FAQs
What is the format? What’s on the exam?
The exam has three parts: ten short answer responses–i.e., 2-3-sentence responses (poems and poetic terms); one paragraph response (The Samurai’s Garden and basic elements fiction); essay response comparing two of the semester’s major works (The Kite Runner, Macbeth, The Samurai’s Garden).
Submit your exam–as one document–to TURNITIN (“May exam”).
What do I bring to the exam (Tue May 23)?
Bring your LAPTOP, and your own copy of THE SAMURAI’S GARDEN (with your bookmark/booklet). During the exam, you will not be allowed to share any of these materials with another person. As for The Kite Runner and Macbeth, the exam packet includes approved passages for both books.
If you want, also bring a book to read, in case you finish early because you will be asked to close your laptop after submitting your exam to TURNITIN.
How should I study?
Poetry: re-read the poems in your folder–ALOUD, either with someone or privately. Have a list of poetic terms nearby, so that you can identify examples in the poems you read. Or, take turns reading poems aloud with a partner, taking turns identifying poetic terms in the poem your partner reads aloud. As with other study techniques described here, I am suggesting methods that might prove helpful for some of you. By all means, be creative. Invent methods, games, practices that work for you and your study-buddies.
The Samurai’s Garden: review your booklet notes. Study those through the lens of individual elements of fiction–characterization or plot development, for example. Continue the mind-map exercise started in the first class of review week. Compare your map(s) with classmates: talk to and question one another.
The play and two novels: Note overlapping subjects and themes among the three major works. With a study-buddy, anticipate and write down questions that could address some aspect of this overlap. For example, how is courage represented in each work? Also, imagine–and write down the results of your imagining–how any of the characters might answer our course’s essential questions: Who am I? What are my primary responsibilities to myself and to the communities in which I live? What does wisdom look like?
When are review sessions?
During regular classes Mon-Thu, May 15-18. Also 1 o’clock Mon May 22, which is the day before our exam.
Anything else I should know?
In class during review week, I will preview the revised exam preamble. You will be asked to sign this preamble on Tuesday morning as a first step in the exam.
