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Janet Yarbrough responds to a question as she works on
an English Ill ass1gnment. ABOVE: Tracy Greer reacts to the
end of h1s th..d per1od Enghsh II class.
Depleted notecard supplies lead to completed term papers
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"om ••••"
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" Is K&.B out of 4x6
After the students had a
were actually staying on the
into a term paper. But I still
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notecards?" " Who got card
topic and gained approval from
store shelves. Most of all, we
wonder if the English IV
catalogue drawer Ce-Cz?"
the teacher, the next step
learned something: how to use
teachers had stock in the
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" Anybody got a hole
was to begin on the
reference material and
notecard companies.
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puncher? " " Where' s my
notecards. One began to copy
assemble it in our own words
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manilla envelope?" These are
facts on 4x6 notecards and
among questions that rose
listed the source on the
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from the depths of the school bibliography cards-you know,
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library. " Why?" one can ask.
the ones with the clipped
Simple: it's time to watch the corners. When one had more
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senior English students fight
than a hundred cards, he was
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for one of high school's
supposed to have enough to
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biggest grades, the " English
write one of those "term
Term Paper."
papers," as they called it.
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Even the name is enough to
When one had completed
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strike fear into any normal
the rough draft, he could
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teenager, Armed with only
generally tell whether the
notecards and reference
teacher approved of the paper
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materials, the 17 and 18 year by the number of red X's
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olds were told to create a
drawn across the pages.
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multt-page story having to do
By the end of the nine
with English literature.
weeks of work , each student
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Teachers requested something
was to have a nicely planned
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normal like " Shakespeare' s Life five to nine page term paper.
~~
in Relation to his Sonnets. "
Then it was over; no more
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Never would the teacher let
writer's cramps from taking
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students do something fun like notes; no more activity in the
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" Macbeth as compared to a
library; and for the first time
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Grapefruit."
in nine weeks, the notecards
With the a1d of microfiche in the school
hbrary,
Ken Winks collects matenal for h1s
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term paper.
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98/English