Junior Summer Reading: English III H

Your summer reading includes the following books:

Breathing In, Breathing Out by Ralph Fletcher
Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

I recommend reading them in the order listed, but that is not 100% necessary. The Fletcher book is a slim volume, and it is a nifty little handbook of sorts about keeping a notebook. You will keep a reading and writing notebook throughout the year. This notebook will be a place for you to jot down your thoughts about a novel or a poem; it will be a place for you to generate ideas for your own writing; in short, it will be you all-purpose English journal, so you should make sure you have one just for this class. You may choose any style of notebook, though I recommend your standard composition notebook because it's a good size, and it is inexpensive (it's what I use myself).

To begin with, use your notebook this summer to record your thoughts and ideas about the three books you read. What you record (observations, ideas, questions, reactions, analysis) and how you record it (by date, by chapter, by section, by complete work) is entirely up to you.

When you have finished reading a book and writing about it, return to your notebook and highlight some of your favorite writing/observations/questions/analyses and post them to this Summer Reading Blog. Also, comment on posts made by your classmates -- this will allow us to have a "classroom" discussion without being at school. I will weigh in from time to time as well. If you have any questions about this, please feel free to contact me by email any time. Happy reading and writing! ~ Ms. R

2 comments:

AnonymousAugust 13, 2011 at 12:33 PM
Let's get the ball rolling on this blog, shall we, Gals? I'll post first to give you someplace to begin. In Chapter 5 of Fletcher's "Breathing In, Breathing Out," he refers to writers' notebooks as being full of "string too short to be saved" yet too important to throw away. I like this idea very much. I have this notion that at any given time, you might open your notebook, grab one of those too-short pieces of string and all-of-a-sudden find a use for it. Maybe it's a simile you made up that you liked the sound of("The children's laughter was like a tambourine") that was unconnected to anything THEN, but NOW it becomes part of a poem or the first line of a story. I appreciate Fletcher for giving me a place to keep all those unconnected bits and pieces of language & observation.
LizSeptember 5, 2011 at 1:20 PM
Hi my name is Liz. Im sorry i didn't blog sooner- i had no idea there was a blog! I agree with this idea of keeping all your writing in a notebook. For example i wrote some poetry last summer, and i ended up being able to use some lines in assignments throughout sophomore year. Anything you write can be used again... kinda like recycling your thoughts and ideas.