Term Two study break tasks

Hi everyone!


Hope you're getting a little down-time and enjoying the break.  Remember to be strategic about your time so everything gets done!

To that end, here's what I want ready for me by DAY ONE of Term Three:

• Read Merchant of Venice play (cover to cover).
• Read summary and analysis sections of Merchant of Venice study guide, for all scenes.
• Reduce ALL notes to core basics.  Yes, 'all'.  For every poem, all chapters in Silas Marner, and all writing styles in Language.

Below are the links for those of you who would like to try some papers.
Enjoy.  :)

Language -
Paper 2 question paper, Paper 2 insert (has the extracts you need to read)
Paper 3 question paper, Paper 3 insert

Literature -
Paper 1 - question paper (all extracts included; answer ONE question for Songs of Ourselves and ONE for Silas Marner)
Paper 3 - this is Merchant of Venice; I haven't taught it, so I won't be giving you questions for it yet.
Paper 4 - good practice!  Just use PEEL.  Pick ONE question to answer.

These links will ONLY be up for this and next week, as I'm unsure about the copyright restrictions and would like to avoid breaking the law; somehow it just seems to be poor role-modelling.  :)


- T. Marcus

lion heart by Amanda Chong

Hi everyone,


Mostly we'll focus on background legends regarding the origin of Singapore.

This link gives a few versions of the above-mentioned legends; the one on the Mer-lion is of particular interest to our research.  This is the story as advertised by a Singapore travel agency website.

(Here's another series of legends.  Number 9 is a largely summarised Mer-lion tale.)

I found a VERY basic summary and analysis, yet Mr. Sir has the most comprehensive online analysis I've seen by far.


- T. Marcus

She was a Phantom of Delight - William Wordsworth

Hi everyone,


Here is a lovely little analysis on the poem that I semi-agree with.  I leave it to you to tell me what parts of this analysis I don't like and why.  :)

This article is of much higher and exhaustively analytical quality.

And of course Mr. Sir's notes yield some strong insights.


- T. Marcus

A little note on grammar: Hyphenating end line words

Hi everyone,


Have a look at this webpage.  This should give you a much stronger understanding of how to use hyphens in your own writing.  (I've seen some VERY interesting choices, and thought I should give you hints on how to present your essays nicely for examiners.)  :)

Now, here's an Are You Checking The Blog check:

• After you've looked at the above webpage, I'd like you to reply to THIS BLOG POST and tell me one thing you learned about hyphens that you're going to do now.  Sign your name.
• If you cannot reply to this post for any reason, come see me in person and tell me directly what you one thing about hyphens was.

Have a good day!


- T. Marcus

Love (III) - George Herbert, extra notes

Hello everyone!


By all means have a look at Mr. Sir's notes, but make sure you read this too!  (It's pretty short.)

I particularly enjoyed a short article from the Wall Street Journal, which mentions near the end:

"But Herbert is most dear to us because his poems suggest an intimacy of discourse between the poet and his creator."

That should be more than adequate for this poem, yet there are LOTS of other places you could look, and a quick Google search of "George Herbert" plus either "Love iii", "The Temple" or "poetry" will give you screeds of information.


- T. Marcus

Father Returning Home - Edith Sitwell

Hi everyone,


Let's get straight into it:

The "nomads entering...through a narrow pass" are apparently referring to a specific aspect of India's long and glorious tradition of being invaded.

This particular time looks back to about 1500BC, when India was invaded by a race known as the Aryans.  Have a look at how different this culture was from what the father in the poem experiences.

Have a look at their history.  Ultimately, the effect of the coming of the Aryans was responsible for the founding of Hinduism.  This adds a further layer to the meaningful nature of their impact on the society they lived in - again, contrasting with the experience of the father.

Further information on the Aryan invasion of the Indus Valley can be found here.

Mr. Sir's website unexpectedly crashed when I was trying to get you an edit of his notes, so I loyally gave up and went to other sites.  This website has some interesting thoughts, though WOW do you have to wade through the ads.


- T. Marcus

Heart & Mind - Our latest Songs of Ourselves

Hi everyone!


The Edith Sitwell link here will tell you a lot about her life.  Don't look at it other than for interest; in terms of helping you with analysis, it won't.

This site has ... I suppose an interesting thought to use as a starting point, but really doesn't investigate the subject convincingly.  Still, it's applicable on the topic of uncontrollable passion.

This one is way better, though still incomplete.  Use it.  Good notes.

Finally, this one yielded some good observations.  Looks to have been done by a student, so my apologies in advance for errors in grammar, spelling and overall structure.  That aside, once again I found it useful as a launchpad into my own analysis.


- T. Marcus