspellings it does not count until you correct it. Webspeak is the new Newspeak, and, quite frankly, it scares me.

Writing and Visual Imagination: Narratives

Haleakala Crater, Maui

Most of the stories we read, particularly the good ones, convey some type of essential idea, philosophy, system of belief, exemplum, moral lesson or theme. Writing and Visual Imagination students: for your next narrative piece, I would like you to inject an underlying idea that you feel strongly about. If this poses a challenge for you, which it should, consider doing some research on different ideas which have worked their way into literature: existentialism, transcendentalism, phenomenology, etc. Feel free to post comments, ideas and questions here.

Meeting Dr. Hosseini

The images above show Katherine A. and Ryan G. hobnobbing with Khaled Hosseini, author of "The Kite Runner" and "A Thousand Splendid Suns". We were lucky enough to attend a fundraiser which sponsored the construction of a school for girls in the village of Da' Subz. I am proud to say that these two students made the choice to attend; after all, how often do we get to meet the author of one of the books we are reading in high school? It may be a once in a lifetime opportunity. Dr. Hosseini spoke about his two novels, the plights of modern Afghanistan, and the aforementioned Zabuli School Project. He was also gracious enough to sign all of our books and take some pictures. I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and I would like to thank Ryan and Katherine for joining me.

Writing and Visual Imagination: Paired Dialogue Poems

Post your paired dialogue poems here by Friday, December 7.