Besides blogs and forums, we've worked more with multiple choice. I've never been a very patient person, so I can say it's hard for me to linger long enough to figure out what's really going on in a poem before answering the questions. The tests also remind me that something very big and real is coming up fast: the AP test. I guess I just never really think about it when I'm reading the books, like Stoppard's Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead. But I'll admit I do enjoy it once I've "cracked the nutshell" and can see all the themes and meanings in a work. Still, I think I'm more of a reader-response theorist than anything else. I'm sure Stoppard thought about some things while writing, but could he have chosen every word so meticulously? I think the real meaning lies in how we, the readers, look at it.
The new atmosphere challenges remind me--fondly--of our old DIDLS exercises. I actually like these better, because this time we're on the creating end. Despite my usual spiel about "doing things myself," I actually like doing these challenges in class. It's good to be able to get different insights and opinions other than my own. It helps me to look at both pictures and text with new "lenses," which will definitely be helpful on the AP test.
If I were looking deep within myself regarding the blogs, I know that I'm not doing as well as I maybe should be. On peer reviews I don't look at the assignment as closely as I once did, or try as hard to remember the books the essays talk about. I want to pass the test, I really do, but sometimes I just can't bring myself to "play the game." Maybe my relationship to these blogs, or even annotating books, is like that between Rosencrantz and Guildenstern--a complete disconnect. But I'll try harder to connect, reconnect, synthesize, etc. Because I don't want to still be like Rosencrantz or Guildenstern on the test--and not just because I want to come out of it alive.
Hannah,
ReplyDeleteYou did a great job of covering the things we have done! I am personally hoping that we will get a chance to do some more multiple choice practice this semester. I really liked how you mentioned that "the real meaning lies in how we, the readers, look at it" and I couldn't agree with you more. The interpretation of the meaning all depends on the reader. I agree, my attention to detail about what to incorporate in my blogs may not be good as it could be! That will be something that I need to work on!
The reader-response argument sounds like the age-old complaint that English teachers just make stuff up and that there's no way the author meant all of the meanings our teachers find. I like it.
ReplyDeleteHowever, having spent that day arranging quotes from R&G Are Dead, I can see how Stoppard might have started with the themes and meanings he intended the reader to identify, and then shaped his words and dialogues around them.
I actually liked the tone word exercises the most, but describing pictures of dinosaurs and kittens is fun as well. It just takes the first 15 minutes of class for all of us to figure out what we're going to say.