Welcome to British Literature. We've had a great start to this class. This is one of my favorite classes to teach; I love British literature, and I love discussing it with students This is a small class this semester, only 3 students, but I have high hopes for the quality discussions that we will have!
We began our class with a Quick Write, in which I wanted the students to respond to the question, "What is your favorite book and why?" We then discussed the elements of quality literature and determined that books that stand the test of time do so because of the story they tell and the style that they tell it in.
Our first book is a prose version of the ancient story, Beowulf. Written as heroic poetry, I have the students read a prose version because for the sake of this class, I choose to focus on the story rather than the poetic style that it was originally written. Written some time between the 8th and 11th centuries, this work had been somewhat forgotten until J.R.R. Tolkein revitalized the study of it, not only because of its literary qualities, but also because of its linguistic and historic aspects. One of the key parts of this class is our group discussions about the literature that we're reading. My favorite aspect of these discussions is that students will bring discussion questions to class. Rather than answer questions from a study guide that I provide, they are to read the material and come up with their own questions that they feel would be good to "mull over" in a discussion. While we will talk about the specific details of the plot and characters, these questions should aimed at more critical thinking and analysis topics. In other words, "how" and "why" questions. As the students read the first portion of the book, they are also to pay attention the themes (see this page from Sparks Notes)
For those new to my classes, I send out weekly Class Notes to let parents know what we did in class and to remind students about the assignments, along with any attachments for that week. I also put the Class Notes and the content for any handouts on a blog for this class. Finally, I have a Google Drive folder that also has copies of the handouts.
I forgot to mention to the class that I have PDFs of coloring pages for the story of Beowulf on the shared Google Drive. I will bring some copies to class next week, but students can follow this link to view the pages and print any that they want.
This week's links:
Class Notes
Assignments for Next Week:
-- Read p. 1 - 30 of Beowulf
-- 3 Discussion Questions: Either answer questions from the Beowulf worksheet or write your own questions.
Have a great week!
Mrs. Prichard
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