Taylor finished her analysis of the poem, "Dulce et Decorum Est," and then we worked on the third assignment from her former teacher, which is an analysis of a Winston Churchill speech. I gave Taylor some notes on the context of speeches in general (occasion, audience, and purpose), and we listened to a recording of "Be Ye Men of Valour." We then read through the speech and identified aspects of its occasion, audience, and purpose. Finally, Taylor composed the first paragraph of her analysis.
We continued work on Taylor's analysis of the poem "Dreamers." She finished her draft of a three-paragraph analysis per her previous teacher's instructions, and we began the introduction to her second assignment, an analysis of the poem "Dulce et Decorum Est."
Today we started one of the assignments sent to Taylor from her previous teacher. We read through two poems ("Dulce et Decorum Est" and "Dreamers") line by line and unpacked their meanings through the images used by both poets. We also outlined how she will organize her written analyses, and Taylor will begin writing them next week.
Session Minutes
75
Minutes Student Attended
45
Lesson Comments
I spoke to Taylor over the phone and we shared a Google Document to read the poems and make some notes. She was not able to get her Skype account connected, so we resorted to a phone call. By the time this started, there were only 45 minutes left in class.
Taylor finished reading the short story that we began last week, and completed an activity identifying the work's characteristics and literary devices. I then gave her some contextual information about the novel "Rebecca" by Daphne du Maurier, and she read the first three chapters of the novel while discussing and noting certain characteristics of the narration (narrator, setting, characters, etc.) and new vocabulary terms. She also viewed a clip of the film adaptation of "Rebecca" (Hitchcock, 1940), which we will revisit after Taylor has finished reading the novel.
Session Minutes
105
Minutes Student Attended
105
Lesson Comments
After today's session, I received information about the assignments that Taylor needs to complete from her previous British Literature class. We will begin working on them right away, in addition to continuing the new readings that I have planned for her.
During this class session, Taylor was going to finish reading a short story and fill out an analysis worksheet on it, and I was going to give her some historical and cultural background information on the novel "Rebecca."
Today Taylor and I had an introductory class in which she filled out a new student survey about her previous experiences and preferences regarding reading and writing practices, as well as other information to get to know her. She also filled me in on what she covered in her previous British Literature class. We then began reading a short story by Roald Dahl, and Taylor answered some reading comprehension and literary analysis questions as we read.
