mrs. dukes class

dude your screwed… Mrs. Duke’s Guide

Written on May 24, 2009 – 6:25 pm | by aimeelynn

Basically, that’s what a lot of people said coming into this class. If you really think this is the problem, then your a victim of falling for gossip. A lot of the things you hear from Mrs. Duke’s class is the amount of work and OMG I FORGOT TO BLOG THIS WEEK. Well yeah, both of those things do come along with being in the class, but there’s nothing you can do about it. At the beginning of the year I was quite upset that I didn’t end up with Mr. Engholm, but now that were nearing the end, I’m so glad I didn’t switch. Mrs. Duke decided to get the hard stuff done with first, then move on to the easy stuff, since our other classes would be doing this in the oppisite way. Mr Engholm did not do the same as Mrs. Duke. So the hard stuff we were dealing with first semester, became 10 times harder for his class second semester. Anyways, besides convincing you not to switch out of Mrs. Duke’s class, I really want to help you with things that I struggled with.

First of all, DO THE BLOGS. Do them on time, do them right, just do it ok. First semester was really pretty easy to keep up with the blogs, you should definantly do the fun blogs if you do anything at all because I mean their fun. It’s fun to write about things you like, and most of the time you feel yourself writing a lot more than you thought you would, because it’s about things you like. Moving on to the hard stuff, you really want to make sure you are actually doing the reading and then telling what YOU think, if you are having a hard time, look at someone else’s blogs for an example. That is what they are there for. Make sure you leave comments so other people know what you are thinking, and if you have the same ideas or maybe yours are contradicting. When I say do your blogs, like really it’s easy, it’s like 50 or so points a week, and it’s just stupid not to. Second semester I found myself not blogging quite as much… BIG MISTAKE. Alright so, I just didn’t blog third quarter, like at all. I did a few, then just gradually quit, because I knew I needed to make 10000 blogs up. The last night of the quarter is not the night to do blogs. I worked on blogs from 3 after school until the early hours of the morning that day. It really wasn’t fun, and my blogs were choppy and not too interesting. Blogs are supposed to be reflections of how you learn, so copying blogs isn’t very smart because you aren’t showing your ideas. Also, trying to think of things you did at the beginning of the quarter just isn’t too easy.

My favorite and least favorite things about this class really clash together. First of all, a lot of the time Mrs. Duke will except late work, unless it is ridiculous, like blogs. This really helps me, because a lot of the times more than one teacher schedules something due on one day, and if this is the case you usually have to pick and choose your grade. If you explain this to Mrs. Duke, she usually tells you that you really should work hard to turn it in tomorrow, but I guess turn it in later if you have to. In other words, she would rather us turn in something that we actually took time to look at and do rather than crap. However, she would rather us turn in crap than nothing at all. Mrs. Duke HATES to see zeros in the grade book. It really bothers her, because she knows at the end of the semester a 50 percent would really make a huge difference in comparrison to a 0 percent. Honestly, this really is true. Which goes with the thing I least like, but on the other hand I love. We have a lot of work! However, this means we have A LOT of points. Because of this, that gives you room to mess up, and improve. So you don’t do one blog, thats a zero. You go back and do it, thats at least 50 percent more. This will make a difference when there is a thousand and something points, usually highering it. So basically, if you know your paper isn’t going to be the best, keep it another night, work on it, and turn it in the next day. On the other hand, if you know you won’t work on it at all, turn it in that day, because some points is a lot better than none at all.

Moving on to vocabulary, yeah not my best subject. In most classes vocab can be easy breazy, but not in Mrs. Duke’s class. We have crazy assignments that make us really understand the word and get in it’s head and do crazy things with the words. There is never a chapter where you complete the workbook pages and turn it in and then have a multiple choice quiz. There is always something crazy, and then you must apply how the word is used in every day language. In other words, don’t memorize the word and definition, there is way more to vocab than that. Mrs. Duke would much rather us learn the word rather than memorize it, and through these rigorous exercises, we usually do. Anyways, just do it the way she wants it, and if you think you need to learn the words another way, then do that way as well.

The novels, books, plays and whatever, basically, just read them, do the work, its easy points mainly. If you don’t do the work continuously, you may get separated into a group that has to do ten times as much work with little help, this happened to my class when reading Percival, you don’t want it to happen to you. If you really engage yourself in the reading and take notes and annotate it will really help you especially when you look back to blog or write about it. There is literature that you can easily tell and I am glad that I did these things for, and there is also parts where I wish I did this.

Basically, come to this class with a positive, willing to work attitude and you will be ok. Participation points really can make or break your grade at the end of the quarter, and this is one of the only teachers that is willing to help you with these. However, if you never turn your things in on time, or something stupid, there will be no participation points to look forward to at the end of the quarter. All in all, do your work, try to turn it in on time, if you need extra time take it, try not to turn in crap but if it’s all you’ve got then just do it. Most importantly, the grass may look greener on the other side, but trust me ITS NOT!!!

Somethings some people in our class didn’t get: Your class is what you make it, if you are full of misbehaving and not doing your work, then great hope you have plenty of time at home, that’s how our class got it! a few tips from this year

1. Don’t fight over now and later’s

2. Don’t fight over chairs; for the most part we are in assigned seats anyways

3. Don’t have a huge mental breakdown

4. Don’t sneak Ernest into class

5. Mrs. Duke will let you eat in class as long as you dont stick trash in the desk or do something stupid which leads to the next rule

6. Don’t bring Chick Filet to class

7. Don’t abuse your rights such as going to the bathroom, if she says 3.4 minutes you better be back exactly then not 3.41… ITS A BIG DIFFERENCE, and if you go to the bathroom. don’t come back with chick filet

8. Don’t talk to other classes (MRS DUKES NUMBER ONE PET PEEVE SO DONT DO IT UNLESS YOU ARE PREPARED TO HAVE YOUR HEAD BITTEN OFF)

9. Don’t curse Mrs. Duke out, even if its under your breath, SHE HEARS EVERYTHING

10. Don’t turn your cell phone on loud and have your friends call it all during class

11. the classroom might be wire tapped so be careful what you do or say!

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Dear Simon Russell Beale

Written on May 24, 2009 – 6:12 pm | by aimeelynn

Dear Simon Russell Beale, Our class recently found ourselves studying Hamlet. Rather than trying to decipher Shakespearian language, our teacher decided it would be best for us to listen to the play on tape. You really played an interesting character. Not being able to see you really helped stir my imagination to what I could be listening to. I imagined Hamlet and Horatio as big very attractive men, while Polonius kind of scrawny and balding, rosencrantz and guildenstern were kind of not too attractive and schemingly bad guys, the king was just kind of large and what seemed in charge but had a flaw, the queen I could see as the ice queen from narnia, and ophelia just gorgeous and tiny. The fact that I could hear these voices, but not put them to a face and see what they were doing really opened my imagination and opened many doors to writing my director’s journal. I would write in my book where I imagined something happening in a particular scene and make sure to include it in my director’s journal. That was my favorite part of listening to your tape.

Another thing I really liked, but thought were kind of funny, was the fact that you had sound effects in the background. These started off with things like the ghost entering, there was really no way to tell when or where or who was entering the scene, so when you had those noises we knew more of what was going on. However, I could see people thinking it was a little cheesy.

For the most part, I really enjoyed listening to your audio version of Hamlet. With the work that our class was to do, this was really important because it helped our imagination flow for our directors journal. There was nothing that told us or showed us this is where something has to go or be done, it was just what the people said, and how their emotions flowed through the scene. It really helped me put my own faces to names, and helped me think of my own individual staging effects and elements of drama for the play.

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Dear Kenneth Branagh

Written on May 24, 2009 – 6:01 pm | by aimeelynn

Dear Kenneth Branagh, I recently watched you in the film Hamlet. My class has been studying Hamlet for a few weeks now and seeing your film really helped set the scene for me. I am definantly more of a visual learner you could say. Seeing you as Hamlet wasn’t what I had pictured in my mind. I would have thought Hamlet and Horatio were kind of the most attractive characters in the play. When I saw Hamlet he was just a little more feminine than I would have imagined, no offense to you, you are a great looking man. However, I just see Hamlet a little more burlier, and just kind of dumber I think. Your Hamlet seems to be quite in control of his actions while the one I pictured was a little different.

I really liked the scene when he find’s Yorick’s skull, I believe your character captured this magnificently. I liked how this scene was shown so much that I chose it to perform for my class, although my acting skills are definantly no where as good as yours, and the scenery isn’t good, nor the props, sorry I’m dissing myself rather than critiquing you. Anyways, on the other hand, I kind of had a problem with the staging of the castle and those scenes. I couldn’t see it being that bright without lighting other than windows and fire, especially in the winter. It seems like it would have been darker, especially in the hall for the dual scene. I could tell that the ending scene where everyone was dying was reworked to capture the audience of today, it was action packed, and very interesting. However, I respect how much you stuck to the lines and everything else that is done in the book. The fact that Hamlet’s funeral is portrayed this way is very interesting, but the breaking of his statue kind of bothered me in the fact that it seemed like they didn’t like him so they tore it down, I believe they should have shown them breaking Claudius’ statue instead.

Thank you so much for your time, and I hope that these things do not upset you. For the most part I really enjoyed your rework of the classic play, but those were a few of the things that I didn’t like as much, and a few that I really liked.

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Third Reading of R & G

Written on April 30, 2009 – 8:28 pm | by aimeelynn

These are still two very confusing books. This one isn’t as hard to understand as Hamlet, but these two characters are pretty hard to understand themselves. Also, the random conversations kind of throw me off, but its ok.

They still to me seem to be a little on the not so smart side becuase of the way they comprehend things that are said to them. They don’t really understand at the first look. The two don’t really understand deep meanings, and only search for the easy way out is how i see them. It seems like the way they are trying to find out things about Hamlet were not thought over well, because he always knows what they are up to. They are getting a little better, but still not good enough. When Rosencrantz and Guildenstern spoke about death I wonder if it was relating to the play, if they were figuring out Hamlet, or to this book itself. I really don’t know, but i’m sure it probably has somewhat to do with all of those

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second reading of R & G

Written on April 26, 2009 – 7:50 pm | by aimeelynn

The intertextuality begins! This is where the author actually stops making up all of his stuff and incoroperates more of Shakespears. There is an exact quote from Hamlet which starts to show more evidence of the two being related. I really think that reading these together are a good teaching mechanism to show intertextuality and show the importance of characters who seem not as important. The two characters always seem dazed and confused and incredibly lost. They really never seem to know what there doing or talking about or what ever. This story explains more of the background of Hamlet while incorporating these characters. This book is a lot easier to read because of the characters being not so serious compared to Hamlet, their not as complex their more like derrrrrrr…..

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First Reading of R & G

Written on April 26, 2009 – 6:26 pm | by aimeelynn

Alright, well when reading Hamlet you have to kind of understand the characters and why they are there. Reading this short novel gives us a behind the scenes look and understanding of the importance of Hamlet’s two friends. This is a much easier read, because it is more modern and it isn’t Shakespearian. There is a lot more going on at one time in this book, but it is more interesting because it is actually easier to read.

The coin game kind of resembles the lives of these two characters. One of the characters wonders why it happens and the other just says it happens. The players are introduced as people that would do ANYTHING for money, kind of trashy i guess.

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a little late… but everything i know

Written on April 22, 2009 – 9:24 pm | by aimeelynn

Ok, so I really couldn’t remember anything about hamlet that I had heard. However, when we read the first little excert I remember exactly everything that I had heard. Basically, Lion King is based on the story of Hamlet. Now that we have read, I have seen many things shown through the characters in The Lion King. The plot is that; his uncle kills his father, he hates his uncle, and plans on getting revenge. For some reason I get reminded a lot of Oedipus, because of the incest that is written about, it’s just kind of messed up I think.

As for drama, our class didn’t remember anything. Well, like always, we were a little out of it, or behind, or what ever you want to call it! We took notes on the elements of drama. The five elements of drama are, characters, plot, dialouge, staging, and theme. Characters are the people (or animals) that are in the work of drama. The plot is the main scheme or background of what is going on. Dialouge is the speaking that occurs between the characters to show the plot. Staging has to do with things such as blocking, which is how the characters are placed and what they are doing, costumes, how the characters look, and props, help portray more of the characters personality traits. The theme is what the work of drama is based on. A few things the class said that kind of had to do with dramas were; scenes, setting, entertainment, subtext, suspense, tragedy, comedy, diction, meter, irony, audience, imagery, soliliquy. You could see that the class was just kind of naming random things to just move on with what we were doing.

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Moving to the lower class

Written on April 5, 2009 – 8:57 pm | by aimeelynn

The past two weeks have been full of many Canterbury experiences. A small class was taught once again another tale by a group of kids. On Monday, A group presented the Wife of Bath’s tale. This was obviously the most prepared and understood group. Their information was presented and taught in a great way. They started off with a power point to teach their main important ideas. Next, the group showed an elaborate drawing of the character in a way that they had portrayed her. It was really interesting how they made connections between this tale and those of others in the Canterbury Tales. The Final piece of the puzzle for this group was the Jeans. The group portrayed the character through a pair of jeans, which was so cool and interesting. There were things such as four broken belt loops and one in tact, which symbolized five husbands. There was money, cash, frill, a leash, and control on the crotch! All of them were in places to show importance and were entertaining and interesting.

The last group to teach was the Pardoner’s group. The group stressed the irony and hypocracy shown through this tale. We learned that the tale was a type of fable in order to show not to do something. The group was very nervous, and worried about what each other spoke about. There were lots of quotes, and visual aids and a bit of lecture. At the end there were delicious brownies which topped it off! We have now come to an end with our tales and we took our test. It will be interesting to see what we move on to next.

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Study guide

Written on April 2, 2009 – 7:32 am | by aimeelynn

General Tales

The Pardoner- Exemplum- Bad- His story is about how gluttony, lying, drinking, and swearing are all bad things. However, he contradicts himself many times while telling his tale.

· A Pardoner is a man that sneaks his way into getting people to buy their way into heaven. He is a complete hypocrite and contradicts himself many times in his story. He preaches against greediness, drunkenness, and gluttony. However, these are his three biggest character traits. He is greedy, because he is lying to people about biblical things, and taking their money that they believe is buying themselves into heaven. He uses relics, biblical references, nice clothing, and elaborate lies to sell himself to others. The story he tells is about three greedy men who end up killing each other over wanting the most gold for themselves. They all plot ways to kill each other, but in the end they all end up dead, and none receive any of the gold. This shows the true character, because he is giving these people lies, but in the end he is lying to himself the most, he will end up in the deepest circles of hell.

The Miller- Fabliau- Bad- His story is a dirty bar story against lying and cheating; he tells this story to show his disgust for the class system and how he simply just doesn’t even care.

Through the Miller’s tale, I didn’t find much of a difference in how he was first portrayed, and portrayed after his story, in fact I found him worse. The class structure is referred to in his story when a lower class man sleeps with an upper class man’s wife. This shows the characters view on the social system, which is that he really doesn’t care. In the tale, Nicholas plays a trick on John, the upper class husband in order to sleep with his wife. This reflects the tricks that the Miller has played on people that he cannot be trusted with, such as tricking them into paying more for the grain and flour. The distasteful subject matter and word usage that portrays the sex, alcohol, and language he uses shows that he is lower class, a drunk, and doesn’t care what people think about him.

The Franklin- Courtly Romance- Good- This story really shows that The Franklin is a true gentelmen and really respects the theme of Courtly love and the class system.

· The Franklin’s tale is a lot more tasteful for the average person during this time period. The teller believes in chivalry and is a lot more of a gentleman. The entire story is that a man and a woman are in love, but he must go off to battle. He has to leave and she is alone and sad, which is when she meets another man who falls in love with her. She sets up a quest that she thinks is impossible for him to conquer, but he accomplishes this anyways. This shows a lot about the character, because he believes you should follow and work hard for love (chivalry). After he has accomplished this in the story, the other husband comes back and the wife doesn’t know what to do. He decides since the other has been so chivalric, he deserves her, but the other decides he could never accept this. This shows that the two are very honorable men that keep to chivalry, which makes this the most important teaching from the Franklin’s tale.

The Wife of Bath- Romance- OK- Her story shows that all women really want is control; which she also explains through her five husbands.

· The tale that the Wife of Bath tells reveals a different person than portrayed in the prologue. At first it seems that she is so dependent on men because she has had so many of them, but through her tale we learn her one desire is control. She really likes to wear the pants in the relationship; portrayed nicely by the group that presented this tale. She shows that she wants control through her husbands because that was her reasoning for marrying each of them. They all bring her up a little more on the social scale. She really is not as bad as she is portrayed, however, she uses her first three husbands for money and social status, but she didn’t like these as much. She married the last two husbands for love, even though they are the “bad” husbands; she speaks on how this is far more important than anything else. The last two husbands were a little young and wild at the time, but marrying them for love made it all worth it, especially in the end when she finally gets what she wants. Her tale basically means that you can’t expect everything out of one thing, at least that is what I got, also with love you will gain more respect, which will bring you closer and want the best for each other.

Before & After

Pardoner

the first, and final impression given off by the Pardoner is that he was the lowest of the low. He was very feminine looking, and also sounded a lot like a girl as well when he spoke. (Lines 690-691 He had a voice as thin as a goat’s; no beard did he have, nor would he ever have…”) He had long blonde hair. (Lines 677-678 The Pardoner had hair as yellow as wax, but it hung as smoothly as a hank of flax…”) He carried relics and told people to give money to the church, but would take the money for himself. (Lines 705-708 “He in one day got himself more money than the Parson got in two months. And thus, with false flattery and tricks, he made monkeys of the Parson and the people…”) This is a character flaw that put him not only at the lowest of the low in class, but also sending him straight for hell! The class decided he was most defiantly a BOO!

· the tale and the teller in this one were parallel. They are both liars and stealers. He admits that he tells stories to get money, because he is obsessed with money; which at the same time he says is the root of all evil. He contradicts himself on all of the sins he brings up, which in all is four sins if you count lying as well. He speaks against drunkenness, but when he tells the story he is drunk. He speaks against money, but is telling the story for money. He is basically a big hypocrite and is very greedy like the characters in his story.

Miller

· The first impression I was given of the Miller was that he was defiantly lower class. He isn’t so obsessed with his social status, but more so with his money. It is said he is large, muscular but heavy set, red hair and beard, and a wart on his nose. (Line 557-558 “…right on top of his nose he had a wart, and on it stood a tuft of hairs”) From this description, I kind of pictured him as being a big drunk (beer belly) and disgusting, not bathing, and smelly, basically I was right. He is a character that loves to talk and tell stories. Like most of the lower class, he lies and cheats to get what he wants, which in this case is money. He makes money by overcharging to grind people’s grains into flour. (Lines 564-565 “He knew well how to steal corn and charge threefold; and yet he had a thumb of gold, all right.”) He tells nasty stories which are usually drunken bar stories, so from this description the class ranked him with a BOO! (Lines 562-563 “He was a chatterer and a teller of the tavern tales, mostly about sin and ribaldry.”)

· my first impression and final impression of the Miller were not much different. I could tell he was a fat, nasty, drunk man that liked to talk dirty and tell bar stories. He had a crude since of humor and was not afraid to be incredibly low class. His tale reflected him like a mirror, and because of his use of vulgar words, he showed his horrible class status. The tale was a dirty bar story about lying, which was something he did daily for money. The prologue had a great description that talked about his vulgarity of language and stories, and when portrayed through his tale, which is what he really was.

Franklin

· The first impression I got from reading about the Franklin was that he was more of an upper-middle classmen. He had a lot of nice things, he drinks a lot of wine, and that he eats a lot (which at the time can show higher class). A general description of the character is that he has a white beard. He is wealthy and well known from the work he has done (line 337 “It was always his custom to live pleasurably”)(lines 361 “He had been a sheriff and a county auditor.) He is very interested in his social status and very interested in his social life. He is pretty popular so he likes to party, entertain people, and live in luxury. (Lines 343-344 The quality of his bread and ale never varied; a man of better furnished in his wine cellar did not exist He doesn’t portray any of the horrible sinner character flaws that some do, but he isn’t a very religious or great person either. For this, our class ranked him as an eh.

· In my opinion, the Franklin should have been more of a YAY, but you couldn’t tell from the prologue. He is pretty high class from the other stories we read. Through his story, you saw a gentleman, which was what the Franklin was. You also saw very chivalric acts that the characters portrayed. These were characteristics that weren’t pointed out in the prologue that I believe the Franklin had.

Wife of Bath

· The first impression of the wife of bath was that she was middle class, but dressed more like an upper-class woman. She is hard at hearing and has kind of nasty teeth, (line 470 “She was gap-toothed, to tell the truth”) but their from the medieval times so their all kind of nasty… but anyways I kind of had the impression that she was kind of slutty and mysterious, but soon that would change. (Lines 461- 462 “She had been a worthy woman all her life; she had had five husbands at the church door…”) She is a little promiscuous, but people like her and her stories. (Lines 476-477 “In company she could laugh and gossip well. She knew the remedies of love…”) Every time I hear this name I think of Caroline with her black tooth and I start laughing. The class also ranked this character with an eh.

· My first impression of the Wife of Bath was that she was kind of promiscuous, and a bad person. I learned that she really wasn’t, and her views about sex were very interesting. In her younger years, she was a bit of a gold digger, and married older men for their money. However, she realized she was missing something’s she really wanted in a relationship. The two things she needed were love and control. She finally found these with her last two husbands, even though they were poorer, and treated her badly. However, when they both realized what they had done wrong, they really loved each other. When they loved each other he gave her what she wanted, which was control.

Important Cultural Occurrences

Class Structure

Religion

Women’s rights

Know how to Answer Five Questions

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Which one gets the girl?

Written on March 29, 2009 – 11:03 am | by aimeelynn

Tuesday March 24 was a day that started off as any other. However, a group discussing the Franklins Tale, from the Canterbury tales taught a large class at Episcopal High School. Much was to be learned by all and the group started off with a power point. The power point was thorough but quite lengthy. It discussed all of the background coming into this tale. They told the class about the aspects of courtly love that are shown, and the major differences between this love and the everyday courtly love. The group explained what a Breton Lai was and how this is one. They pointed out the symbolism that was used and the references to greek god’s and astronomy. The power point was very interesting and taught us a lot about the tale, however it was lengthy and didn’t give the students much time to put in their ideas about the story even though this was simply the research and not giving away plot. After the power point, the class was broken into two groups for Lit circles. Here is where the knowing and unknowing can be showed of the tale. The discussion groups were very good for learning, but upon listening and watching one could tell there wasn’t input from everyone. In my opinion, and that of other’s, this group did an excelent job at teaching their research and conducting class.

Friday March 27 the class was taught by another small group. This tale was the Miller’s tale. It was more of a dirty bar tale. The group didn’t show very much research, but some was shown. The class was conducted starting with the group having us write the names of the characters, their characteristics, and how they were all related. We discussed all of these and learned interesting facts. We took notes on what was taught, and also the way it was taught. It was very engaging, but could have been a little more diverse. The group did a very good job as well.

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