10th Grade Periods 1 and 4
Mr. Chao
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Overall Structure
Support Statements
Understanding of the Book
Thesis Statements
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And…
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You FINISHED your first
Process Paper this year!
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MLA
Outlining Supports
Being Specific
Being Clear
Using Examples to PROVE
Quotes
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Please review MLA on the Purdue OWL website.
VERY FEW had their heading correct.
Schmoe 1
Joe Schmoe
Mr. Chao
English 10
4, December 2012
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SNAZZY TITLE (No Underline)
Times New Roman font, Size 12, Double-spaced, 1-inch margins all the way around, NO EXTRA SPACES AFTER LINE
BREAKS.
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You DO NOT repeat the heading on pages after the first (just put the last name and page number in the upper right)
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Some creative themes and excellent points made
NONE of you mixed up themes with subjects
(hooray!)
Most of you stated your
themes clearly in your
THESIS and a few of you
even included a MAIN
THEME or MAIN IDEA.
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Intro Paragraph
◦ Hook
◦ Connection to the Book
◦ Thesis (3 TS outlines)
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Body Paragraphs 1-3
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TS (3 Supports outlined)
Support 1 (2 examples)
Support 2 (2 examples)
Support 3 (2 examples)
Conclusion
◦ Restate Thesis
◦ Transition
◦ Inference (Things to Do in a Concluding Paragraph)
- Without structure it all falls apart!
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Most people who had errors in structure didn’t
have completed outlines or didn’t get their outline
signed off by me.
What’s more frustrating are the people who had
COMPLETED outlines and ignored them!
If I sign off your outline, it
means that YOU ARE DOING IT
RIGHT! It is in your best
interests not to turn around and
“wing it” on the actual paper!
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The outline format is not OPTIONAL. It is
MANDATORY to include 3 supports and 2
examples per support. Paragraphs missing
these things are considered incomplete due
to inadequate evidence. Please make sure
you FINISH your paper.
- The last thing you want is to lose
points due to poor effort.
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The Good:
◦ Most papers had a hook
◦ Most papers had a thesis
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The Bad:
◦ Most didn’t connect hook to the book
◦ Most didn’t elaborate
Everyone in the world wants candy. The rich, luscious
smell it gives off makes most people’s mouths water. There
is an unlimited diversity; everyone has a favorite. It has its
way of making people happy but it can be evil by giving you a
mind blowing stomachache or sweet tooth. Yet, it is a
universal desire having great and wicked qualities. The same
is true of love in William Shakespeare’s play A Midsummer
Night’s Dream. This play brings out the amazing and horrific
qualities of love. Shakespeare specifically shows us that love
can overtake you, it has many forms and it can send you to
the moon but also break you heart. In the end, everyone
desires to be loved.
A young boy filled with love for the girl of his dreams
contemplates leaving his home to go see her. He is in his bed as his
parents in the other room are fast asleep. AS he stealthily creeps to
the back door, he opens it as quietly as humanly possible and
nervously walks to the corner of the street and embraces the love of
his life. He believes that the consequences his parents will give him
for finding out what he has done will be well worth seeing the one
that he adores. Just as this boy filled with love does a foolish thing
for love, so too do the characters in the play, A Midsummer Night’s
Dream by Shakespeare. This play displays themes like love is blind,
love causes disagreements and rejection, and love can make a
person fall into a world of imagination. The themes displayed by
characters in this play show that love can cause one to do foolish
things.
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Your THESIS is your paper’s ROADMAP. It should OUTLINE each
of your main ideas (themes).
The goal is to have THREE Topic Sentences that each state
RELATED themes/ideas. Your MAIN IDEA should be the glue that
connects everything together.
◦ A Midsummer Night’s Dream, a play by William Shakespeare, shows
various lessons on love, especially how love can change you; it makes
you “blind”, it makes you make decisions you wouldn’t normally make,
and it makes you say things you don’t mean.
◦ Main Idea: Love can change you
 Theme 1: Love makes you blind
 Theme 2: Love makes you make decisions you wouldn’t normally make
 Theme 3: Love makes you say things you don’t mean
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Topic sentences that outlined supports are
much more clear and detailed.
◦ Love, like most powers, is difficult to control (theme) because true
love will always prevail against its opponents (support 1), will
never stop trying (support 2), and if it can’t succeed, will destroy
itself before it gives up (support 3).
◦ Love can also make you act differently (theme); it can make you
betray people (support 1), become jealous (support 2), and blind
to a person’s imperfections (support 3).
◦ Love works in mysterious ways (theme).
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Most of you came up with themes that were
original and oftentimes, insightful.
◦ Tip of the Cap:
 Love works in mysterious ways which can make a person fall in
love with someone truly unexpected.
 Jealousy is a part of love that is almost inevitable, but it is
merely a stumbling block to love, not a destroyer of love.
 Love brings out the true colors because of the many different
personalities a person can have.
 There is never a guarantee that our feelings will be returned
regardless of how strong our feelings are for the person we
love. Love is not always returned and people are sometimes left
heartbroken
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Support statements are ARGUMENTS that YOU make
and can prove. They support your main ideas.
◦ Be careful not to confuse supports with examples.
 TS: Love is unstable
 Support: Lysander can’t decide on who he loves.
 TS: Sometimes love needs a miracle for it to happen
 Support: In the book, there are fairies.
 TS: Obstacles vary, though in AMND many people and
unexpected love potions serve as some of the things to be
overcome
 Support: In the beginning of the book we see Egeus does not
approve of his daughter.
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Rate the following Supports from 1-5
Love is uncontrollable. The fact of the matter is you can’t choose
who you love.
Love can be changed. Literally, the whole plot was about lovers
mixing and matching pairing with one partner like Hermia then
switching to Helena.
Love is changing all the time. During the story, it changes hands
like a hot potato.
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While most everyone pulled from the same traits,
there were some very detailed and well-written
supports
◦ Theme: Jealousy is one of the Seven Deadly Sins and it
surely comes out when you are in love
 Support 1: When others try to show affections towards their
lover, people get defensive because they want to be the only
person to show and be shown love.
 Support 2: Love makes people do anything to be with the one
person they care most for.
 Support 3: When people are in love, they are always looking for
answers to explain suspicious behavior.
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“Vanilla” arguments
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Love
Love
Love
Love
can cause more pain than gain
is powerful
can be good or bad
leads to fights
Spice it up? 
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Make sure that your examples do 3 things:
1. PROVE your support (argument)
2. PROVE your main idea
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Like Supports, examples are best when they
are SPECIFIC and DETAILED.
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When using quotes, you should need to do
the following IN ORDER:
1. Introduce the quote with SPEAKER and CONTEXT
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A note about context: Your reader should be able to find where
in the book the quote occurs BEFORE reading the quote.
2. Provide the quote.
3. Properly CITE the quote.
4. Summarize the quote
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This means you need to translate or paraphrase what the
character is saying. This is especially true with Shakespeare
since it can be difficult to understand what the characters are
actually saying
5. Explain how the quote proves your point.
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Argument: Love can cause hatred for people who don’t
deserve it.
◦ Quote: Demetrius tries desperately to convince Hermia that he is
better for her than Lysander when he says, “Relent, Sweet Hermia;
and Lysander, yield / Thy crazed title to my certain right”
(Shakespeare I.I.93-94). By saying this, Demetrius shows that he
hates Lysander because he has Hermia’s heart even though he
doesn’t deserve it.
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Argument: Love is a game played in the mind based off of
one’s thoughts
◦ Quote: Puck administers the love juice to Lysander, and he falls in
love with Helena. “Transparent Helena! Nature shows art, that
though they blossom makes me see thy heart.” (Shakespeare
II.II.105-106).
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Argument: Throughout the book many characters are put on
spells.
◦ Quote: For instance, Demetrius falls in love with Helena because
he is put on a spell. “O Helena, goddess, nymph, perfect, divine!”
(III.II.140).
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Argument: Even though it is hard to be constantly giving love
and receive nothing in return, we continue to give love
because it is simply the nature of love to carry forward and
express our infatuation.
◦ Quote: One of the main characters, Lysander, teaches us that love
is patient and has to overcome obstacles in order to work. “The
course of true love never did run smooth” (1.1.136). Lysander
recognizes the necessary conflicts that come with relationships.
He also acknowledges how deserving love is of countless trials
and strife.
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Plot is important. You use plot to prove your arguments. But
without arguments and analysis, plot doesn’t do anything.
In the play, when Hermia, on eo fhte four main characters in love, is betrayed by the love
potion that made her love, Lysander, not lover her any more, she feels that all is lost in her
world without him. When Hermia says, “I am amazed by your passionate words. / I scorn
you not. It seems that you scorn me.” (III.II.223-224) she is hurt finds out that Lysander
truly believes that he doesn’t love her any more, and love Helena, another key lover in the
play, whose heart belongs to Demetrius. Hermia starts to blame Helena for making
Lysander love her when it really was the fairy Puck who applied the magical potion, “O me!
You juggler! You canker blossom! / You thief of love! What, have you come by night / and
stol’n my loves heart from him?” (III.II.292-294)
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Hermia is self-conscious of her height which reveals
that love is blind. (Telling)
Hermia reveals that she’s self-conscious when she admits how she
is “so dwarfish and low” (III.II.306). (Showing)
You need BOTH in order to effectively prove your
argument.
Hermia mistakenly thinks that Lysander has fallen for Helena
because she is taller while Hermia is “so dwarfish and low”
(III.II.306) which shows how love can cause people to be
irrational and not see the truth. (Telling AND Showing)
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Telling: Love makes the lovers do desperate
things.
◦ SHOW ME:
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Telling: In love, everything works out in the end.
◦ SHOW ME:
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Telling: Love causes misunderstandings. “Oh
spite! Oh hell! I see you are bent / To set
against me for your merriment” (III.II.148-149).
◦ SHOW ME:
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Did you Restate Thesis?
Did you use one of the strategies from “Things to Do
in a Concluding Paragraph?”
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Use a Quote
Ask a Question
Connect to Today
Universalize
Suggest a Practical Application
Provide a Warning
Call to Action
Paint a Vivid Picture
Did you leave your reader with
something to think about?
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