Hello!

A few reminders:

Today, we'll discuss My So-Called Life, The Achievement of Desire, and the textbook's perspective on the American family.  We'll spend some time reviewing for the upcoming oral exam (next week!).  Bring your lists of 10 key terms to class, and we'll work in groups on preparing for the oral exam.  We'll take a trip to the TLITC e-portfolio lab, too.

Submit your in-progress e-portfolio for peer critique by TONIGHT, 11/21 at 11:59 PM in our course in http://bhcc.digication.com  Please also do a short self-assessment.

Next week, the oral exam will take place!  Sign up for the oral exam here!  Please arrive five minutes before your scheduled exam time and wait at the bottom of the stairs in the hallway outside my office--I will call your name when I am ready for your exam.

By 11/27, next Wednesday at 11:59 PM, please critique two of your classmates' portfolios on http://bhcc.digication.com

Revise your portfolio in response to your classmates' feedback!

By Tuesday, 12/3, submit the second draft of your portfolio for peer critique on http://bhcc.digication.com

Today in class, we will watch an episode of My So-Called Life.  As a television show, it is an artifact of American leisure time, one of our topics this week.  It is also a depiction of American teenage life in the 1990s, and looks at an American family and its members.  This episode, "Father Figures", focuses on the protagonist's (Angela Chase) relationship to her father, and her close friend, Rayanne (who has grown up mostly fatherless) and her role in that relationship.  You can read a fan-created transcript of the episode here.  Think about how Richard Rodriguez' family (as described in The Achievement of Desire) is different from and similar to the Chase family depicted in My So-Called Life.

Please take notes on today's interviews!  

Please use these notes to type up and submit by email by Tuesday at 2:30 PM (also bring a copy to class)

• your notes on ONE interview subject
• your ideas for three additional questions you might ask the subject, based on his answers as reported in your notes
• your ideas for three additional questions or ideas you might investigate using other sources (books, articles, websites, etc.) inspired by the interview, if you were doing a project on education in the U.S.

For next time, please also reread the Richard Rodriguez reading. Focus this time on what he says about his evolving relationship with his family.

Sign up for the second oral exam!

A reminder

Please work on developing your e-portfolio!  The first draft is due Thursday, 11/21--not long now!  Please submit this first draft in Digication, in the relevant assignment in our course in Digication (http://bhcc.digication.com)

Today, you will receive three handouts:
Zora Neale Hurston, How It Feels to be Colored Me (1928)
Richard Rodriguez, The Achievement of Desire (1982)
Adrienne Rich, Claiming an Education (1977)

Please read these by Tuesday.  In different ways, they all speak to diversity in America and American education, the topics we are thinking about most at this moment in the class.  Please write a two or three paragraph journal response to whichever one YOU find most compelling and email it to me by noon on next Tuesday, November 12.  In your response, identify a compelling and important idea in the essay or speech you have chosen, and discuss how it relates to your personal experience.

In addition, by Tuesday, please think of three questions for the interviews we will conduct on Thursday, November 14.  For information on this please see the "interview questions assignment" linked in the previous post.

Please also work on preparing for the oral exam, coming up the week of November 25.  Here is the guide for the upcoming oral exam.

Interview questions assignment