WELCOME TO SEMESTER TWO: We have finished reading The Other Wes Moore, but I still need to collect and grade your annotations. Our next book will be Charles Dickens novel Great Expectations. You should purchase the Modern Library Edition, isbn 375-75701-5

Monday

Returning the finals. Students will spend time re-reading your essays. I will lecture on different issues within the times essay test, including: creating a debatable thesis statement, argumentative body paragraph structure, and inverted body paragraphs. We will also cover various issues relating to style (vague wording, rhetorical transitions and quote integrations) and conventions (use of commas and elipsis, MLA format, formatting of titles).
HW: No homework.

Tuesday

What is implicit bias, and how does it shape our understanding of race and economic opportunity? We will start with a working definition and then move into a documentary about Swedish Nobel Laureate Gunnar Myrdal's 1938 study of racial injustice: American Denial.
Hw: Obtain your copy of the next novel, Great Expectations. Our bookstore will have it either Thursday or Friday. The cost is $10, plus tax.

Wednesday

Continuing our work on the Myrdal documentary and the idea of implicit bias.
HW: Bring your copy of When the Emperor Was Divine, The Lord of the Flies, The Catcher in the Rye. Review your annotations, looking for passages that illustrate an answer to this question: How do we become the person that we are? Post ONE quote per text in the following spreadsheet. Use google sheets or google drive and check "shared with me" to find the document, entitled, "Thematic Quotes." You can view it here.

Thursday

Returning copies of The Other Wes Moore. After adding a quote for Wes Moore and reviewing everyone's passages, we will discuss. What shapes us? How do we become, that which we become?
HW: Reading a biography of Charles Dickens.

Friday

Watching a documentary on Charles Dickens life.
HW: Reading chapters 1-3 from GE.