Bellwork

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Bellwork

• Please Answer
• What advantages do we offer students when we
  provide them with a prompt that asks them to
  analyze literature?

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TWISTing up Literary Analysis A Strategy for
Prompt Writing

• Nicole Lemme, Ida S. Baker High School
• Crystal Marrone, Ida S. Baker High School
• 2009 Cadre

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Overview Outcomes

• Overview
• The teacher will learn the TWIST strategy as a
  means to facilitate close reading of literature,
  culminating in a literary analysis of any length
  and for any grade level.

• Outcomes
• Teachers will understand the concept of Perfect
  Practice
• Teachers will understand and be able to include
  key research-based instructional strategies for
  teaching in a block schedule.

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Benefits of Literary Analysis

• Writing literary analysis responses to prompts
  helps students to
• Practice critical thinking
• Improve their organization
• Write with greater coherence
• Develop a central idea
• Develop support backed by evidence
• Prepare for AP and college-level study

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What is TWIST?

• It is a close reading strategy that encourages
  students to look for meaningful details in a
  selection of prose or poetry.
• TWIST may help students to formulate a
  well-written thesis in response to a prompt.

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The elements of TWIST

• T Tone
• W Word Choice
• I Imagery and detail
• S Style
• T - Theme

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Elements contd

• Tone
• Attitude of the author or speaker toward the
  subject
• Word Choice (Diction)
• Terms referring to the specific words or clusters
  of words in the selection that are loaded with
  connotation, associations, or emotional impact
• Imagery or Details
• A term referring to sense impression created by
  the writer images may be those of sound, touch,
  smell, taste, or sight. Detail refers to facts or
  objects.

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Elements contd

• Style
• A term referring to the authors characteristic
  use of language and the tools of a writer
  figurative language, point of view, literary
  techniques, etc.
• Theme
• Concerns the meaning of the passage, the insight,
  both particular and universal, that an author has
  to offer about life itself. It is the core of the
  work, its reason for being.

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Doing the TWIST

• Please read the passage from Eudora Weltys One
  Writers Beginnings.
• As you read, look for elements of TWIST in the
  passage.
• Fill out your graphic organizer for each element
  of TWIST that you are able to locate.

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Charting Ideas

• In teams, please rotate from chart to chart,
  adding ideas for each element of TWIST.
• Use your answers from the graphic organizer you
  just completed.
• Please dont duplicate any answers.
• Time will be called when it is time to rotate to
  the next chart.

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• Amused, nostalgic look at the roots of her
  intellectual life
• Shows admiration and appreciation towards her
  mother
• Fear of going into the library contrasted with
  her mothers encouragement
• Gives reader a sense of awe and apprehension the
  author felt upon entering the Library
• Authors intense love of reading is clearly
  evident
• Reverence towards books with the Library as holy

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• Language used to describe her feelings for
  reading is intense
• Rushes home
• Leaps upon books she has seized
• Gratifies her devouring wish to read
• Feels bliss when she enters world of fiction
• Her insatiable appetite for reading must be
  fulfilled immediately

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• Weltys mother reading Time magazine while
  playing at Little Red Riding Hood
• Reading while baking, curling hair, and playing
  games
• Fantasy images Big Bad Wolf, dragon eye, and
  librarian as a witch
• Cave-like library

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• Writes as an adult understanding her childhood
  experience
• Uses a humorous point-of-view
• Use of capital letters for emphasis, SILENCE
• Use of hyperbole I would do anything to read
• Use of colon and semicolon to link related,
  complex ideas

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• Perception vs. Reality
• Allusions to fairy tales, archetypes, and heroic
  fantasy
• Transformative power of literature to make every
  day life special
• Insatiability of Passion
• Her hunger and need fuels the love and inspires
  the desire to create

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Next Step Attacking the Thesis

• First, revisit the prompt for the passage.
• Now, in pairs, apply the three-part process of
  Thesis Development in relation to the prompt
• Define or identify the TASK
• Consider WHAT needs to be addressed
• Decide HOW best to respond to the prompt

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Three-Part Process Answers

• Define or identify the TASK
• Analyze how language conveys the intensity and
  value of her experiences.
• Consider WHAT needs to be addressed
• The prompt directs students to discuss Weltys
  language and how this language creates meaning
• Decide HOW best to respond to the prompt
• By concentrating on language (diction, tone,
  syntax, and imagery). Then, develop a framework
  for response.

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Crafting Your Thesis

• Now that you have answered your TASK, WHAT, and
  HOW, and you have filled out your TWIST graphic
  organizer, create a thesis that addresses the
  prompt.
• There are several copies throughout the room that
  you can use as anchors. (This is Perfect
  Practice!)
• Use these to check your thesis or if you are
  struggling with crafting your own thesis.
• These are meant to be aides Please dont copy
  someone elses thesis.

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Discussing what makes a good thesis

• The challenge of obtaining books from the strict,
  stern, rule-bound librarian haunted Eudora
  Weltys childhood reading experiences made
  reading seem even more desirable because the
  difficulty of getting them made books seem like
  forbidden fruit.

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• Through her use of language related to the world
  of fairy tales, archetypes, and heroic fantasy,
  Eudora Welty makes the world of books seem like a
  magical and perilous realm of mystery and
  adventure.
• Reading is a natural and as necessary as
  breathing to people such as Eudora Welty and her
  mother to such readers, the experience of
  reading is bliss and the delight of reading
  lends a charm to life that is more precious than
  any treasure.

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How to use this in your classroom

• Start with TWIST for those students unfamiliar
  with literary analysis.
• Next, have students practice creating valid
  thesis statements.
• After students are comfortable and succeeding
  with thesis creation, have them transition into
  developing introductory paragraphs.
• From here, students can craft introductions
  followed by body paragraphs outlined.
• Finally, move students into full-blown essays.

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Ideas for different levels

• For honors and AP level students, give them timed
  writings
• For general ed. students, allow them to develop
  essays at a less structured pace.
• Use previous college board prompts and modify
  them to meet your classroom objectives.

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Modifying College Board prompts

• Adapt only a small part of the original question
  to make the topic appropriate for your students.
• Substitute more suitable passages from literature
  while maintaining the themes used in the original
  examination questions.
• Select terminology (from TWIST) and use that
  terminology when constructing your own written
  response topic.

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Examples of Modified Prompts

• Original Prompt Read the following poem
  carefully. Then write a well-organized essay in
  which you analyze how the poems organization,
  diction, and figurative language prepare the
  reader for the speakers concluding response.
  Discuss the events leading to the speakers
  epiphany.

• Modified Prompt Read the following poem
  carefully. Then, using quotations from the poem,
  describe the poets feelings for the migrating
  wild geese.

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Examples of Modified Prompts

• Original prompt Read carefully the following
  autobiographical narrative. In a well-written
  essay, analyze some of the ways in which the
  author recreates the experience of his guilty
  6-year-old self. Consider devices such as
  contrast, repetition, pacing, diction, and
  imagery.

• Modified prompts Analyze some of the ways in
  which the author recreates the experience of his
  guilty 6-year-old self. Consider repetition and
  imagery.
• Write about a time you did something wrong.
  Discuss similarities and differences to what the
  author experienced.

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Your Turn

• Discuss how you would modify the original prompt
  weve been working with (below). Try to discuss
  this with teachers who teach similar levels.
• In the following passage from her autobiography,
  One Writers Beginnings, Eudora Welty recalls
  early experiences of reading and books that had
  later impact on her craft as a writer of fiction.
  In a well-organized essay, analyze how Weltys
  language conveys the intensity and value of these
  experiences.

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Additional Resources on Sharepoint

• TWIST graphic organizer template
• Eudora Welty passage with prompt
• Full-length anchor papers for Welty prompt
• Head graders rationale for why the anchor papers
  received the score they did
• Rubric for grading Welty responses
• This entire powerpoint

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www.collegeboard.com

• Resource where you can find previous AP prompts
  for modification, along with rubrics and anchor
  papers for the past 10 years

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Sources

• The AP Vertical Teams Guide for English, 2nd
  edition.
• www.collegeboard.com
• http//www.areavoices.com/hodgepodge/index.cfm?blo
  g27853