Worke Shited Page

December 9, 2007

Hi.

I’m done with my semester(s)! Well, I have to give a final exam on Wednesday but i’m pretty much done with my semester. And, i’m just about done with grading. I haven’t been this far ahead in grading since, I don’t know when.

I hope y’all don’t mind if I rant for just a minute about teaching English Composition (special thanks to colleague and fellow blogger–and postcard-er– Shin for reminding me of my rant). If you don’t teach English Composition, or if you don’t care, you might want to skip this quick rant. By the way, I LOVE teaching– and even teaching English Composition. But every semester this happens… the dreaded…

Works Cited page. A Works Cited page is like a Bibliography and is required at the end of all essays that require research. The official definition is here. I teach how to write a Works Cited page at least 4 times during the semester. We practice them in class, I have the students bring in their sources and practice writing them and then turn them in to me so I can give them feedback and they have to keep practicing them until they get it right.

So why is it they can never get them right? (there are a few student exceptions). It’s not difficult to write a Works Cited page. All you have to do is look in any MLA Guidebook (unless you’re using APA but we in English use MLA). All you need to know is the info from where you got your source: was it a webpage? an encyclopedia entry? a magazine? newspaper? academic journal? book with two authors and an editor?

And the format. You don’t EVER need to memorize HOW to do a Works Cited page (though when you’ve done enough of them you remember the little things like indents, spacing and periods and alphabetical order by last name). I tell the students that even I don’t memorize it. I LOOK in an MLA Guideline book and it SHOWS me how to format it. I just COPY– C-O-P-Y it from the book to make sure i’m doing it correctly.

So why is it I get Works Cited pages that are NOT indented?

They are NOT in alphabetical order.

They have NUMBERS before each entry (NUMBERS ARE NOT ALLOWED!):

1. Williams, Rob. “MLA Citation is like, so hard!” Words of Wisdom from my ten thousand years of teaching. New York: AnyPublishingHouse, 2007. 171-188.

Also, note above the citation is not INDENTED!

They have NO (or little regard for) punctuation.

I mean, come on, you can search online for how to do these things! There are Citation machines! You can plug info online and it will create a Works Cited page for you! (though these can also be incorrectly formatted).

The worst thing for me, though, is that students don’t even remember what the page is called. At the top of the page I have gotten:

Work Cited (it’s supposed to be WORKS, yes, even if you only have ONE citation it’s still called a Works Cited page).

Work Citied (because work happens in a city)

Worke Cite (is this the Middle English version of the word?)

Werke Cited (Old English)

Work Shitied (ok I made this one up)

Workcited (if you run it all together the teacher won’t notice!)

Wory Cited (i’d worry too if I wrote this one)

Here is a sample of WHAT A CORRECT WORKS CITED (page) LOOKS LIKE!:

click on it to make it bigger and even MORE exciting!

***

ok, now that that’s done, on to other/better things.

I made my first batch of Christmas cookies of the holiday season.

These are Coconut Cookies from Weight Watchers!! (Only 1 pt. each!) that I was a little wary of (especially because, while making them, Ted informed me that not many people like coconut–him included). They are kind of like macaroons but more ‘cake-y’– probably because they have angel food cake in them. They came out pretty scrumptious and were the hit of my friend Kelli’s party on Friday night (if I do say so myself). Even TED ate them!

Really easy recipe, too:

Coconut Cookies (don’t they look like lil’ snowballs?!)

serves: 64 (ha ha, it really says that on the recipe) points: 1 (hell yeah!)

1 18 and 1/2 oz. Angel Food cake mix

1/2 cup water

7 oz sweetened coconut flakes 350 Degrees

–Mix all ingred. together;

Drop rounded teaspoons onto a greased/sprayed cookie sheet.

Bake until golden brown. (* my oven burned the bottoms of the first batch so I started taking them out when I saw a golden brown ring around the bottoms of the cookies).

***

ok. i’m done for now. there will be more blog posts now that i’m on vacation.

stay tuned!