Artifact 9

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Francesca Roley
Adv. Field Seminar
Journal 10
10 April 2012
Artifact 9: Student Work—Opinion Statement
On March 12, 2012, for an Exit Ticket, I asked my students, “Make a
Judgment Call: Do you think the Prince’s punishment was fair or unfair? Why?” We
were in the middle of Romeo and Juliet, and the Prince had just banished Romeo
from Verona for killing Tybalt—who, however, killed Mercutio, Romeo’s dear friend
and the Prince’s cousin. In order for them to more easily TAG the sentence (Turn the
question into an answer, Answer the question, and Give details about the answer), I
provided a sample TAG statement for them on the Promethean Board below the
prompt: “I think the Prince’s punishment was fair / unfair because… (3 more
sentences supporting your argument).” Some responses were as follows:
“I think the Prince’s punishment was unfair because Romeo was helping
his friend out who just got killed by Tybalt. Tybalt killed Mercutio and
that wasn’t right. So Romeo gets mad and fight Tybalt then killed him.
It’s not write for the Prince to send Romeo out of Verona because he
needs to see his wife Juliet.”
This response came from Kathy, who we’ve already said is a self-proclaimed
mixed ethnicity student. She indicated that she was both Native Hawaiian/Pacific
Islander and Asian (Cambodian), but that she was indeed born in Philadelphia.. I
praised her for including good reasons behind her opinion. She followed the TAG
statement provided with a correct use of subject-verb agreement: repeating the past
tense of the verb (“was”) and using the correct form of the verb for the singular
subject: “Romeo.” She remains in the past tense for her next sentence as well, where
she provides a second reason for her opinion. In her third and fourth sentences,
however, not only does she switch to the present tense (“Romeo gets mad” and “It’s
not…”), but she forgets the “s” on the end of her singular verb (“fight” should be
“fights”), switches back to the past tense (“killed”) and then uses the wrong
homonym for “right:” “write.” Yet, her statement does include correct apostrophe
usage to show possession and contraction (“Prince’s,” “wasn’t,” “It’s”), provide three
reasons for her opinion, and provide ample explanation of the context out of which
that opinion arose.
“I think the prince punishment was unfair because tybalt wanted to
fight, and he got it. It’s not romeo fought for killing Tybalt because
tybalt killed Mercutio. Its also not fair because putting Romeo in the
death penalty is very harsh and too hard for “sweet Romeo”. I hope
Romeo leaves before he gets caught and die =(.”
2
This response came from Nashali, who we’ve already said is a selfproclaimed Puerto Rican student. She also claims, however, that English is her
native language, and that writing comes somewhat easily to her. She feels that the
Constructed Response is the hardest part of English class, and indicates Journal
Entries or the Multiple Choice question form as her preferred tool of assessment.
First, I did indeed comment on Nashali’s Exit Ticket that the Prince decided to exile
Romeo, not execute him. Otherwise, Nashali did provide two reasons for her
opinion, give the context behind her opinion, and insert her voice into her
statement. Her uses of “he got it,” “‘sweet Romeo,’” and “I hope Romeo leaves...=(“
are particular to her writing style and personality. Respectively, she writes
forcefully, assumes Juliet’s perspective on Romeo, and inserts herself into her
opinion on the text.
Nashali does, however, neglect to use apostrophes to show possession
(“prince punishment,” “romeo fought”) and to capitalize proper names: 1 out of 3
uses of “Tybalt” were capitalized; 3 out of 4 uses of “Romeo” were capitalized; the 1
use of “prince” was not capitalized; the 1 use of “Mercutio” was capitalized. Perhaps
it was only natural for her to capitalize the names of certain characters—maybe
those whom were the most fleshed-out/ human for her. Moreover, Nash
demonstrates proper usage of apostrophes for contractions only half the time,
writing, “It’s” the first time, and “Its” the second. This inconsistency makes me think
that she, like many students, I’m sure, still has to think about these rules when she
writes—at least some of the time. Nash also spells “fault” as “fought,” betraying a
use of phonetic spelling. Finally, she gets confused on her subject-verb agreement:
she uses the past tense when she writes her first sentence and at the end of her
second sentence, but uses the present tense in the beginning of her second sentence
as well as in her third and fourth sentences. Yet, Nash did a great job of having her
subject and verbs agree in terms of singular versus plural construction and really
put her voice into her writing.
“I think the punishment was fair because Romeo was only seeking
revenge on a murderer. If they were to give Romeo the death penalty,
that would be unfair.”
This response came from Michael, who we’ve already said is a selfproclaimed White/Caucasian student. Born in Philadelphia, not only is English
Michael’s native language, but America is his native country. On the writing survey,
he indicated that writing comes very easily to him, and only marked “Other” when
asked for the hardest part of English class. Michael, like Kathy, followed the TAG
statement provided with a proper use of subject-verb agreement: “Romeo was.” He
also inserts his own voice into the statement through his use of both strong
diction—“seeking revenge”—and the subjunctive tense of the verb to defend his
opinion through contrast: “If they were to…” Michael did not, however, fulfill the
length requirement for this assignment. So, I commented on Michael’s Exit Ticket
that he needs more details, such as who Tybalt killed to make him a “murderer,” and
the reasons why it’s then alright to punish Romeo at all.
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