Summer Assignments

[Claire]

[font=arial]...are the most annoying things anyone could ever think of.

This is pretty much my first summer where the assignments will actually mean anything; going into the ninth grade I didn't have one, and the work I had to do before tenth grade ended up not counting because I switched schools very early into the year.

Anyway, the kids going into the college level AP Language course have had a very rough summer, and I'm sure most of them are nowhere near finished with the assignments (including myself, which really sucks because school starts again a week from monday. :[[[[)

Here's basically what we have to do:

Read A Lesson Before Dying by Ernest Gaines AND The Things They Carried by Tim O'Brien, keep a "dialectical journal" and write an essay for one of them.

Print out a copy of Henry David Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience" essay, write an essay on that, and answer a bunch of questions.

Read On Writing by Stephen King, write an essay on it.

Read Into the Wild OR Into Thin Air, both by Jon Krakauer, write an essay on it.

Right now I've read two and a half books and written one essay. I'd say I'm pretty much screwed, as I can't even begin to think of how to write the one I'm focusing on now (about Into the Wild).

And pretty much the only reason for that amount of work is that the teachers in charge of this class want to weed out the kids who don't think they can handle it. I'm sort of expecting to walk into that classroom on the 20th and find about ten kids there. (That's just if I don't explode with frustration before I make it there).

So, complain about your own summer assignments, about how much of a waste of time they are (especially since summer break is a time to RECOVER).

Or you could praise them for being useful, [SIZE="1"]but if you do I'll beat you up. >:[[/SIZE][/font]

[2010DigitalBoy]

[COLOR="DarkOrange"]Well, for English 11 advanced I was given 2 novels. Huck Finn and 'The Awakening.' Every 2 weeks was a set date that I was supposed to email the teacher with interpretive questions about each story. I have yet to even start reading the Awakening, and huck finn I read about 40 pages before school ended and never touched again.

I think I'm also supposed to write a report on one and do a packet on the other. I don't care - I have no plan to do it :p. Didn't do any homework last year, don't plan to start now.[/COLOR]

[eleanor]

[font="trebuchet ms"] @ Clurr: That sucks, it truly does. I've never seen such a big summer assignment for AP Lang. Last year all I had to do for that class was read On Writing Well by William K. Zinsser and analyze our own writing styles. AP Lang is a ptetty slack class if you already know how to write timed essays, though. Everything else is sort of useless (at least, my class was).

[b]AP Lit[/b]

[i]The Poisonwood Bible[/i], Barbara Kingsolver
[i]Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead[/i], Tom Stoppard
Annotate poem anthology of choice

This assignment surprised me. Incredibly light, and even though my reader journals are the devil, it's all just busy work. I had to annotate a book of Lucille Cilfton poems, though, and sometimes I was just stumped.

[b]AP Gov[/b]

[i]The Future of Freedom: Illiberal Democracy at Home and Abroad[/i], Fareed Zakaria
[i]The World is Flat[/i], Thomas L. Friedman

This was actually an interesting book, as opposed to other nonfiction summer reading I've had. I actually enjoyed reading it, because I thought Zakaria was saying something worthwhile. It was a sort of a pain in the *** to write an essay analyzing it, though, mostly because I don't know much about international politics and Zakaria analyzes everything for you.

Need I say anything about The World is Flat?

I'm just glad my other AP classes didn't give our summer assignments. Now that I've finished, I have two more days to enjoy summer. =_=[/font]

[Dragonmanm2]

[COLOR="Blue"]I got all this meaningless crap to do over the summer.
I have to read "Who Moved my cheese? for Teens", and "The Mysterious Benidict Socitiy." I finished the first book, but the second tries way to hard to be Harry Potter.

The theme of both books is change, and dealing with how your life changes. I know all about change. I've been working with Asburger's Syndrome all my life, so change in my life is no challenge for me.
The teachers at my school are just trying to help prepare me for getting my own place, and a job, that's all.
I guess all college students have to do that sooner or later. Oh well.

"KAMEHAMEHA!"

Dragonmanm2[/COLOR]

[pooperson]

[COLOR="DeepSkyBlue"][SIZE="1"]Thankfully, I didn't have any summer assignments this year, as I dropped the one class I [I]would[/I] have it in. That was AP Government with the We The People program. I would have had to..

1. Read the textbook. It's long.
2. Read two books from a hugely long book list and write essays about both.
3. Research two current events and do something or another. Powerpoints? I dunno... I forget. I dropped the class (due to a scheduling conflict, mind you.)

Going into freshman year was pretty bad when it came to summer reading. But that was only because of the huge assignment: [U]Great Expectations[/U]. I don't even remember what I had to [I]do[/I] (but I'm thinking there was a dialectic journal)... just that I had to read it and do a few assignments. It took me two weeks to just [I]read[/I], and that was [I]with[/I] Sparknotes. I also had to read two other books of my choice ([U]Staying Fat For Sarah Byrnes[/U] and [U]A Child Called "It"[/U]) and do some pretty easy assingments.

Sophomore year I had to read three books... the first was [U]1984[/U]. That came with another dialectic journal. All I remember is that it took a really long time but that I loved the book to no extent. The second book was [U]Foundation[/U]. I don't think I had an assignment on that one... but it was an interesting book, to say at the least. Then I read [U]Death of a Salesman[/U]. That was one of my favorite books I have ever read. I had an assignment, but of course I don't remember what it was.

Then junior year was going into AP Lit. Three books again. [U]Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolfe?[/U] was incredible. I don't remember the assignment. Then there was [U]Tom Sawyer[/U] which included a dialectic journal and [U]Huck Finn[/U] which included a dialectic journal and an essay. Yeah.

And of course, with all these books, I had further assignments and about a thousand quizzes the week school started.

Yay summer reading![/SIZE][/COLOR]

[Allamorph]

[FONT=Arial]My one question is: what the devil is a dialectic journal? I'll assume it's some inanity or other that some English "professor" cooked up so other teachers could cop out and follow a format. Sadly, most things that go on in the English classroom are inane, so what have we.

Summer reading is a pain, especially when accompanied by essays. What the teacher never, [I]never[/I] considers is that no one wants to buy the books, and the local library most likely only has one, maybe two copies of the literature in stock, so basically the first person to check them out hangs onto them until they've finished their essays, and then whoever finds it next out of the twenty-odd people searching for it takes it, and the rest are hung out to dry.

Also, lower-level summer reading materials have utterly no relevance to each other whatsoever. The teachers don't even [I]try[/I] to link them. You'd think, you really would, but no. You can't wean people onto summer assignments. You ultimately end up antagonizing all the students, instead of "preparing" some of them. (For what, I can't possibly imagine.)

Oh, jays; I'm ranting, aren't I? Oops.

Oh well. At least I don't have to worry about them anymore.

[quote name='Lunox][FONT="Trebuchet MS"][U]Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead[/U'], Tom Stoppard[/FONT][/quote]
That play was the best evar. Especially the ping-pong match.

Seriously, guys. If you haven't read this, I highly encourage you do. It's great. So what if it ties into Hamlet?[/FONT]

[Claire]

[quote name='Allamorph'][FONT=Arial]My one question is: what the devil is a dialectic journal? I'll assume it's some inanity or other that some English "professor" cooked up so other teachers could cop out and follow a format. Sadly, most things that go on in the English classroom are inane, so what have we.[/FONT][/QUOTE]

[FONT="Arial"]Honestly, I don't even know myself. The directions they gave us in this humongous packet aren't completely useful. It says something about picking quotes as I read and try to interpret/analyze it. The entries in the journal are supposed to have 2-3 quotes and the analysis for each needs to be a page long (!!?!?)

It doesn't even tell me about how many quotes I need to analyze. >:[[/FONT]

[eleanor]

[quote name='Allamorph'][FONT=Arial]
That play was the best evar. Especially the ping-pong match.

Seriously, guys. If you haven't read this, I highly encourage you do. It's great. So what if it ties into Hamlet?[/FONT][/QUOTE]

[font="trebuchet ms"] I liked Albert, lol. But I don't recall a ping-pong match. :L [/font]

[Allamorph]

[FONT=Arial]So basically, you're supposed to take the entire book and dissect it in your own words. Bleah. I'd rather just do a book report and have done.

[quote name='Clurr][FONT="Arial"']It doesn't even tell me about how many quotes I need to analyze. >:[[/FONT][/quote]
Like you expected any different? :P
[quote name='Lunox][font="trebuchet ms"'] I liked Albert, lol. But I don't recall a ping-pong match. :L [/font][/quote]
Statement. One-love.

You seriously didn't catch that? :animesmil[/FONT]

[eleanor]

[quote name='Allamorph'][FONT=Arial]
Statement. One-love.

You seriously didn't catch that? :animesmil[/FONT][/QUOTE]

[font="trebuchet ms"] That's tennis! I guess they use the same scoring for ping-pong, too. lol[/font]

[Korey]

You kids complain about the silliest things now a days. I took AP English courses and I had summer reading EVERY year that I was in Advanced English. I got slammed my Junior and Senior years with 4 books and plays and essays to interpret. So before you kids go and complain about how much work you had...let me remind you that YOU signed up for these classes you smartypantses. :P

I think I can clear up the "WTF is a dialetic journal?" question. Basically a dialetic journal is something where you right down quotes from the novel and explain their significance in the work and what literary terms they contain. In my Junior year of AP english...we had one due for every novel we did. It's very time consuming but if there isn't a strict set of guidelines, you can BS it and look for the similes and personification in the novel....^_~

All I can say from here is good luck and imagine what college is gonna feel like.

[Allamorph]

[quote name='Lunox][font="trebuchet ms"'] That's tennis! I guess they use the same scoring for ping-pong, too. lol[/font][/quote]
[FONT=Arial]Statement. Two-love. :p

Tennis, ping-pong, badminton: aren't they basically the same?
[quote name='Korey']All I can say from here is good luck and imagine what college is gonna feel like.[/quote]
Oh, man, college feels [I]great[/I]. I had to write all of two papers for the entire year. I mean, wow. Not having to BS at all was so wonderful. I even managed to tie [I]Tainted Love[/I] into the second one, just for fun, and I made it work.[/FONT]

[Rachmaninoff]

[quote name='Clurr;787607][font=arial]...are the most annoying things anyone could ever think of.[/font][/QUOTE]I honestly can't relate, since even though I never took classes that resulted in summer assignments, I always had music lessons twice a month and practicing to do every day of the week. About the only exception is that sometimes I'd take Sunday's off. I suppose the reason it wasn't annoying is I like doing it. [quote name='Clurr;787607][font=arial]So, complain about your own summer assignments, about how much of a waste of time they are (especially since summer break is a time to RECOVER).[/font][/QUOTE]On some level I don't think they are a waste, but then even in college I've always taken summer classes as well. About the only difference is I'd take a lighter work load so I'd only have classes three to four times a week. That was how I recovered, so to speak, a lighter workload so I could do more fun things while the weather was warm. So I can't really complain since I've gotten use to it.[QUOTE=Clurr'][font=arial]Or you could praise them for being useful, [SIZE="1"]but if you do I'll beat you up. >:[[/SIZE'][/font][/quote]I'm guessing this is the point where I get beaten up right? But then I can't help but think that way, I know my goals in eventually getting my doctorate in music has been strengthened by all those summers that I did practice. It's helped me get to where I am now, close to getting my masters degree. Taking time off has the opposite effect for what I'm doing. I got hurt in a car accident last year and couldn't practice for several months, it really hurt as I was playing catch up for a while to regain some of the edge I lost.

[Soren]

[FONT="Garamond"][SIZE="3"]Yay, summer assignments!

(Runs)

I don't have it too bad, except for the fact that I took summer school (my schedule is [I]very[/I] crowded) and most of my assignments were popped on me 3 weeks before school starts.:animedepr

English III/GT: Read "East of Eden" by John Steinbeck (so far, really good), mark 10 passages that I think are well written (I have upwards of 20 picked out, and if I had it my way I would turn the entire book in as a well written passage)

Creative Writing: Read and write a report on each:
2) books (one fiction, one non-fiction) (I am going to cut corners and pick East of Eden, and the non-fiction is a biography, "The Man who Loved only Numbers")
1) poetry collection (Poe! Woohooo!)
1) play (some Shakespear, no doubt)
1) short story collection (I have a collection of Korean shorts under the title "Land of Exile", but I don't think there is any way I will have this part of the assignment done on time.)
5) pages of original work (already done)

Instrumental Music:
Have all scales and arpeggios prepared
Learn a new piece

It's giong to be a little craxy, but I love school work (ducks), so it shouldn't be to bad.

@Clur: What do you mean, recovery? What's more relaxing than reading more than a thousand pages of writing and writing reports on all of them? [I]WHO SAID I"M NOT RELAXED?! WHERE'S MY COFFE?![/I]:mad:
[/SIZE][/FONT]

[Claire]

[quote name='Korey'] So before you kids go and complain about how much work you had...let me remind you that YOU signed up for these classes you smartypantses. :P[/QUOTE]

[FONT="Arial"]It's just my school that had this workload, as far as I know. The high school my mom teaches at only made their upcoming AP Language students read TWO books and do ONE assignment. :[

Last year was kind of stressful for me, though I'm not completely sure why. It's not like I exerted myself that much. Although it was pretty tense to take tests I had no idea what to do on (ahem, algebra >_>)....[/font]

[SunfallE]

[COLOR="goldenrod"][FONT="Comic Sans MS"]I never had summer assignments for the simple reason that I hated High School and never did more than I had to. I liked Orchestra and that was about it. XP But college, that was another matter, I loved college! So I always took the summer semester since a number of the classes had all sorts of fun extra activities that weren't available in the fall or spring terms.

I took science honors just so I could also go on the trips with the class to the different national parks in Utah. Heh. Those trips were great fun, and so was the class, but then I like science. :catgirl: Now if it was a class that gave extra English assignments... I'd run in the other direction. Extra assignments like that are just wrong. lol

Anyway... I'll trade you on the English for the Math Clurr. Those assignment/tests... I do know what to do with them. Unlike the English. XP[/FONT][/COLOR]