It’s Everybody’s War (new link)

Hi there!

The Internet Archive link for the short film It’s Everybody’s War doesn’t seem to be working at the moment. (Of course! Thanks for letting me know, Jin Ju!)

However, you can see it at Google videos, here.

Essay for April 30th, and Homework

Here’s Yanfei’s essay for class critique on April 30th.

For April 29th and May 1st

Someone messed up — I think at the bookstore — and our comic book was never ordered. I was furious. Ah well.

Instead, we’ll talk about what we’re going to be doing for the second half of semester on April 29th, and probably take a look at the movie Hackers on May 1st, if I can get my hands on it.

Your MP3

Well, your exam is done!

Here’s an MP3 of it. Listen to yourself — to everyone, if you like — and then fill out the papers you can download from here.

Remember to check the schedule about your discussion-leading homework. The next discussion is coming up, and your discussion will be coming sooner or later! Start thinking about a topic and talk to me if you’re not sure. I’ll have some homework for you next week, so enjoy your weekend off! And don’t forget, you need to hand in your evaluation papers for Sang Woon’s discussion. The papers are available here.

Your MP3 and Your Loanshark Presentation

Well, your exam is done!

Here’s an MP3 of it. Listen to yourself — to everyone, if you like — and then fill out the papers you can download from here.

And remember that presentation you prepared about what you’d do to get the money to pay back a loanshark? (The presentation based on the last discussion exercise we did together.) I’ll remind you next week — you’ll need to make that presentation on Wednesday, May 1st. So get cracking!

Also, this weekend I’ll be posting about the Discussion Leading schedule. I forgot to do it earlier. Make sure to check, and to think about the topic you’d like to lead a discussion about, just in case you’re first! (We’ll be starting discussions on May 5th or 7th.)

One More Thing…

I’ll accept your reaction papers for the panel discussion on The West Wing (our last panel discussion) until Tuesday, April 29th. However, you also will have to prepare a preparation paper for the 29th, because there’s a panel discussion that day. Make sure you get both done! For more about preparations and homework, see below on the main page for this course.

Preparation for April 29th & May 1st

UPDATE: The Internet Archive link is down, but you can see it on Google Video.

Here’s a list of the things you need to check out for the first week after midterm exams:

For April 29th:

While V for Vendetta offers us the chance to examine bad leaders a little, something I will lecture about, as it’s an interesting and important contrast to the optimism of The West Wing — we’ll be mostly focusing on those people who enforce leaders’ decisions… that is, one form of the Man of Action, “Cops” (another archetype that should remind us of Jack’s role as The Sherriff on Lost).

For May 1st, we’ll have a panel discussion focusing on another form of the “Man of Action,” The Soldier. For this panel discussion, you should check out two films:

Remember that for both of those discussions, you will need to prepare Panel Discussion Question/Thoughts sheets beforehand, and Reaction Papers afterward. It’s going to be a busy week!

You might think of working ahead by checking out the films Fight Club and Catch Me If You Can, which will be for the following week’s discussion. I’ll post more about what else you need to prepare for that week a little later.

Format Guidelines

Hi everyone. I apologize for the lateness of this, but luckily, we discussed everything that is relevant in class. I discovered that my format handout prints weirdly, because it’s saved in PDF form and for 8.5×11 paper (a common North American page size) and not A4. So instead, here’s a formatting guideline. You can check the points one by one to make sure your formatting is good:

The Discussion Feedback Papers

Note: this is NOT for Midterm exams. For Midterm exam evaluation papers, please check here.

For Discussion Feedback sessions, we will use the following papers for feedback. Please make sure to print some up for yourself, and makes sure to bring them to class every time we have a discussion. (You’ll need extras, actually, for friends who run out.)

If you’re NOT leading, you need to print out this paper:

Student Feedback Sheet (PDF): You’ll be using this sheet to assign a grade to your groups’ leaders, to help your group decide on a feedback rating.

IF you ARE leading, you’ll need to print out these sheets:

Leader Feedback Sheets (PDF): You’ll be using the first sheet to give a feedback grade to your group(s) and, on the back, to rank students who were exceptionally good participators, or exceptionally bad ones. You’ll be using the second sheet to evaluate your own discussion leading-abilities.

As with all feedback, comments are important. If you don’t make comments, you’re not taking the feedback seriously enough, and will lose marks.

Midterm Exam Self-Evaluation Paper

This week, you’ll be having your midterm exam. After the exam, I’ll be asking you to fill out both of these papers for the exam:

Conversation Exam (PDF): a page for you to evaluate yourself in terms of your performance during the conversation exam, as well as to evaluate your participation in the past 7 weeks of class. Please make sure you include plenty of comments; without them, you’ll lose a grade point for not taking the exam seriously!

and

Project Evaluation (PDF): this is the normal group project evaluation paper. Make sure you list all the members in your group besides yourself. (Your self-evaluation is on the other paper.) This will help me to know how hard your group members worked, and who you think did the best during the exam. Again, please include comments unless you want to risk losing marks for not taking the exam seriously!

Everyone, good luck on your presentations!

Next Page →