250_Unpacking

=ENG 250 Unpacking Activity Instructions=


 * //Before you do anything below, make sure you've read this "Intro to Wikis" page.//** Links to the group pages are at the bottom of this page. You'll see your name listed at the top of your group's page.

This activity will be conducted in small groups using your group's wiki. First, make sure you've carefully read (//not skimmed//) the Professor's Notes for Weeks 6-7, on our Content page. In fact, you should print them out if you can because figurative language will be important for the rest of the semester. (Make sure it’s the new version.)

Now, reread Billy Collins's "Introduction to Poetry."

Read it again. (I'm not being a smartypants. This is a key strategy in literary studies, especially with this process.)

As a group, you will use the four-step "Expert Moves of Unpacking Figurative Language" process (in the Prof's Notes) to create a wiki document in which you collectively and collaboratively extend, enhance, deepen, and make precise your first reading of Collins's poem using what you learned from the Professor's Notes and your rereading (and rereading again) of the poem. After you have read over Collins's poem again, start thinking about it through the expert moves above. Notice all the figurative language in the poem. Read with an eye toward the "unpacking" habit of mind that this lesson cultivates.

Your group's task is to effectively and thoroughly unpack your assigned section (located at the top of your group’s page) by applying the "expert moves" outlined above. To give you some ideas, here's a sample using Collins's lines 5-6. Your small group will collaboratively draft a similar document written on your group’s wiki page and ultimately end with a single, polished document with clear, coherent paragraphs, like the sample. Each page has been formatted with a template of sorts to help your group begin the unpacking process.

Now, a few words about **logistics**.
 * As a group, you'll be assigned a section of the poem with some figurative language to unpack. You'll see your assigned selection on your group's wiki page.
 * To find out which group you're in, look at the top of each of the group pages in the wiki. Your name will be on one of them.
 * Someone in each group will need to volunteer ASAP to serve as **Facilitator**. Revisit the “Small Group Discussions” information on the Content page.
 * Each member in the group will need to post her or his **first content** (substantial contributions to the developing interpretation) no later than Friday, March 7 at 4am. Between then and when the Polisher begins polishing the document (Thurs, March 13 at 4pm), everyone will use the wiki technology for its greatest strength: **collaboratively expanding, developing, refining, revising the interpretation.** Avoid entering your contributions in a separate paragraph like "Nancy's interpretation: blah blah blah"; instead, integrate it into what's already there.
 * Someone else will need to volunteer ASAP to serve as **Polisher**. A Polisher's role is to bring together, make coherent, and polish/proofread the final version after all contributions have ceased (Thurs, March 13 4pm) and before it's due (Fri, March 14 4am). These roles earn extra credit in the course.
 * There will be no single reporter since the wiki itself will be the report, written by everyone in the group. In that way, everyone’s a reporter.
 * The groups are small, so each of you is relying on the other. Be a good groupmate, and contribute to the activity. If someone in your group is inactive, so be it. Don't count on that person, and do your best with your active groupmates. You won't be penalized for his or her inactivity.

Now, go to your group’s wiki page, and get started!


 * Group 1 || Group 2 || Group 3 || Group 4 || Group 5 ||