The Simpsons help us learn, I promise!

We spent the beginning of class talking about our speaker from last day, and we have decided to sign a thank you card for him.  Any students interested in writing a note for him should do so and give it to me by next Monday.

Students were then asked to assess their current knowledge and skill level with respect to the study of short stories.  We will review ourselves again part way through the unit, and then again at the conclusion of the unit.

We then watched an episode of "The Simpsons" with the goal of reviewing certain elements of fiction.  Students were divided into four groups, and each group was responsible for applying one element of fiction to the visual text.  Groups analyzed the following:

• protagonist (traits, round or flat, static or dynamic)
• antagonists (examples of these)
• conflicts (examples of both external and internal)
• theme (construction of a theme statement)

Groups shared their information so that everyone in the class had a record of all four elements.