Monday Sept. 14   Class Plan

1. Freewriting. Topic suggestions from the class--anything related to values? How about "describe a time when you discovered what you believed in"?
How about something like, "How it feels to be (x) me"? or "The cosmic (your name) emerges" (Hurston 209)? Describe the "cosmic" you...or describe how you feel about being something--some aspect of your identity that you did NOT choose, but that is imposed on you by the culture in a particular way, OR that you have named for yourself in a particular way (reclaiming a "name," for example, that used to be derogatory, like "queer" so that you use the term and define it, rather than accept its definition and negative associations that others have created for you).

2. Discuss news items you wrote about in small groups of 3/4. Each person takes a turn describing the article he/she chose and explaining his/her comments about it. After each person has spoken, the next person in the group to the speaker's right) must ask a question. Purpose: to practice small-group communications, especially listening skills and "sharing the floor."

How to listen in order to ask questions: take notes, writing down key words from the speaker that you find interesting or have an opinion about yourself. Use that word to help you generate a question using the "journalistic heuristic" (begin a sentence with one of these words: who, what, when, where, how, why).

Collect/return writing. Conferences possible this week during my office hours. Sign up and stop by!