UPDATE and REMINDER: Make sure your essay
is about the photo - at least in the intro and conclusion. Address the photo and interact with what's in it. Bring the reader to the moment that it was taken - and then launch into the story behind it. The best essays will focus on just one photo, and will not be able to be read unless the photo is there with the essay. If the reader can read your essay without the photo, you might be straying from the prompt.
Due Date: Again, I'm flexible since it is AP time. Get it done before AP is over, and bonus points for those who got it done by the original date. If you wrote it and maybe didn't follow the prompt that closely (75% of you :) you can write a new one and have at least one "extra blog post" taken care of.:)
This assignment should be relatively easy for you to write, so I'd like it to be completed between now and AP exams. I actually felt compelled to write my own version of this assignment, and enjoyed the experience quite a bit. It was easy to think of a meaningful photo, and it didn't take long at all to bang out 5 paragraphs.
So what should you write? It's up to you. You can approach this assignment any way you see fit. I'd like you to be creative, and write in an accessible tone that is reflective, analytical, and maybe even poetic at times. There's the old saying that "a picture speaks a thousand words." For this, I think you should only need about 500. Let's say at least 500. To get there, you can consider the 5 W's.
For example:
- Who's in the picture? Family? Friends? No one? A dog?
- What's unique about it? Is there a story behind it? What does it mean to you personally? What do you think about it when you look at it?
- When did you take it? What kind of person were you at that time? How have things changed?
- Where did you take it? What does that place mean to you?
- Why did you take it? Why do you like it? Why is it good?
- How would you describe it poetically? Etc. etc. etc.
Things you should focus on, which I will take into consideration when grading:
- Organized paragraphs. Every paragraph should have a unique function, and fulfill that intent before progressing to the next paragraph. Try and hop from one stepping stone to the next gracefully with proper transitions.
- Avoid Repetition. Make sure you aren't over emphasizing the subject of your sentence or paragraph with repeated mentions of a noun. This was a problem with the Walmart essay, where the word Walmart was used to explain the drawback of Walmart, in order to reveal the postive aspects of Walmart and the harmful aspects of Walmart. Make sure your sentences are concise and to the point, and don't fill the essay up with filler.
- Connect your intro and conclusion, and have a strong theme.
Please don't feel you need to answer all or any of the 5 W's, and please don't use what I wrote as a template. It's not important to discuss the camera you used or the technical details of photography, but if you are into that - cool. The real purpose of the essay is to explore "reflection" with a visual prompt. The photo doesn't even need to be one that you've taken personally. You can even be in the photo. Or maybe it's simply a photo you really admire or love. It can be really old, or even really new - taken for the exact reason to write this essay. You can write descriptively with a bit more emotional/personal depth than you otherwise would in a Walmart essay. I'd also like you to provide a title for your photo - which is what most professional artists do with their work. Here's mine:
Steps
I've taken thousands of pictures over the years, but didn't invest in a "serious camera" until a photographer friend of mine commented on the photo above. He didn't believe me when I told him I'd taken it with a 5.1 Megapixel Sony Cybershot, and he said a simple "point and shoot" had no business capturing what it did. So, at least in my eyes, the above photo has some magical quality to it. Two monks ascend a granite stairway into the foggy heavens of Mount Taishan, and despite hoards of Chinese tourists wearing matching red hats about to swarm into the shot - I was able to click the button at just the right second and preserve a bit of perfection. Oriental romanticism perhaps.
My romance began in the third grade. My teacher, Mrs. Crandle, always traveled during summer vacations, and after returning from Japan she taught us all about the unique social customs. In my mind, there could be no place on earth as alien. I imagined myself flying off to Tokyo to learn ninja skills from a wise sensei, drinking tea while sharpening a samurai sword beneath cherry blossoms. I made it my goal in life to someday journey there, and when I found out later that I could teach English as a means of a "working holiday," I sort of knew where I'd end up after university.
Twenty five years later, I'm not in Japan, and the "working holiday" is kind of serious. I'm in Korea, where I've immersed myself into a unique culture, marrying myself into a kind Korean family, working at a world class Korean high school. Korea is my home, and I'm happy to wake up every morning and dress up in Korean traditional clothing, and then go to work where there's even the odd traditional Korean building, where I eat traditional Korean food. I don't get to train with ninjas or hang out with a kungfu master, but I get to spend time with amazing students. My life hasn't included lofty ambitions such as becoming president or walking on the moon, but when I look at the picture above, I feel I've somehow realized a practical childhood dream. But it did take a while to get here.
Traditionally, those who climb Taishan seek "sunrise, birth, and renewal." To reach the top, one must climb precisely 7,200 steps. Following those monks, I climbed them in 2007, after climbing three of the other "Five Great Mountains" in 2005. If China had become my backyard playground, Korea had become my home away from home over the course of 5 years - where I'd work, save money, and then get on a boat to head back to China. Or maybe a plane to SE Asia. Or maybe Europe. Sometimes I'd travel for a month before going back. Sometimes for three. On my longest journey, I spent almost a year venturing from Korea to the southern tip of India, without boarding a single airplane. Most of the time I was alone, and the only earthly possessions I owned were a backpack, clothes, an iPod and a camera. Sometimes it was sad, and I wondered what the point of all this wandering was. To take pictures?
Photoshopped to be black and white, the monks are actually holding bright red plastic bags full of vegetables. I might have also cropped it to exclude an elbow or two, as there were thousands of other tourists who were also making the pilgrimage. I recall getting food poisoning from some dumplings I ate at the top, and I remember having to pay double for a place to sleep because I wasn't Chinese. Oriental romanticism isn't always an ideal that's easy to maintain, but those two monks, climbing carefully up those solid steps towards a holier place - they mean a lot to me.
In life, we have to keep on climbing.
