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CSE HUMANITIES PROGRAMME Secondary Three Literature in English ONLINE LESSONS

**STUDENT LEARNING OUTCOMES **  CORE CURRICULUM
 * Students identify and evaluate codes of characterisation in literary texts.
 * Students identify and evaluate the use of hyperbole and irony in literary texts.
 * Students examine stereotypical representations in literary texts.
 * Students discern controlling viewpoints, attitudes, values and/or assumptions in literary texts.

CURRICULUM OF CONNECTIONS
 * Students examine how textual meaning is generated through relationship between the creator of the text (the narrator), the subject of the text (the narrator's family members) and the personal context in which the text is written.
 * Students understand how readers can question, challenge and reshape the representations of poeple and the world presented by a text.
 * Students understand that the construction of a literary text will be influenced by the creator's expectation of an audience and context.

CURRICULUM OF PRACTICE CURRICULUM OF IDENTITY
 * Students select, evaluate and organise information from a literary text to construct written responses to questions.
 * Students produce written responses that present information in a form that suits its purpose (i.e. answer the question).
 * Students ensure that written work is legible and spelling, punctuation and grammar are accurate, so that menaing is clear.
 * Students use knowledge of principle characteristics of creative non-fiction to construct their own works.
 * Students reflect on their own personal experience and relations with family members to create on their own short works of creative nonfiction.
 * Students understand the roles and relationships involved in constructing a creative nonfiction text.

__ Creative Non-fiction __ ** This exercise requires you to listen to a work of creative nonfiction. Before you listen to the story it would be useful for you to familiarise yourself with this new literary genre. Below is a basic definition of the creative non-fiction genre (taken from Duke University's writing studio):
 * LEARNING EXERCISE 1

'Creative non-fiction is a relatively recently recognised 'genre' that involves writing from personal experience and/or reporting on other peoples' experiences. The best creative non-fiction work usually involves conducting a considerable amount of research, most often 'in the field', involving oral history interviewing, participant observation, detective/sleuthing work, as well as jumping into new adventures. The range of possible topics is virtually unlimited, and this type of writing actually has a very long history. Creative non-fiction encompasses memoir writing, biography and autobiography, oral history, and inspired reportage on almost any subject. It involves writing about actual events in your own life and/or others' lives, conveying your message through the use of literary techniques such as characterization, plot, setting, dialogue, narrative and personal reflection.'


 * Read more**: [|Creative Non-Fiction: Duke University - Writing Studio]

According to Sarah Turner, when analysing a piece of narrative non-fiction, the reader should be able to identify:
 * clear, well-developed characters
 * a narrative arc
 * tension and revelation
 * engaging dialogue, written out as opposed to direct quotations
 * story told using scenes rather than straight exposition
 * an identifiable theme
 * careful use of imagery, symbolism and metaphor


 * Read more:** [|What is Creative Non-fiction?]

**__Example of Creative Non-fiction: David Sedaris__** David Sedaris is perhaps the most well-known creative nonfiction writer. Sedaris was first publicly recognized in 1992 when National Public Radio broadcast his essay "SantaLand Diaries". He published his first collection of essays and short stories, //Barrel Fever//, in 1994. Each of his five subsequent essay collections, //Naked// (1997), //Holidays on Ice// (1997), //Me Talk Pretty One Day// (2000), //Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim// (2004), and //When You Are Engulfed in Flames// (2008), have become //New York Times// best sellers.

Below is a video of David Sedaris reading one of his creative non-fiction essays on the American late night talk show //David Letterman//. Watch the clip and get a feel for the autobiographical, self-depracating and irreverant tone creative nonfiction works often assume.

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You can listen to more of David Sedaris' essays [|here]

__
 * LEARNING EXERCISE 2 **

Task __ Listen to the story by Sandra Tsing Loh broadcast in the [|'Adult Children'] episode of //This American Life.// You will need to: 1. Follow the link to 'Adult Children' episode of //This American Life//. 2. Click on the 'full episode' link located next to the icon. 3. Toggle the cursor to the 28:00 minute mark on the audio timeline and click play. The story goes for 30 minutes.


 * Instructions**: While listening to the story answer the questions below. Type out your responses in a word document and upload to your respective class [|iVLE student workbin]

** SECTION 1 ** How does the narrator characterize her father? What examples does the narrator provide to illustrate her father’s ‘stinginess’? How is hyperbole used as a rhetorical device? What is the only adjective the narrator’s father uses to describe the kind of wife he wants? Why does the narrator have a problem with what the single adjective implies in this context? How does the narrator describe the women that send their photos to her father? How does she come to draw these conclusions?

**SECTION 2** What are the reasons for the narrator’s sister’s bitterness towards her father’s quest to find a new wife? Why is the exclamation by the narrator’s sister that ‘he [her father] could not just let things go!’ ironic? What does the narrator find surprising about her father's new wife? Why does she find this surprising? What are the personal differences that the narrator's father suggests were the reasons that his new wife left him after five weeks? What stereotype does the narrator's father say that his new wife reinforced?

What traits does the narrator’s father admire in the next potential wife he courts? How is Xiu Ping characterized? How does this characterization contrast with that of the wife before? What is the ‘shocking juxtaposition’ that the narrator refers to when she is in the bathroom? Why is this ‘shocking’? Whu does Caitlin (the narrator’s sister) find being in her father’s house painful? What is Xiu Ping’s reaction to the narrator’s father’s complaint about the greasy meat? Why does the narrator find this reaction incongruous with the situation? What is Caitlin's reaction to her father's complaint? What does she ask her father? What is his response?
 * SECTION 3 **

What is the general theme that is evoked in the song Xiu Ping sings. How does this theme relate to the events in the story?
 * SECTION 4 **


 * Hint: this question requires more than just identifying the theme in the song, it requires you to understand the main theme of the story and analyse the key events and characters in the story in relation to this theme.**

**DISCUSSION** Use the discussion board to post comments in relation to the following question:


 * How do you and your parents see the story of your family in different ways?**

Write a short 800 work of creative non-fiction. Use your family as your 'topic' and write a short passage word characterizing one your family members. Use interesting, humourous or insightful anecdotes to colour your description.
 * ACE ASSESSMENT **


 * Instructions**: upload your creative non-fiction passage to your respective [|iVLE workbin]