9: 100 word short stories

Write a short story with 100 words or fewer. It should have as many features of an interesting story as possible, and it must be written in standard, readable English.

When you are done, format it so it fills a landscape A4 page and print. Mr. Kilmer will show an example.

If you don't have time to format it, post as a comment to this entry.

Royal National Theatre live broadcast at Finnkino

Phédre (by Jean Racine in a version by Ted Hughes) starring Helen Mirren broadcast live from the Royal National Theatre in London. Shown at the Maxim theatre in Helsinki Monday 25 May at 20:30.

More information: from Finnkino and from National Theatre.

11: World Literature assignment template

Download the MS Word document here.

9 self assessment

Put your self assessment in a comment. Make sure you include your name.

reading lists part 2

So here are some interesting lists I found. Click on the image to go to the site.

I strongly recommend this well-designed site from The British Council. It has recommended lists for different age levels with specific categories, and the blurbs are interesting and useful. I went in for a quick skim and came out with five new titles I want to read.

This seemed to be a pretty standard list of young reader classics from the American perspective. The same site has other reading lists.

This is a lively list of new stuff to read from New York Public Libraries. NYPL also has the ALA Top Ten Young Adult Books list, with short reviews.

Users can register and vote on books, and those books are assembled into various lists. It's a bit of a mess, but has lots of reviews of lots of books. I linked the teen section but there are many other lists as well.

A review site for 10-15 year olds written by 190-15 year olds. The newest reviews are of books from 2005, so it's not too up to date, but the categories seem useful, and it is well designed and easy to read.

For something more serious, check out a list of 101 Great Books recommended for college applicants.

The Big Read is a American National Endowment for the Arts literacy program, and they have assembled a nicew list of classics of American literature. Of course, it has the same name as the BBC Big Read, a 2003 competiton throught the UK to choose the nation's most popular books. They have ranked them up to 100.

Any other lists to recommend?

reading list part 1

I am often asked about recommended books for different aged students. I have some thoughts about how to choose books to read generally.

• My first recommendation is to go to a library and just start pulling stuff off the shelf. Does the cover look attractive? Is the blurb interesting? Read the first page. Browsing and sampling is what most readers do.


• Choose a genre and start working your way through it. I recommend mysteries, or spy novels, or westerns ... whatever you are interested in.


• Ask friends what they've read, and try out those books.


• I find the Amazon sites useful for finding new books. If you enter a book you like, look at the 'Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought'  listings for more ideas. Also, Listmania! allows Amazon users to make lists of books they like or that fit some category in which they are interested. For instance, I like Boy by Roald Dahl, and I found a list called 'Children's Books I could read forever' put together by a teacher in Norway.

In part 2, I have some links for some interesting and useful online reading lists.

10: Pride and Prejudice commentary assignment

Here's the pdf.

draft due: Monday 11 May
published due: Friday 15 May

9: Network clip

We were talking in class about how a System can be accepted and then opposed. I was reminded of this clip:

11: world lit intro slideshows

Antigone:


Three Sisters:


Mother Courage: