Sweenglish
Host blog for Isaac Sweeney's English classes at Richard Bland College
Wednesday, July 16, 2014
Not Teaching
For the first time since 2007, I won't be teaching in the fall. I'm now Richard Bland College's Director of Grants.
Saturday, April 19, 2014
Phi Theta Kappa Kickball Tournament
Phi Theta Kappa hosted a kickball tournament on April 17 to raise money for the Testicular Cancer Awareness Foundation. We raised more than $200. Check out some photos on facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10152056394688587.1073741835.78511978586&type=1
https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10152056394688587.1073741835.78511978586&type=1
Wednesday, March 19, 2014
Thursday, February 27, 2014
Into the World
As part of their contracts, students in my English classes have to send at least one of their final revisions "into the world." The language in the contract is a little different from ENG 100 and 101 to ENG 102 because of 102's focus on literary genres, but the idea is the same: to think of the writing we do for class as being able to exist outside of the classroom, in the real world. This is a relatively new requirement, and I've asked students to let me know if they get responses from "the world."
Yesterday, a former student, Davianna O'Berry, shared a response with me and, with her permission, I'm including a snapshot of her twitter conversation with Erin Palmer. But first, a little background.
One of the short stories I assign for the semester is Lorrie Moore's "How to Become a Writer." The first writing assignment is a short character analysis with a twist -- students have to find some sort of personal connection to a character. So it's kind of a character analysis combined with a personal narrative.
Davianna related to Moore's depiction of uncertainty in college and beyond. She posted the essay to her class blog and found a relevant article online: "Why it's OK to be confused about your career," by Erin Palmer. She then shared her blog post with Erin Palmer, that article's author, via Twitter. While Davianna's essay may have a couple missteps and while the blog post may have a typo or two, I'm still excited that Davianna's ideas made it out of the four walls of our classroom and into the world.
Here's their Twitter conversation:
Yesterday, a former student, Davianna O'Berry, shared a response with me and, with her permission, I'm including a snapshot of her twitter conversation with Erin Palmer. But first, a little background.
One of the short stories I assign for the semester is Lorrie Moore's "How to Become a Writer." The first writing assignment is a short character analysis with a twist -- students have to find some sort of personal connection to a character. So it's kind of a character analysis combined with a personal narrative.
Davianna related to Moore's depiction of uncertainty in college and beyond. She posted the essay to her class blog and found a relevant article online: "Why it's OK to be confused about your career," by Erin Palmer. She then shared her blog post with Erin Palmer, that article's author, via Twitter. While Davianna's essay may have a couple missteps and while the blog post may have a typo or two, I'm still excited that Davianna's ideas made it out of the four walls of our classroom and into the world.
Here's their Twitter conversation:
Thursday, January 30, 2014
Why We Read and Write Poetry
Also on my personal blog. Since I keep hearing this on commercials, I thought I'd post a video of the original speech, from Dead Poets Society.
Friday, January 24, 2014
Thursday, November 7, 2013
Think Different
I posted this on my personal blog, but I wanted to post it here too. It's an Apple ad from 1997 (it's also in the movie Jobs). This is the real one, and it's for all the people -- especially students writing about the world -- who say things like "That's just the way it is" or "Things will never change." Maybe what we all need is a little more crazy!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)