How is my summer going?

pretty, pretty, good!

PS: That is Dave Matthews

Sophocles PowerPoint

As promised: Sophocles PowerPoint


Here you go Austin, Michelle, Jon, Ryan and Julie!

Mr. Cullen

Hamlet Test and The Road Trailer!!!

Students,

I hope that you had a wonderful day at Kennywood. I really thought that it was going to thunderstorm, but it seems that the weather held. I have a few updates for you:

The Hamlet Test for Periods 6 & 7 will be Thursday May 21st. Be sure to review the Shakespeare PowerPoint, because that will be a lot of points on the test. Here are all of the Hamlet Study Guides, and here are all of the quizzes.

Since most of you read The Road, you might be interested to know that a trailer for the film was finally released. It will be in theaters this fall (only a year late!). Looks to be a very close adaptation to the book-- so it will be very scary and depressing.

Enjoy!

Hydroxy Cut

I rarely post things that are not related to the class, but I thought that this might affect some of my students. According to the FDA, you should stop using all Hydroxycut products immediately. 

Here is the article from CNN.com. 

Periods 6 & 7: Hamlet

Wow! It seems like it was only last week that we started Hamlet and we are already almost half of the way completed with it! I know that this can be a very challenging unit for the students, but my suggestions is to not allow yourself to get "stuck" on the language. This play is about the isolation of Hamlet from the rest of society-- so try to put yourself in Hamlet's shoes (and in the shoes of the other characters).

If you have any questions about the play, please feel free to post them here. If you need any help on the day that an assignment is due, please feel free to see me during activity period, 2nd period or 4th period. I also stay afterschool Monday-Thursday.

Happy Shakespearing!!!

Study Guide (All Acts)
Full-Text version (no line numbers-- but easy to read!)
Journal & Schedule

*BONUS

If you can tell me the title of the book that the above picture is from, I will give you 3 bonus points. Only 1 student per class can win the contest. You must post your answer as a comment to this entry...

Periods 3 & 5: 1984

Now that we have finished with Hamlet, we are reading George Orwell's 1984. My goal for this unit is for you to be able to make connections between the book and the world in which we live. While this book may seem "out there", it does have relevance to us.

This post will be updated with any and all changes. If you have any questions about the assignments, feel free to post them here.

Study Guide (sections I, II, III)

Reading Schedule

Journal Assignment

Full-Text 1984

Hamlet!!!

Seniors-

As period 6 & 7 begin Hamlet, period 3 & 5 are preparing for the culminating assessment for our unit on Shakespeare and Hamlet. 

On Tuesday I will update the blog to be more specific for period 6 & 7 in regards to Hamlet. If you are looking for the study guides, you can find them in in the post relating to period 3 & 5. 

For periods 3 & 5: Your Hamlet test is Tuesday, April 21st. If you have any questions about the play or the test, feel free to post them here. 

Good luck!!

The Time Traveler's Wife Movie: August!

For all of those waiting for the film adaption of the Time Traveler's Wife, they announced that it would finally be released in August! 

Here is the article. 

As far as the Road and The Lovely Bones, I have read nothing!

Periods 3 & 5: Hamlet

I love teaching Hamlet-- and that is one of the reasons that I love teaching Literary Studies. As we read Hamlet together, this post will be the epicenter for any and all of the resources that you will need.

If you have any questions or concerns, feel free to post them here!

Shakespeare/Hamlet PowerPoint

Journal Assignment & Reading Schedule (to be updated later)

Full-text version of Hamlet

Study Guide 1

Stuidy Guide 2

Periods 6 & 7: 1984

Here is the post that all things related to 1984 will be uploaded. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask them!

Full-text version of the novel

Study Guide [all sections]

Due Dates

I will add things here as they pertain to the story!

Literary Studies: A Big Week Ahead of Us!!

Update: Here are the study guides for each of my Literary Studies classes. I will continue to update these documents (put them in chronolgical order and add any late assignments). While these are not perfect, they will help you prepare for the test.

Period 3

Period 5

Period 6

Period 7

Update 2: It has come to my attention that not all of the quizzes were handed back for our reading ofOedipus the King. Since these will be an excellent resource to study, I am posting all of the quizzes for Oedipus. Of course, you will need to fill in the answers yourself!

Oedipus the Quizzes

Update 3: I have decided to remove the essay from the test tomorrow. The test is long enough without an essay question to deal with. Please note that you will complete that essay at a later date (Thursday/Friday). 


Seniors-

First and foremost, I would like to thank all of the students that took the time and participated in the most recent opportunity for bonus. I will have all of the bonus points entered into Skynet by the end of the day.

As the title suggests, we have quite the busy week! I wanted to write a post so that you know exactly what is expected of you for each of the upcoming days.

On Monday you will be working with your partners (trios!) to complete the "Oedipus Quotes Assignment" that we started last week. If you want, you could also find a few quotes from Antigone, because that will also be on the test. If you lost your assignment sheet, here is a link to another. This assignment must be completed by the end of class. You will be able to access all of the quotes from all of the classes by 8 pm Monday evening. I am hoping that this is an excellent source for all of you to use to prepare for the test.

Tuesday will be an in-class review day for the upcoming test.

Wednesday will be your "All things Sophocles" test. For this test you will be responsible for all of the information that we have discussed concerning Sophocles, the Greek Theater, Oedipus the King and Antigone. I will tell you now: this is not an easy test. It is quotes based, so you will need to identify quotes, who said them and why they are significant to the text. Please also remember to study the Power Point that I gave at the start of the unit (You can find the entire presentation in an earlier blog post).

On Thursday, you will have your full book test. This test is worth 20 points and allows you to demonstrate an understanding of your novel. After the quiz, we will have reading circle discussions and immediately after your group's discussion, your journal is due. I am asking that these journals are typed and are at least 3/4 of a page long (double spaced). If you are having a problem thinking of a good journal topic, feel free to use the topics that I have created for you in this earlier blog post.

Friday will be a continuation of our reading circle discussions.

It is a busy week! Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns.

Mr. Cullen

Opportunity for Bonus: Closed!

Students-

Since many of you have asked for extra credit, I have decided to give you the chance to earn up to 4 bonus points. Since I am a big fan of movies, you will be attempting to pick the oscar winners for the top four categories (Picture, Director, Actor and Actress).

Before the Academy Awards begin (8 pm EST), please post who you think will win in the top categories. You will receive 1 bonus point for each of the categories that you get correct, for a possible 4 points.

And the nominees are:

Best Actor:

Frank Langella- Frost/Nixon

Sean Penn- Milk

Richard Jenkins- The Visitor

Brad Pitt- The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Mickey Rourke- The Wrestler

Best Actress:

Anne Hathaway- Rachel Getting Married

Angelina Jolie- Changeling

Melissa Leo- Frozen River

Meryl Streep- Doubt

Kate Winslet- The Reader

Best Director:

Slumdog Millionaire

The Reader

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Frost/Nixon

Milk

Best Picture:

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Frost/Nixon

Milk

The Reader

Slumdog Millionaire

In order to expedite the process of looking at the results, please post them in the following format (and these are my picks!). If you do not use the following format, I will not accept your results. Good Luck!

Best Actor: Frank Langella

Best Actress: Meryl Streep

Best Director: Frost/Nixon

Best Film: Frost/Nixon

All Things Antigone

Seniors,

Since the rest of the week is somewhat hectic, I wanted to post the upcoming schedule for our reading of Sophocles's Antigone. First and foremost, if you neglect to bring your book home, here is a link to a full-text version with line numbers. Please be aware that (once again) the translation is different from our textbook, so the line numbers are a little bit off. Once again, all of our readings end after long parts spoken by the chorus.

Reading Schedule

For 2/17
lines 1-416

For 2/19
lines 417-1091

For 2/20
lines 1092- 1470

I expect that we will go through this play at a much quicker rate, since you are already familiar with Sophocles's style.

If you miss class on any of the above days, you will be expected to take the quiz on the following day.

Please feel free to post comments if you have any questions.

Random Updates

Since some of you do read the blog regularly, I have decided to post a few things that I found interesting today.

As some of you know, I love the Muppets. I found this article on CNN.com about Jim Henson's inspirations for some of his greatest characters. Very cool.

I also found this article about Marvel releasing motion comics for the iPhone and the iPod Touch. If you are familiar with the Watchmen, DC has already released a motion comic for the entire series (a bit pricey, in my opinion-- but they are great!).

I will be giving 3 bonus points to the first person from each of my classes that can identify the muppets in the above picture [the lobster's don't have specific names]

Good Luck!

New Kindle from Amazon!

Students,

While I am not entirely sold on the device for my everyday use (since I make so many annotations in my books) I do really like Amazon's Kindle (if you don't know what it is, you can think of it as an iPod for books).

Here is an article on the new version of Kindle that was released today. I think that some of you might find it interesting.

This device intrigues me, not because of the current applications, but because of the future applications. Wouldn't it be great to have all of your textbooks on one electronic device? Instead of going to the college bookstore and spending hundreds of dollars on textbooks, one day you might be able to download them wirelessly for a fraction of the cost! Very cool.

Of course, if the Kindle catches on, I might be making fewer trips to Half Price Books!

Reading Circle Journal: Update!

Seniors,

When your full book is due on Thursday, February 26th, you are also required to turn in a journal. In the past, students have had problems writing a journal and instead have simply written a summary. While summaries are sometimes important writings, I do not not simply want proof that you have read the text (your test score is the evidence I use for that).

Composing a journal entry is higher-level analytical writing as compared to a summary. Since these writings are sometimes more difficult to start, I am posting "possible journal entry questions" for each of the reading circle texts.

As a way to earn a few bonus points, you can post possible journal questions onto this blog entry.

This post will be updated through Wednesday evening (2/25), so please check back!

Mr. Cullen


Period 3
The Road
Slaughterhouse V
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close
Catch-22
The Color Purple
Interview with a Vampire
Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy


Period 5
In Cold Blood
Lovely Bones
The Road
Wicked
Time Traveler's Wife
Fallen Angels

Period 6
The Catcher in the Rye
The Lovely Bones
Cat's Cradle

Period 7
Black Like Me
The Road
The Lovely Bones
Fahrenheit 451

*Please note that this post has been updated to include the date for the full book quiz and journal!!

Death of John Updike

American author, and two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, John Updike has died. My seniors should remember him as the author of A&P, one of the short stories we read during the first nine weeks of school. 

Here is a link to his obituary [if you read his obituary, you might get some bonus points on the next reading quiz!] . 

Mr. Cullen

Terrible Towel Challenge

Update: The window of opportunity for this bonus has closed. Thank you to all of the students that sent pictures in! I will leave the pictures up as a way to celebrate our Super Bowl Championship. Way to go Stillers!

Mr. Cullen

In anticipation of the Stillers Super Bowl victory, I am going to offer students a chance to earn up to 3 bonus points for finders pictures of Terrible Towels in random places around the country or world. Pittsburgh and Tampa don't count. I will give bonus points based on how crazy/awesome the location of the Terrible Towel is. You can email me the picture and I will upload it to this post.

For example, here is the Terrible Towel at the International Space Station.

and here is a picture from www.postgazette.com:

Good Luck!

Update: submitted pics as of 1/28:

Sophmores: Anthem

Sophmores,

As promised, here is the information pertaining to our reading of Ayn Rand's Anthem. On this post you will find study guides and the vocabulary handout. If you have any questions about the book, please feel free to post a comment (I am sure that another student may have the same question!).

Chapter 1 Study Guide (Due 1/28). Please write out the answers to these questions in your journal.

Vocabulary List You will have a test on the first 12 words Friday (1/30) after your 4-Sight test.

Left your book at school? Here is a full-text version of Anthem (not easy to read, but you can still do your homework!) 

Oedipus Schedule

Since the snow is falling and delays are being called, I wanted to give all of you the schedule ahead of time pertaining to our reading of Oedipus the King. The dates listed are the dates that the reading is due, not the date that it was assigned. Expect a quiz everyday.

[The due dates have been adjusted for the snow day on 1/28]

Due Date Line Numbers*

1/27 1-244

1/29 245-571

1/30 572-996^

2/3 997-1350

2/4 1351- end

*I could not find the exact version that we use in class. This version is a different translation, but is very close to our textbook. The above line numbers are for the textbook version. The version online is a little bit longer-- just pay attention to when the chorus ends (that is where I have broken up our readings)

^ Due to the snow delays this week, I shortened the reading for period 3. If you are in period 3, you only need to read up to line 768. This will allow us to discuss things that we have been unable to discuss thus far. Expect a quiz!