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"Poetry is a sword of lightning, ever unsheathed, which consumes the scabbard that would contain it." Percy Shelley
A House made of Paper - An In-Class Essay for The House on Mango Street: This essay wasn't given after students started creating Illuminated Texts of the novel - and for good reason. An Illuminated Text, when properly done IS an essay of sorts. It uses the actual text to make a point - to give a unique perspective on a work. In fact, their is perhaps even more critical thinking going on as the student must also come up with their own focus rather than answering an assigned prompt. In this case, there are three different prompts that look at very different aspects of The House on Mango Street. The essay is designed to be completed in class in one period - which is actuall y great given teachers' weariness of AI and take home essays.
Lesson Overview
Lesson Overview
Here are the instructions from the Essay Handout (found below):
Here are the instructions from the Essay Handout (found below):
You are to choose one of the following topics and write an essay (2-3 pages) on it. Whichever essay you choose to do, I very strongly recommend that you take a few minutes – come up with a thesis and write a short tentative outline. When time is limited, as it is during an in-class essay, an outline will help you save time and connect one thought to the next in a logical way.
The Prompts:
The Prompts:
For a more complete description of the prompts - see the actual handout (found below). But here is a summary of each of the four prompts:
Esperanza's vision and longing for a "house" and how that changes throught the novel.
The expectations of women and the women characters in the novel.
Virginia Woolf's idea of women needing a "room of their own" in order to write and how this relates to Esperanza.
Does the novel take a negative look at men and males in its prose?
Handouts
Handouts
Most Recent Handouts
Most Recent Handouts
House on Mango Street - In Class Essay Docx PDF
House on Mango Street - In Class Essay Docx PDF
Again here are the instructions (for more on the essay see the above Lesson Overview)
You are to choose one of the following topics and write an essay (2-3 pages) on it. Whichever essay you choose to do, I very strongly recommend that you take a few minutes – come up with a thesis and write a short tentative outline. When time is limited, as it is during an in-class essay, an outline will help you save time and connect one thought to the next in a logical way.
Toni Morrison's The Song of Solomon:
Toni Morrison's The Song of Solomon:
WHAT CAME BEFORE:
WHAT CAME BEFORE:
Falling Paper - The House on Mango Street Illuminated Text Project
Thoughts on the Lesson
Thoughts on the Lesson
One reason that this essay was not done in the later years of my career has to do with the timing of this novel. Because it was done at the end of the year - as I've mentioned before, so many seniors were gone or taking AP tests. It was very hard to get an entire class together.
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