Tuesday 11/22/11

There are a handful of you absent today -- hopefully on your way to visit family for Thanksgiving!  I collected the explications on "The Nymph's Reply to the Shepherd" that you completed for homework, and I will give extra credit to those who did an above-average job.  We worked on scanning exercises individually and then shared our results on the board.  I put a copy of the exercise in your files in the classroom.

Meter consists of TWO components:  1.  the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in 2. lines of a set length.  Helpful hints when scanning a line of poetry include:
1-start with iambic to see if you hear the da-dum sound.  
2-if more than two lines are provided, read both lines since both will have the same pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables
3-look for the most important words in the line.  Usually but NOT always, they are the ones that are stressed.

• Hexameter = 6 feet in a line
• Check out Moodle for some Scanning Practice exercises in prepartion for exams.
• Raleigh used the word "nymph" on purpose (vs. "a girl's")--- to add to his poem's meaning, tone and purpose. I am eager to see if anyone included this in their explications!
• No homework this weekend.  The next vocabulary quiz is TUESDAY, the 29th. 

I am thankful for all of you and wish you a relaxing, memorable Thanksgiving with your families.