An important reading item - everyone should access this

Dear Sir, I have read a short story I found on the web while I was looking for the black plague in Africa. It was a very touching piece of writing about an African boy of 8 years old. His mother had died the previous year and his father had died 3 years ago.             The writer says that the boy, himself was suffering from the disease as well. The writer describes the boy’s character as a calm and gentle person who gave everyone a feeling of relaxation.             Jonathan, the boy, loved talking to people and adored the beauties of the world. He liked watching people’s reactions to things. He liked finding out something new. He thought of the world as a beautiful and majestic place with secrets at every nook and cranny. Jonathan liked watching the birds in the sky and he knew that they were in peace with nature; to Jonathan’s ears the song of the birds was a beautiful melody. He liked the pitter patter rain drops falling from the dark clouds gathered in the sky above him. He liked every natural thing in this world.             What I liked most about Jonathan was that he was not afraid of dying. He was ready for his time to come and be united with his parents, friends and family.             I liked the ending of the story- “the poor little innocent souls know is that they are standing at destiny’s door, waiting to be invited in”. You can read the story on this link -  http://www.bukisa.com/articles/46916_standing-at-destinys-door Azima Tarannum

• The writer's purpose
• Capturing a dramatic moment
• Planning and writing a talk [Dialogues and Speeches]
• Different forms of writing [Radio News, Tele Conversation, Diary Entry, Interview, Plan of Operation, Letter to Friend, Police Report, Ransom Note, Song Lyrics, Laundry List, Pamphlet, Lecture Notes, Grocery List, Blurbs, Bills, Menu Card in a Restaurant, Letter of Recommendation, CV, Absence Letters, Obituary, Billboards, Epitaphs, E-mail, Text message, Chatting, Twitter, Assignments, Thesis]
• Writing a Screen Play
• Writer's Technique
• Choice of Words
• Sentence length
• Rhythmic flow
• Distinctive Style
• Satire 
• Imagination

Translation of Tagore Song "Aji Dokhino Duar Khola"

My southern entrance is left open today

Come home, come, enter your abode

O my spring thou come to me

Today my southern door will be open

I'll put your heart on waves

Come home, come, make your entry

Fresh in your green dewy chariot

Come thou with your steps over the star flowers

To my garden.

[Collectively translated.]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8D4SC_NQb6Y


Terms:

• Couplet
• Cultural Translation
• Variation in translation
• Word choice / Diction
• Personification

Most Dangerous Game: Novel Reading for January 2012

Reading is The Most Dangerous Game:

• Oni: Pride and Prejudice/Great Expectations (Re-send me a schedule of classes)
• Lord of the Flies: Maliha, Galib, Raief, Sabrina, 
• Pride and Prejudice: Fariza, Azima, Asmita, Aporajita, 
• Sense and Sensibility / Northanger Abbey: Tanima

From among the above Novels choose a Chapter and a page for reading in the class.

Enjoying English Book 4 

O Level English Practice - J Millington Ward

Send me reports on your reading at home. 

shahidul_mamun@yahoo.com

Darwin and War Movies

Today we have read a few paragraphs of Darwin's wonderfully worded Journals, which he had kept during his Voyage of the Beagle. A few words which is often used in our everyday writings have also been discussed.

Task: Imagine that you have arrived at a volcanic island as part of a scientific expedition team - give your description of how you arrived, what did you see, what happened. 

16 December Friday Class Schedule

Dear All,

On the 16th December, National Independence Day, we will have following items. 

1. Brief Breathing Exercise - 10 Min. We had these sessions on previous occasions. 
2. Film Screening on a Larger Screen - duration 2.30 hours - 
3. Little other interesting things!

Everyone is requested to attend. The session may take a total of 3 hours. SO, ask your parents to pick you up at 11.00. Anyone who is late will miss out a lot of things.

A Home Task - Street Children

Topic:

Street children: their vulnerability and our responsibility.

We have already discussed and brainstormed on several points and everyone MUST bring their essay. You should remember that this is an Argumentative Essay.

Submission is mandatory for all.

[Minimum 1000 - Maximum 2000 Words]

Coming Friday

Entire class will be on what you have done in the next 5 days from today.

Bring the following books -

1. Seely
2. Village by the Sea
3. Chekhov Stories [Those who have problems regarding sentence structures will read this]
4. Novel of your Choice [Mayor of Casterbridge, Pride and Prejudice, Sense & Sensibility, Animal Farm, Great Expectation, Lord of the Flies, Jane Eyre, Robinson Crusoe]
5. STRESS BOOK.

Students who are NOT working on any Text: Sabrina, Aporajita, Shafat. 

Today's Items

1. Moby Dick - while explaining the word 'volition' - we also watched a clip from Gregory Peck Movie.                
2. Sea-Fever
3. We also looked into the first paragraph of Chapter 2 of Village by the Sea. There is a sentence beginning with "It was quite a cheap cotton sari ...", which has 60 words in it. Students should not attempt anything longer than 25-27 words in their longest sentences.
4. We will have MOCK on coming Friday - 4th November. Please bring the following
1. Stressbook
2. John Seely - Oxford Secondary English Book
3. Pen and 2 Pencils of 2B Grade. 
4. You MAY also bring Color Pencils / Pastel.
5. Duration 3 Hours
6. Full Marks: NONE
7. You will be Graded: A / C / D
8. You will be marked HOLISTICALLY

History in TIMELINE

Find an excellent link here. Use this to refresh your memory and make corrections to your concept of history.

http://www.fsmitha.com/t-index.html

Essay Topic from 2011 Edexcel Paper

All these 3 topics are pretty easy to handle.

1. Describe your favourite place - Real or Imaginary [Should be based on Sylvia Plath's poem Wuthering Heights]
2. Write a story - real or imaginary - titled "The Visit" [Based on the short story The Landlady]
3. "Travel broadens the mind" - to what extent do you agree with the view. [Must also include reference to Emily Dickinson poem There is no Frigate like a book]

The first essay is Descriptive, the second one Narrative, and the third one Argumentative.

Descriptive and Narrative essays - Guidelines

Descriptive Writing:

1. Use a magnifying glass for detailed description
2. Use careful assortment of Adjectives
3. Impressionistic writing - [page 32 of New English Course - extract from To the Lighthouse]

Narrative Writing: [We read an extract from Huck Finn]

1. A little of Dialogue - little of Description - little of Planning
2. Use Dialogue to establish a character
3. Description - 2 types - Description of action and of objects
4. Never write a story that gives SOLUTION in the end.
5. Never write an story in a strictly chronological order - [Bad Example: Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen]
6. Try to include overlapping TIME / Parallel Time in your story-line. 
7. Learn to use Flash-back technique.

In BOTH cases: 

1. Perfect Graphology
2. Variation of Punctuation [Use Semicolon, Colon, Dash, Hyphen carefully] 
3.  Sentence Variation
4. Too many LONG and too many SHORT sentences MUST be avoided.
5. Try to write minimum 650 words in ONE hour.

Best place for learning to Write Articles and Stories

The place can be found here:

http://www.britishcouncil.org/learnenglish-central-magazine-archive-2.htm

We read and LISTENED to an article titled Vice, Investment and Seven Deadly Sins. There is also an interesting article on Wormholes and Time -travel.

You are also advised to go to MIT website and read the following article.

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2011/graphene-thermoelectric-1007.html


Please also check this very interesting video!!!

http://www.stumbleupon.com/su/2HMImL/www.youtube.com/watch%253Fv%253Dfc1X8VJBfDA

Reading Report from Yasin

Sir I have read two more stories of Chekhov.

"In The Graveyard"

The story describes a graveyard where a man who is almost at the end of his life comes to the graveyard for the last time to forgive  the person who was his biggest enemy who now is dead and lies beneath the depth of the grave. One of the line in the story I have loved the most and that is - 

". . . forgotten friend Mushkin . . .".

Time had erased the never, and corrected the falsehood of man.

"The Album"- This is another story that reflects the true colour of the human nature.Its about a General who, after a long duty of ten years, retires. Its a sorrowful moment for him and his sub-ordinates that a man serving his country for long years will now retire.The sub-ordinates presented him with an album containing picture of themselves. But as the General returned home all the sorrow moments disappeared and his true colour was revealed when he gave the album away to his children - he tore the pictures into pieces. 

An essay based on the Hungarian song

The Morning After

The prisoners finished their daily chores and went back to their cells. They had to work every day from the morning till the sun went down. Every day they made weapons, grenades and other tools of destruction. They worked for the German people because they were captured from Hungary, during the First World War. The weapons which they made every day were used against their own country, the only thing they could do was watch because if they protested they were beaten to death.

The prison was very bad, it was rotten and the rules were very harsh. The prison seemed like living hell. Inside the prison there was a place called the “Gas Chamber”, where the prisoners who were sick were kept so that they died there after several days. The prisoners who disobeyed the prison or did any mistake were beaten very badly and then kept in the “Gas Chamber”. The prison was on the outskirts of the city. No one could go to that place without the permission of the government. The prison was highly protected by the guards and if someone tried to escape they were killed.

The moment the sunlight reached to the cells of the prisoners, they had to wake up and start working. They were in the prison for many days and they did not know where their families were. They even did not know if their family members were still alive. All the timed they hoped that they are going to be free again and would be able to see their family again. A prisoner called Benedict was missing his family very much. One day he asked one of the guards that when will he be able to see his family again. The guard said that he won’t be able to see his family again because Hungary could never defeat Germany in the war. This made Benedict very angry so he punched the guard on the face. All the guards surrounded him and he was beaten to death.

One evening four of the prisoners planned to sing a song in the prison. All the other prisoners gathered in a room to listen to their song. It was a sad Hungarian song and they sang it to express their feelings. When they started to sing, all the other prisoners were happy for a moment but as the song went near the ending the prisoners were sad again. They knew that the morning after they had to start working again. After several months the war ended. They all were free again and as soon as they got out they took a breath of freedom. They all went back to Hungary and met their family after many years. But they could never forget the pain they had to go through in the prison.

From Tazwar

Comment: The general language level is OK. But the essay relies too much on description and chronology of events. There is not a single dialogue and no human character is established. However, I am sure that the writer will develop these ideas very fast because he is working with a determination.

Mamun

All Literature Syllabus - 2011 and 2012

A Level Literature - Cambridge

1. Unit 3: Songs of Ourselves, Dragon Book of Verse, Seamus Heany Selected Poems, Passage to India.
2. Unit 4: Equus, Winter's Tale, A Streetcar Names Desire, An Ideal Husband.
3. Unit 5: Coriolanus, The Changeling, Mansfield Park, Hard Times.
4. Unit 6: The God of Small Things, To the Lighthouse, Translations.

This week Sayka shall concentrate on Unit 5 and we will have a lecture class next week.

O Level Literature -

EDEXCEL

Paper 1
Full Marks: 60 / Time 1 h 30 min

Novel: Pride and Prejudice + The English Teacher
Drama: An Inspector Call + Our Town + Importance of being Earnest [Mise-en-Scene]
Poems: Anthology + Dragon Book of Verse

CAMBRIDGE

Full Marks: 100 / Time 2 h 40 min

Novel:          Wuthering Heights / Great Gatsby / Ethan Fromme
Drama:         Much Ado About Nothing / Death of a Salesman
Poem:          Songs of Ourselves + Dragon Book of Verse

The Grand Question

"I lose concentration at the end of first one and a half hours. What do I do?

Let's play some solutions:

1. Take a break after the hour. During break listen to Music - anything goes. Really? Depends on the student's cultural upbringing (which invariably always depends on the family's cultural status.)
2. evabe uthle - ja concentration chilo ta O chole jabe.
3. Try doing a different subject.
4. The day you don't feel like - don't study at all.
5. Make a Prison-house around yourself - and this will force you to concentrate and study.
6. When all in the house are asleep - study - these are the best hours to concentrate. [Problem: The existence of family members are a big problem in my life.]
7. Do nothing - sit and stare at the wall - [so strange!]
8. Play - [With whom, what?] [Not video games - TT, Chess]
9. Sleep [escape from the troubles of life - when you wake up - the troubles are back again!]
10. Read story books - [sounds very depressing and Counterproductive indeed!]
11. Go out for five minutes - and come back after a while. [Very suspicious solution]
12. Plan for further rough N tough time ahead.
13. Play musical instruments - those who can not shall listen to instrumental music!
14. TV - Master-Chef Australia, Sports Channel,
15. Facebook [suggested by Shafat Jamil] - the matter shall be taken care of later.
16. Family gossip - for some time.
17. Visit this BLOG.
18. Painting is one of the best solution.
19. Gossip over phone - for 20 min.
20. Demand for special food - demand met - you eat - and sit before the TV feeling satisfied.
21. Prepare experimental foods. Waste materials and time.
22. Bully others - younger and older brothers and sisters.
23. Cycling - where? [Park, road]
24. Reading newspapers - listening to news.
25. Reading a magazine.
26. Origami [Sounds lame]
27. Cartoon sketch [Most un-creative]
28. Crafts making
29. Visit grandmother [who lives next door]
30. Go for shopping [with whatever money you have or don't have]

Argumentative Essay Topic

1. Child obesity can only be stopped by putting a ban on fast-food chains.
2. There is no solution to the traffic problem in Dhaka.
3. Communism is a better way to governance than capitalism is.
4. Instead of increasing tax, government should negotiate with opposition to put an end to strikes and thus save public money.
5. Limited physical punishment at school should be allowed.
6. Social networking is detrimental to studies.
7. Bullying is fine within limits.
8. Cats are better than dogs. 
9. Drugs are NOT affecting today's youngsters.
10. Sale of gaming consoles should be stopped in Bangladesh.
11. Poverty is never going to be eradicated in Bangladesh.
12. Better governance can only be assured by a rule of many instead of rule by one.
13. Child labor should NOT be banned in Bangladesh.
14. Video games create psychological and behavioral disorder in children that stays through adult years.

The sad, pensive, and melancholic Hungarian Song in the movie "Fateless"

When the moon shines through the night
Wonder what she dreams about,
If there's any charming knight,
On a mighty steed snow-white.

Her dream is like a fairy tale,
It's now time for her to wake,
There are few knights left for today,
And our one will stay away.

And yet while I see those tiny clouds
That floating on the rim of the sky
Until I can see them high,
My hope will forever fly,
Just as the story of mine. 

The song is full of wistfulness and sadness – we hear the slow, pensive and subdued voice. There is no doubt left that they sing it from a kind of utter hopelessness – they do not have to pretend that they have to sing in a particular way – the whole thing comes so naturally to them. The solo accompaniment of the piano adds to the lonely and haunting atmosphere of the situation.

A sentence in sequel to "To the Lighthouse"

Everything lay in ruins – under the bright sun’s glare; I looked around for a second time to scrutinize and suddenly it occurred to me that all these years this place had been kept populated by all these small creatures; I felt grateful to them.

The above sentence is written as a sequel to the first paragraph of the 9th Chapter of To the Lighthouse. Expand the above sentence into 2 more paragraphs. Try to show some story-line.

Here is Virginia Woolf's original para.

The house was left; the house was deserted. It was left like a shell on a
sandhill to fill with dry salt grains now that life had left it. The long night
seemed to have set in; the trifling airs, nibbling, the clammy breaths,
fumbling, seemed to have triumphed. The saucepan had rusted and the
mat decayed. Toads had nosed their way in. Idly, aimlessly, the swaying
shawl swung to and fro. A thistle thrust itself between the tiles in the larder.
The swallows nested in the drawing- room; the floor was strewn
with straw; the plaster fell in shovelfuls; rafters were laid bare; rats carried
off this and that to gnaw behind the wainscots. Tortoise-shell butterflies
burst from the chrysalis and pattered their life out on the windowpane.
Poppies sowed themselves among the dahlias; the lawn waved
with long grass; giant artichokes towered among roses; a fringed carnation
flowered among the cabbages; while the gentle tapping of a weed at
the window had become, on winters' nights, a drumming from sturdy
trees and thorned briars which made the whole room green in summer.