Renaissance Poetry Reflective R-A-F-T

Summative Assessment

While your essay on Henry VIII by William Shakespeare is not a scored essay, it is an important process piece as we continue to develop your minds as careful readers and sophisticated writers. As such, you are to write a reflective R-A-F-T (Role-Audience-Format-Topic) analyzing your own writing on this poem, specifically, and your general progress towards the goals of this AP Literature course. Own the fact your paper is really good, average or really not so great. You will learn more that way. Here is your R-A-F-T:

Role / Audience / Format / Topic
AP Reader / AP Teachers / Score Explanation (see below and see example---2 pages total) / Analysis and explanation of how the student scored and why she/he received the score she/he did.

Learning Goals. Students will…

PART 1: (1 page max---single spaced okay)

Your R-A-F-T paragraph should show a thoughtful reflection of your thinking and writing, written in the style of an AP Reader (see example sheet on back – 3rd person, objective tone):

  1. Explain the score you gave yourself. Pretend you are a grader for the AP exam and want to use your paper as an example paper. What would the commentary for this paper be and why? See the example from an AP sample below. Own the fact your paper is really good, average or really not so great. You will learn more that way.
  2. What you did well and what could be improved? Give specific examples of phrases, sentences, and dictionyou are most proud of and those that you recognize need the most work. Include an explanation of WHY they are good or need improvement.

PART 2: (1 page max---double space please)

Your general reflection on your performance should include the following:

  1. What you need to work on for future readings and/or future writings (timed or otherwise) and how you plan on doing this. Create three specific goals for yourself that have to do with writing.
  2. What is working for you in general? What do you need more help with? (NOTE: This is not a BLAME THE TEACHER essay.)

Scoring Rubric:

EXEMPLARY: Meets ALL of the requirements of PROFICIENTin addition to:

Writing and analysis is succinct and shows mastery over the English language.

Student clearly sees where the errors in thinking and writing occurred and how they could solve them without specific guidance from the teacher.

Goals move beyond the simplistic and are SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-Sensitive) with clear steps to be taken to achieve the goals.

PROFICIENT

READING: Includes accurate and relevant references to score given and to the essay and its characteristics – uses specific examples from the essay.

READING: Analyzes and provides insights into student’s writing and thinking about the text studied.

READING: Analyzes and provides insights into student’s writing and thinking about the performance in general, including goals for the rest of the trimester.

WRITING: Uses accurate and appropriate speaker persona and style for audience and purpose.

WRITING: Writes in complete sentences without grammatical/spelling errors. Errors do not distract.

WRITING: Paper is formatted in proper MLA formatting, typed, double-spaced, no more than two pages.

Basic:

Meets ALL of the READING standards but not the second WRITING standard of the PROFICIENT requirements.

Limited:

Meets less than 2 of the READING standards requirements OR none of the WRITING standards.

These examples are a little more succinct than you should be. You have a page to communicate your analysis using this style. Please refer to the sample commentaries attached to the Cardinal Wolsey essays:

Sample: 1A

Score: 9

From its early distinction between the voice and echo in Pack’s poem, this elegant essay inspires confidence. Using a well-developed introduction to identify the poem’s form and explicate its structure — “[t]he ‘echo’ … is the narrator’s alter ego” — the essay explores the literary devices the poet works with, including rhyme, imagery, and symbol, and connects them to the poem’s meaning. The discussion of the interplay between voice and echo is rich: “The echo is not just blindly trying to coax or comfort the voice, but he exists to give real answers.” The essay suggests a student fully engaged in a conversation with the work — reader response at its best — and the probing goes deeper, to “the central idea of this sonnet — we all know we must die, and that our fate is sealed due to the inevitable mortality. Yet the echo says, ‘leap’ for the future.” Such thoroughness, persuasiveness, and insight, combined with an especially effective control of language, earned this essay a score of 9.

Sample: 1B

Score: 5

This essay, while appearing to sustain an organized response to the prompt, relies heavily on generalities. It mixes knowledge of literary terminology with limited critical diction (“a standard Shakespearean sonnet, which makes great use of a variety of literary techniques”). Frequently, an idea is introduced but not capitalized on, as in the second paragraph, in which the essay mentions “mood and tone” without characterizing either, then suggests “that the speaker has been struck by a tragedy” — essentially a new direction. The paragraph treating imagery asserts that “[t]he whole poem creates a picture in the reader’s head” and that this imagery “contributes to the meaning of the poem,” without clearly articulating what this meaning is. The conclusion late in the essay that “the speaker’s problems arise from love” develops from a reading of image and metaphor, but the statement lacks persuasiveness. This essay received a score of 5 in acknowledgment of both its plausibility and its superficiality. It contains the framework for an essay with potential but lacks precision in its analysis and offers inadequate textual support for its thesis.

Sample: 1C

Score: 2

The introduction to this brief essay discusses how Pack uses rhyme — a technique that plays an important role in the poem — but never develops the kind of clear orientation that would signal where the essay is headed. The reference to “a sort of surreal quality to the poem” raises a point worth exploring, and the consideration of tone in the second paragraph could serve a fuller analysis as well, but both are left undeveloped. As it concludes, the essay’s tentativeness becomes apparent: “The echo most likely is his subconscious way of ‘finding help’ within himself.” As in the opening sentence, where the phrase “intended meanings” acts as a placeholder for greater specificity, the end of the essay avoids linking the earlier analysis to a controlling idea. The result is an essay that was scored a 2 because of its lack of development and support from the poem.