Mr. Manley - 8th Grade ELA

Tonight's Homework: Complete pages 61 and 62 that focus on the usage of "its" and "it's."


Welcome Back!  Here are the notes for the literature we are covering this week.  There is also a classwork assignment attached that everyone is responsible for handing in on Thursday.

“The Great Rat Hunt”

By Laurence Yep (p. 107)

      VOCABULARY WORDS

            barricade-           blockade

            brusquely-          abruptly; sharply

            fumigate-            exterminate

            improvise-          to act without a plan

            ineptitude-         clumsiness

            mug-                    the face

            perpetual-          long lasting

            rationalize-         justify; excuse

            ravage-                destruction

            reserve-               unfriendliness

MEMOIR

Definition: A first-person recollection of an experience or event

3 Characteristics

1.             told from 1^st person point of view using       the pronouns I, me, we

2.             are accounts of actual events

3.             include the writer’s feelings and beliefs about his/her family and community

Theme

Definition: The message about life or human nature communicated by a literary work

·    Apply lessons learned by the main characters to ALL of us

◦  Themes of Rat Hunt

We don’t have to be good at everything

Sometimes it’s smart to be scared

Don’t underestimate love

Acceptance

It’s okay to be you

It’s important to try

“The Great Rat Hunt”

By Laurence Yep

(Pages 107-114)

ANALYSIS QUESTIONS

Directions: On your paper, answer each question in a complete sentence.

1.           Identify this literary genre.

2.           Describe Laurence’s conflict.

3.           Do you think Laurence’s father resents him for not being able to keep up?  Why or why not?

4.           On page 108 in the top paragraph of column B, how does Yep use personification in describing the rat?

5.           What situations in Father’s past might explain his brusqueness and reserve? (Hint: see page 111) 

6.           Do you see any relationship between Laurence’s feeling of being an outsider in his own family and his father’s experience as an immigrant?  Explain.

7.           Why was it so important to Father that Eddy and Laurence learn to play American sports? (See page 112, col. A)

8.           Yep uses hyperboles on page 113, bottom of column A to describe the rat.  Write one of them on your paper.

9.           In your opinion, which is worse, being a failure or being a coward?  Why?

10.       Why is it significant to Laurence that his father called it “our” trophy?

11.       What do you think is the theme of this memoir?  (Hint: look in column A on page 114)