Class 8

In class 8, we had an hourly, and then we had a lecture with an introduction to George Orwell.

You need to bring your finished short story to Class 9, and read "Shooting an Elephant" which is available at the photocopy shop and here.

Note that after Eid, we will go back to our usual schedule: Monday 3-6 (section B) and Friday 3-6 (section A). I'm still trying to figure out how Section B will make up the one class that will be missed due to Eid. Stay tuned!

Class 7

In class 7, we did the following:

• worked on sentence rewrites
• studied the difference between "that" and "which", "then" and "than", and "especially" and "specially"
• Did a writing exercise about voice (see post below)
• had a lecture about the subtler points of Creative Writing.
  
  
  Section B: bring your short story outlines to class tomorrow. Your hourly starts sharp at 10:45 am. Section A, your hourly will be 10:45 am on Thursday morning.

Creative Writing Exercise

Here's the passage you were asked to work on to give it more "voice":

I was really excited about going. It would be the best day of the summer. We were going to go rafting.
My mother, father, brother, and sister got to go. They were excited, too. My dad knew a lot of stuff about rafting. This would be neat.
When we got to the river, it looked big. The water was moving fast. I got scared.It turned out to be fun. We ate sandwiches and drank pop. I wore a life jacket and got wet.
It was the best thing I did all summer.

Late Papers

Those of you who brought me your papers late - Zoyaa Mahmood, Muhammed Daniyal Asad, Fatima Zia, and Sheherbano Mirza in Section A - please bring them to me in the next class so I can have your marks changed from "0" to the requisite grade. Don't forget.

After this, I will not accept any late assignments. If you haven't created a blog by now, too late. If you don't bring your paper on time - the short story - I won't accept it after the deadline. If you miss the hourly, there is nothing that I can do.

There are two non-negotiable elements to SZABIST education - punctuality and deadlines. No compromise on either. There are no excuses. If you need to miss a class, inform me BEFOREHAND and hand your assignment in to me BEFOREHAND. I won't accept it afterward.

Back to 100 Clifton!

Starting from tomorrow, Wednesday September 17, all EWS classes will be held at 100 Clifton. See you sharp at 10:45 am!

Class Timings

This week, Section A has a makeup class (6) on Wednesday at 10:45 and regular class (7) on Thursday at 10:45 am.

Next week, Section B will have regular class on Monday 10:45 am (7) and makeup class (8) on Tuesday at 10:45 am.

Class 8 for both classes will be your second Hourly.

Class 6

In today's class, we studied:

• How to develop into a strong writer
• A lecture about the Nitty Gritty of Creative Writing
• Grammar: Subject-Verb agreement
• And we worked on writing an oulitne of our short story which you will bring to Class 7.

Class Timings for Next Week

Section B will meet as usual on Monday, 10:45 am.

Section A will have a makeup class on Wednesday, 10:45 am, as well as Thursday, 10:45 am.

Please note that many of you are being very careless about your attendance. Some of you already have two or three Late's, which is equal to one absent. Some of you have one or two Absent's, and three Absent's means you will fail this class. So please come on time - your grade depends on it.

Class 5

In today's class:

• We worked on grammar - verb tenses in the future, and did a small verb quiz to test our knowledge of gerunds and infinitives. The verb quiz is available in your Yahoo Group pages.
• We discussed Roald Dahl's short story, "Poison".
• We had a lecture on writing fiction.
• We reviewed the answers to the hourly exams.
• We listened to three Poynter's Podcasts on:

1. Paying attention to names
2. Using original images and avoiding cliches
3. Riff on the creative words of others

Your assignment is to come up with an idea for a short story. The idea should be encapsulated in a single sentence that includes the central conflict in the story.

What's wrong with this ad?

Point out all the mistakes you can see here (not including the photograph of our new President).

Class 4

In class 4, we had our hourly, then a lecture on Creative Writing.

I asked you to write a paragraph imagining yourself as your mother preparing Sehri - what would be her thoughts; what would she say; how would she act? This is to be posted on your blogs as Entry 2 and will be marked for your grade.

Finally, you were asked to read Roald Dalh's "Poison" for the next class, and to bring the final drafts of your "Who Am I" essay for Class 5.

Poison

The short story by Roald Dalh that I've assigned you to read for the next class (Thursday for Section A, Tuesday for Section B after your hourly on Monday) is available at this site.  Please print it out and bring to class; I will be making the photocopy available on Monday at 90 Clifton.

Class 3

In this class, here's what we did:

• Passive and Active Voice exercises
  
• Listened to Poynter Podcasts about the active and passive voice - activate your verbs! Use passive voice to show the victim of the action
  
• We also worked on punctuation and listened to a Podcast about that - use punctuation to control pace and space
  
• Finally we had a lecture on Proofreading and Editing. Remember that you will make mistakes that the Microsoft Spell Checker won't catch. It's important that you read over your work to make sure you catch everything. Especially homonyms - words that are spelled or pronounced the same but have different meanings.
  

Blogs have been added to the blog list on the left. 

The hourly takes place in Class 4: Thursday, September 4 at 10:45 am for Section A and Monday, September 8 at 10:45 am for Section B. Good luck!

Do you agree?

This newspaper article explains the importance of prepositions in a very unique way!

The Writing Center

While you're working on your "Who Am I" essays, remember that you can take your drafts to the Writing Center at 100 SZABIST for feedback and help with your work. This is a free service for you so be sure to take advantage of it!

Section A Makeup Class

Our makeup class will be held tomorrow, Wednesday, September 3, 2008, in room 22 at the 90 Clifton Campus. The timing will be 10:45 am - 12:45 pm.

Ramadan Kareem!