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English 1: Annotated Bibliography

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English I Annotated Bibliography

Assignment Overview

Fall 2025

 

This year in English I, we hope you learn how reading stories helps us and supports us as humans. The world can be chaotic and filled with twists and turns, so losing yourself in a story and learning from protagonist’s journeys is a skill we hope you grow while at Ursuline. We also hope you can:

Recognize your identity and your origin story and how they have shaped you and your worldview.  Through empathizing with the lived experiences of characters, you can use your writing process to engage in contemporary conversations thoughtfully and respectfully about your identity group and others.

To build your empathy for our characters in The Secret Life of Bees, we will embark on a research adventure to gather information about their setting and context that helps us understand their conflicts and decision-making. Researching and navigating credible sources is also a skill you will use your entire life.

Your task:

Step 1: You will choose a research focus relating to The Secret Life of Bees.

Step 2: You will learn about the research process from our library team.

Step 3: You will select THREE sources that relate to your question.

Step 4: Read & annotate each chosen source, creating Notecards in NoodleTools for each one so that all your thoughts, notes, and annotations are in one place.

Step 5: You will write the following for each source:

    • Full MLA citation
    • Paragraph 1: A summary of the source, including one quotation from the source
    • Paragraph 2: A short reflection of how this source builds your understanding of your research focus within The Secret Life of Bees, including one quote from the novel

Please select from one of the following research topics:

  1. Civil Rights Act of 1964

Character focus: How does the Civil Rights Act influence Rosaleen?

  1. Jim Crow Laws and segregation

Character focus: How does segregation and / or racism impact the Daughters of Mary?

  1. History of mental health care (note: you are not diagnosing a character!)

Character focus: Stigmas around depression and mental illness during the 1960s, and the treatments available to those suffering with mental issues // thought: consider how May struggles with mental health