This is the assignment for class on Monday, 5 May.

Peer Edit for Nano-, Micro, and Short-Short Fiction

You should have two stories with you today. I would be surprised if after receiving quality constructive criticism from your conferencing team you are not able to improve each of them. After reviewing the questions you will need to answer about your work, discuss the questions with your conferencing partners. Then take turns sharing your current draft and discussing each of the questions with your group. When you are done discussing you may revise your piece and then finish the assignment described below. This assignment is due AT THE START OF CLASS on Tuesday, 7 May.

Nano-Fiction is a story of exactly 58 words. Micro Fiction is a story of between 88 and 100 words. Short-Short Fiction is a story of 250 words or fewer (but more than 175). You are two have two stories, and each of the two must be a different type of story.

Conference Partner 1 ____________________________________________________ (print legibly)

Conference Partner 2 ____________________________________________________ (print legibly)

A) On a separate piece of paper, using complete sentences, paragraphs, etc. answer the following questions about your first very short fiction form:

What form did you choose to submit? Why did you choose this form?

State what you like about your story. Use an example or examples from your text.

State what you think would make your story better (using a quote is nice).

Does your story have an ironic twist? Why or why not? What is your ironic twist? On a scale of 1-10 or other scale of your choosing how much of a twist is it?

What did you do as an author to make the twist not be “out of the blue” but instead something that makes sense once it happens in the story? (Or, how will you revise your story so that the twist does not “come out of the blue” if it currently does?

What other changes will you make as a result of your conferencing? Why will you make these changes, or why will you not make any changes?

State what grade you think you should earn. State reasons for this being an appropriate grade.

B) On a separate piece of paper, using complete sentences, paragraphs, etc. answer the same questions about your second piece:

C) On a separate piece of paper of paper please write a short essay that explains I your own words:

How very short fiction is similar to other kinds of stories and how it is different.

What is it like to write very short fiction for you? Is it easier, harder, different (how?)?

What if anything you learned from this unit on very short fiction?

When complete, assemble your work in this order:

This sheet; first story (shortest piece) then appropriate self evaluation; second story then 2^nd self evaluation; Assignment C.

Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, 29 April - 2 May

Two pieces of short, short fiction are due on Tuesday, 7 May.  Writers are to choose two from the three types we have studied: Nano-Fiction (exactly 58 words); Micro-Fiction between 88 and 100 words; Short Short Fiction fewer than 250 words.

Tuesday and Thursday Junior will be completing their state writing assessment; seniors will have time to revise their short short fiction and their thesis rough drafts. Juniors will receive rough drafts on the 7th. All students will have at least one week from return of their rough drafts to the time their final is due.

Ms. Margolis will guest teach on Thursday and Monday of next week.

Tuesday, April 16th

Today the class generated a list of "stock characters" and a list of modifiers.

Writer's combined one of each and used this character as a prompt.

After sharing, the class returned to the analysis of micro-fiction.

The class was divided into teams; each team was assigned three stories. Each team read and discussed the stories focusing on developing an evaluation for a presentation to the class. Teams discussed Which of their stories were good? Which was best? How each story provided a "twist"?.

We began but did not complete the presentations.

Juniors also rotated to appointments with their counselors for forecasting.

Monday, April 15th

Writers were reminded about their poetry projects. Some have still not completed their self-evaluation of the work; this needs to be done.

The class generated a series of settings:

musty laundromat

messy dorm room

damp basement

sweaty gym

moldy beach house

bland motel room

deserted street corner at noon

moist swamp

abandoned apartment

dark alley

bloody bedroom

vacant gas station

spotless mansion

after an arena rock concert

spooky train stop

Each writer choose one of these locations as a prompt; after writing the class shared.

Next writers received a new set of short, short fiction. The stories were read and discussed.

Rough drafts of the thesis are due on Thursday.

Tuesday, April 9th

Note Change in Due Date: Rough Draft of the Thesis is now due on Tuesday, April 16th!

Writers got back their model sections back today, and they turned in completed outlines. Outlines will be returned on Thursday, April 11th.  All students should bring thesis materials to class on Thursday; juniors will be spending a large part of class time completing ACT Registration.

Mr. Zartler gave a lesson on several common problems students had in making writing their model sections. Writers had time during class to practice fixes to these issues and to conference with Mr. Zartler about them.

Thursday, 4 April

Many writers got there model section back today. The rest will be returned on Tuesday of next week (Monday is a PM block schedule, we will not have class).

Mr. Zartler located the missing writing, if he thought he had misplaced yours you do NOT need to email a copy.

Class today was built around developing the outline for the thesis. The outline is to be turned in on Tuesday. It should include all the notes for the thesis.

Mr. Zartler gave these notes many notes and examples including the following:

How to: It is pretty easy to create the outline for your thesis IF you have completed note cards. If you have 50-75 note cards you are in good shape.

To figure out what your outline will be you will take your note cards and sort them. Begin with your “Working Hypothesis” card. Put this at the top of a large desk or table. Then begin sorting your cards into stacks. Each stack should be on one major theme, topic, or idea that will help support and explain your hypothesis (there should also be a stack off to the side for cards that you are not going to use). You will probably make 2-5 useful stacks at this stage. Each of these main stacks will be a section of your paper.

Once you are done with the first sorting you should decide what order you will present the sections you have created. Put your stacks in the order you will put them in your paper from left to right. Next you should number each and every card in every stack. Take all the cards from the first section that will be in your paper and mark each of these cards with a Roman Numeral “II;” put this number on the far left of the top line of every card in the stack. (Roman Numeral I will be for the introduction to your thesis.) Take the cards for the second section of your thesis and mark all of these cards with a Roman Numeral III. Repeat this until you have written a roman numeral in the upper left corner of EVERY note card you are going to use.

After you have numbered every card according to the section it is going to be, begin the next process of sorting your cards. Take all of the “II” stack and see if you have a card that represents the thesis for this section. If you do not then create a new card that has the thesis for the first section. Add a “A.” to the card just after the “I” (e.g. II. A.). Next, take all of the cards in the stack and sort them into related piles. Depending on the breadth or complexity of this particular section you are either creating piles that represent paragraphs in a section, or you may be creating 2-3 subsections to a section.

Once all of the cards in the section have been sorted into piles, each stack needs receive a capital letter. Cards that will be in the introduction to the section will receive the letter “A.”, cards for the first body section will be labeled I.B., the second body section I.C., etc. If your section has subsections, and not just paragraphs that the capital letters will represent the sub-sections. Cards in subsections will need to be sorted into stacks to create paragraphs.  If a section has sub-sections then paragraphs will receive an arabic number after the capital letter, e.g. II.B.1, II.B.2, etc. Each time you create a stack of cards that is a sub-section, you should create a card that states the thesis of that sub-section. This card will always be the letter “A” that follows the roman numeral. Each time you create a stack of cards that represent a paragraph (generally a stack of 2-5 cards would be appropriate for a paragraph) create a Topic Sentence card for that paragraph. Keep this card on the top of each stack of cards that represents a paragraph.

Repeat the process of sorting cards within each section and subsection until you have labeled every card with a Section, (Sub-section -- if applicable), and paragraph Number or letter.

You may be wondering what all this sorting has accomplished; in short you have created your entire outline by sorting your cards!

Monday and Tuesday, 1 -2 April

There were no April Fool's lessons this year.

Ms. Margolis guest taught and the class read and analyzed several related forms of short fiction.

Writers should get handouts from Mr. Zartler, as writers will be required to write and submit some of these short forms.