English I students worked with connotation in the poem “Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden.

Sundays too my father got up early
and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he’d call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,

Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love’s austere and lonely offices?

English 8 students worked with chapter 3 of Nightjohn, running a Socratic Seminar to discuss the question of whether or not Sarney should take the chance and learn to read.

We will be working on our weekly Friday individual work tomorrow.

Homework

• English 8 Studies: none.
• English I Honors: 
  • complete and turn in your irony/symbolism work at Moodle;
  • determine the five most important words in the whole poem, “Those Winter Sundays.”