Some Recitation Helps

Many of you have asked for some help in picking your recitation pieces.  I thought I would start first with some inspirational help - a scene from one of my favorite movies, The Dead Poets Society starring Robin Williams:

I know that some of you are choosing a poem for your piece, and this movie is full of wonderful recitations by Williams and his students.  It is rated PG, but I think that is a  very liberal rating not only because of some sexual references but also because of  the circumstances surrounding the death of one of the students.  Please speak with  your parents before watching this film. 

If your recitation interests tend toward more of a literary interest - poetry or fiction - I have a website that you may find very helpful.  It's a page put together by a literature professor at Washington State University.  You can find a list of American Authors and a list of American Literary movments, but most helpful to you may be the timeline.  That way you can pinpoint poets or authors within a particular time period that may be of interest to you (or check to make sure that your author/poet wrote in the timeperiod of this first section of our class).  Take a look at it HERE and you may want to bookmark it - it could be helpful in your English/Lit classes, too!  Your recitation doesn't have to be a poem - it can also be a selection from a piece of fiction!

If your interests tend more toward the political or military interests you may be most interested in reciting a speech (or portion of a speech).  I have found two helpful resources (in addition to your text):

Biblical Patriot's Important and Historical Speeches (these are only of American Interest, but be careful of the dates!)

Wikipedia's List of Speeches (this is a very comprehensive list, so not all of them are appropriate for this assignment)

Your text is actually a good resourece, too.  It is full of quotes of speeches, famous documents, and poems which are all appropriate for this assignment.  They are easy to spot because they are either indented to set them apart from the rest of the text or they are in italics.  Also check those footnotes for more ideas!

I also found a very good resource for helping your with the presentation portion of the assignment.  It's a website called Poetry Out Loud.  Look at their tip page HERE.  Take a few minutes to listen to listen to some of the student recitation videos.  Poetry Out Loud is actually a national competition that encourages youth in memorizing and reciting poetry!

Another post this afternoon will clearly and simply lay out the requirements for this assignment...