Tag Archives: epic

1/26/2015 – A

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Hope you guys had a great weekend.

I started today off by talked about how language has changed from the 11th century by showing how the Lord’s Prayer has changed over the centuries. Old English has very little in common with the English that we read/write today.

We then took notes over what an epic is and specifically, what an Epic HERO is. We spent a lot of time talking about the VALUES of an EPIC HERO.

epic1 epic2

We then watched the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny and asked each one of you to ponder a specific questions as we watched:

  • Who are the epic people featured in the video?
  • What are the “valorous deeds” that have been accomplished?
  • What are some examples of the supernatural?

If you weren’t here for this, you can do this in Blackboard. I may have to play the video for you if you can’t get to You Tube on your phone.

We then worked on the Epic Dude. Using our notes, find an epic hero and fill out the template. If you need to see examples, I have some in class that you can see. 🙂

12/4/2014

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Get ready for the hardest thing you’ll ever read. Worse than Shakespeare! Harder than a stereo manual! Even more difficult than trying to file your taxes! It’s John Milton and Paradise Lost!

We listened to the Rolling Stones Sympathy for the Devil before we began today, and I even dressed up for the lesson today.

riley devilI gave you all MY notes for this, so it should be saved as a OneNote file on your desktop. If you weren’t here, or I couldn’t send it to you (Elizabeth and Kawika!), I’ll give it to you tomorrow. No point in making you do extra work!

Big ideas to remember: free will, pride, invocation, topic statement, epic, Adam and Eve, inversion, run on sentences, and sects.

If God is all powerful and all good, how is it that evil exists?

This is the essential question that John Milton is trying to answer with this poem, and for him, it goes back to Adam and Eve making a poor decision. So then he had to explain WHY Adam and Eve made that bad decision, which is why he spends so much time writing about Satan.

Make sure if you weren’t here and this confuses you, try this summary from Shmoop.

1/27/14

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Riley as a CeltWe are moving quickly and assignments may not match up completely in BB since we are cramming two days into one – a few things have been skipped over, so make sure you keeping track of your grades in Gradespeed AND Blackboard!

The first thing we did today was take the Wergild quiz: You can find this in Beowulf: Peanut Butter Jelly Time: Wergild Quiz. It’s worth 30 points and it’s open note, open group, open internet, open OneNote, open poster! You can take it as many times as you want – the point of this is learning how to translate the textbook and the poster into test questions.

Our adventurers came back from their reconnaissance mission tired, but with much knowledge. We learned that there is an old, epic king who is very generous, noble, and honorable who might be willing to help rebuild The Revenge (that’s the name of the ship, remember?). We have to learn what EPIC is before we actually go meet him. So listen up!

To prepare, we watched the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny and wrote a list of five EPIC things that we saw.

Then, we went to Beowulf: Epic Hero and printed the Characteristics of an Epic to OneNote and took notes. You can get this from a neighbor.

We ended the day with Epic Dude. Make sure that you look in BB for the instructions and that you use complete sentences. I don’t need five sentences for each square: I need a total of five sentences.

Epic DudeHopefully, I’ll see everyone tomorrow! Boo for inclement weather days!

1/28/2013

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Today, Riley started out today with the Riley Review of Peanut Butter Jelly Time – it was pretty much just a small mini-lecture reviewing all the history bits from last week.

Captain Riley as a Celt

Remember that OLD ENGLISH is not the same thing as ENGLISH.

Our adventurers came back from their reconnaissance mission tired, but with much knowledge. We learned that there is an old, epic king who is very generous, noble, and honorable who might be willing to help rebuild The Revenge (that’s the name of the ship, remember?).

But what does epic mean? We watched The Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny and identified what made this ULTIMATE, and then we took notes over an epic. Get those notes from crew member, Zully.

We then worked on the Epic Dude. Using our notes, find an epic hero and fill out the template.

One last bit of great news: ALL of my students have leveled to cabin boy!

IV – 11/26/2012

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Get ready for the hardest thing you’ll ever read. Worse than Shakespeare! Harder than a stereo manual! Even more difficult than trying to file your taxes! It’s John Milton and Paradise Lost!

Make sure that you get the notes from the background information from a classmate for the John Milton background and the first 75 lines.

Big ideas to remember: free will, pride, invocation, topic statement, epic, Adam and Eve, inversion, run ons

If God is all powerful and all good, how is it that evil exists?

 

IV – 8/31/2012

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Since our ship was destroyed by the dragon, we decided to hitch a ride with some Vikings back to Sweden to meet their King – Beowulf. Supposedly, he’s pretty generous and might even give us a ship!

So, on our way to travel to Sweden, we learn a little about this king. WE hear that he is EPIC. Epic? EPIC? What does that mean? I guess we better figure this out before we meet him.

We watched “the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny” and made of  list of of the hard core people and hard core things they did.

THIS WAS EPIC!

To drive home the point, we then highlighted notes from the textbook – called Epic Hero.

We then chose an epic hero from tv, movies, or from real life and filled in the blanks about him/her. Make sure you draw an object in the hand!

Lastly, we wrote an acrostic poem on the back of the Epic Dude that describes elements of an epic poem. Make sure that this information comes from textbook highlights and not over your specific hero. GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS.

2/2/2012

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We are now ready to actually meet Beowulf and ask him for help with our ship.

Beowulf was old, but still epic and hard core. He was actually a lot like Hutch from Secondhand Lions. We watched this video on YouTube (can’t watch on KISD computers!).

Then we met Beowulf. He was actually pretty nice, but he got impatient when people wouldn’t talk to him (or were just downright rude). The dragon that attacked our ship is actually attacking his villages and people as well. He said that he would help us, but that we’d have to help him fight the dragon. He was leaving in twenty minutes!

He left us with his lawyer, and we drafted up a contract between us and Beowulf. BE SPECIFIC, otherwise someone might be at a disadvantage.

We then went with Beowulf to fight the dragon, but things weren’t going so well. In fact, we got so scared that we ran off (most of us). In fact, some people *botched* their rolls, which meant they got so scared that they had an accident. 

We watched sadly as Beowulf was deafeated by the dragon, but his followers or thanes decided to build him a monument to his glory so that his name can live on forever.

It was a very sad day.

1/23/2012

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We were told that Beowulf is an EPIC HERO, but we don’t really know what that means, so we we tto the textbook to find out. We don’t want to accidentally offend King Beowulf when we meet him to request help to fix our ship.

We read and highlighted information from the textbook about epic heroes. We then created out own “Epic Dude” – think of a hero that is epic and fill in the blanks about him/her. Make sure you draw an object in the hand!

We watched the Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny and wrote an acrostic poem on the back of the Epic Dude that describes elements of an epic poem.

Pretty easy day!

9/12/11

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We started out sneezing today about underestimation. Grendel (and Unferth, too) underestimated Beowulf when he went to attack the monster. We talked in class about how teachers can underestimate students, especially students whose first language is not English. Riley once had an algebra teacher who sent students who spoke Spanish to the special ed. teacher. No lyin’.

We then read two sections: The Monster’s Lair which described where Grendel’s Mother lived and The Battle with Grendel’s Mother, in which Beowulf attacks Grendel’s Mother.

Riley was all crazy, acting things out. But the best part was when Beowulf received INTERVENTION (help) from the giant’s sword hanging on the wall. She talked about how she was writing a paper, and no ordinary pen or pencil could make do – she needed an EPIC weapon to help her defeat that paper. But the pencil is so mighty that no ordinary student can lift it – only an EPIC CAPTAIN like Riley could even hope to use it. Sorry, Oscar. That’s why you can’t write with the pencil. 🙂

The assignment for the day was to write up a real estate listing for Grendel’s Mother’s swamp. After she died, there was no one to inheirit the property, so we are acting like real estate agents to sell the property. Hopefully, we can get a HUGE COMISSION on the land to help fix out ship. Instructions and help are in LMS.