Posted 18 April 2008 10:14 AM
There is SUCH a huge jump in the literature assignments between
dialectic and rhetoric. I know that I read somewhere that in year 2,
they worked on beefing the dialectic up, but at glancing through my year plan for next year, there is still a VAST difference between the two. My oldest will be an 8th grader when we do this next year and I would like to help him get ready for rhetoric work the following year. Part of the problem is that the dialectic
and rhetoric read different things. I guess I could just give him an
occasional rhetoric assignment..maybe one a month a first, then every other week at
the beginning level. The problem with that is that the skills build
on one another. Or maybe I could find some literature guides that
analyze the literature at the dialectic level more deeply??? Part of
the reason I'm worrying about this now is that next week there are
two HUGE used curriculum sales and I need to know which books to
snatch up if I need to. That said, as a former English major I
already have all of the Norton Anthologies and a GIANT hardback book
of all of Shakespeare as well as most of the novels mentioned for
rhetoric. I don't have most of the history rhetoric resources, but I am not concerned about jumping up to rhetoric history in 9th grade. I
don't think the history is such a big jump between the dialectic and
rhetoric, but the literature is HUGE. I didn't do most of the
rhetoric literature skills in TOG until I took upper level English
classes in college. Those frameworks seem like they would be very
intimidating to a 9th grader. So... how do you ease them into it? Any suggestions for this transition year?

Christine

Christine,

I have a few thoughts on this. Year 2 rhetoric literature really is difficult and sometimes obscure. As we get into unit 4, suddenly the literature is substantially easier and more accessible. I don't know how it will be in year 3, but it seems to me that the language and concepts are getting substantially easier for the students to understand.

I agree that there's a jump between D and R. I don't know what the answer is. I'm not sure that assigning that difficult work during a lower level is the answer. If he's going to have trouble with the work during 9th grade, it seems to me that he will have even more trouble in 8th grade, and he might also develop attitude problems that you would then have to overcome. The frameworks really address philosophy as much as they address literature; so maybe the solution is to start building his philosophical awareness rather than having him start reading the year 2 literature.

The dialectic work does include some "real" literature, like unmodified excerpts from Shakespeare. This was hard for the students I taught; I needed to walk them through this line by line, helping them to see how the word order was different from our standard word order. I think this was good preparation for R work. And there is definite teaching of literary concepts in year 2 dialectic, which will help.

I guess that I would recommend taking it easier on him during his 9th grade year, rather than trying to make things harder on him during his 8th grade year.

Hi Beth,

Thank you. One reason why I was wondering is that he will be doing Biolgy and Geometry next year which are typically 9th grade courses, so he might be graduating early. Next year may be 9th not 8th grade. He did really well on his ACT this past spring as part of the Duke program and is going to a statewide ceremony to get recognized. That said, he is definitely more of a math/science/grammar person than a creative thinker. Although I've seen a lot of improvement in his thinking and writing this year.

Christine

Hi Christine,

We are currently in the middle of unit 4 of TOG 2. This is our first year at the rhetoric level for my oldest two children. Like you, I have an eighth grade son who will probably graduate early. That is why we chose to put him in the rhetoric level. It was very difficult in the beginning, but we have smooth sailing now.

Before moving your son to rhetoric level I would make sure that he can handle the level and volume of reading. I was confident that my children could handle that as a bare minimum. We eased into our year by first requiring only that all of the reading be complete and all of the vocabulary definitions be memorized. There are a LOT of definitions for the new rhetoric student. They would attempt the SAP stuff, but mostly we worked on all of the analysis stuff together. This will be much easier for you as an English major.

After becoming familiar with many of the analysis vocabulary, the outlines didn't seem as difficult. They (I) didn't have to look up every term to find out what they were supposed to put in the outline. We now are cruising along. My rhetoric students complete all of the reading and assignments and we discuss about 80-90% of the literature outline during our discussion time. They did not do a major analysis type paper this year, but. . . this mama is pleased with our progress. Looking back over the year I realize that a lot of the difficulty in the transition was that I had to get in the groove with literature terms, planning, discussion, etc. Overall we have done more with this year of literature than I ever did in high school or college.

Blessings,
Kim
Mom to 10 great kids,
ages 15,14,13,12,9,7,6,4,2,baby due 9/08

quote:

Originally posted by Brandtclan:
Hi Christine,

We eased into our year by first requiring only that all of the reading be complete and all of the vocabulary definitions be memorized. There are a LOT of definitions for the new rhetoric student. . Overall we have done more with this year of literature than I ever did in high school or college.

Blessings,
Kim
Mom to 10 great kids,
ages 15,14,13,12,9,7,6,4,2,baby due 9/08

Kim,

What a great idea!!! I think I will do this!! This makes complete sense! Thanks!
Christine

Am I to understand that the dialectic assignments have been beefed up in Y2? We completed Y1 last year and I found there to be a HUGE difference between D and R. It seems to me that we skipped H.S. lit. D does not teach enough literary analysis and R is college material. The High School step seems to be missing.

BTW I did not find this problem with the history, and had no problem going between the D and Rh level with my 8th and 9th graders.

Hi Randi,
Yes, the dialectic assignments are beefed up and the skills learned are increased in Years 2, 3, and 4. Specifically, the novel as literature came into its own in the late 1700's. It is after this that more and more classics were available for younger students to read. (This falls into the latter part of our Year 2 Unit 3 and into Unit 4.) Thus, before this time, our "literature" assignments are largely historical fiction and thus there isn't as much to analyze.

Hope this helps!