APELC Class Notes
Objectives: APELCers processed texts from multiple genres.
Third juniors and seniors, we concluded Things Fall Apart today. Megan asserted the fluid nature of culture when I asked you to think about Okonkwo’s rigid nature. The ebbs and flows of culture(s) have informed our study of language and ideas throughout the year, and I appreciate all of the mind-bending that you all engaged in over the last four quarters.
We finished talking about the pop-political texts pertaining to the ascendancy of Barack Obama and their rhetorical significance. We examined a few pieces from the site Is Barack Obama the Messiah? (and to be fair and balanced I mentioned the site Barack Obama the Antichrist?, which informed our discussion of the messianic adoration that’s been bestowed upon our 44th president and included further analysis of Matthew Clark’s Simulation of the Triumphal Entry of the Christ and Michael D’antuono’s The Truth (the unveiling of which was canceled after the artist pusillanimously caved to public outrage).
The symbols were obvious, and I think, not so rich. Many expressed various offenses at the depictions of Obama, Nora, for example, at the sheer iconic spectacle of the texts, and Lauren for their overstepping religious boundaries. Taylor, on the other hand, defended the material and practical necessity of the artists’ endeavors. And Hal reminded us also that these texts were not endorsed or sponsored by the President, and that ultimately the artists must bear the full brunt of criticism and/or appreciation they warrant.
Here’s a piece, Obama Wet with Victory and Blackberry by Lukas Ketner (that’s my own title as I’m sure of its proper name) via another site, for fun and to highlight degree of unbelievable fandom that surrounds Mr. Obama. An updated version can be found at Mr. Ketner’s blog.
I also said I’d post the following video of Johnny Cash’s rendition of Nine Inch Nails’ “Hurt”, which is utterly rife with religious symbols (the singer was a devout Christian). Dig it if you will.
See you next week for our final full practice before the APELC exam on May 13.
English 9 Class Notes
Objectives: Freshmen identified and explained character, setting, idiom, plot, imagery, irony, foreshadowing, point of view, motif, symbol, and theme in a novel.
We continued steadily through the our text today, first freshmen. We read through chapters 16 and 17, two of the most important chapters in the story as we see the seriousness of Atticus’s task of defending Tom Robinson. You do have homework to attend if you didn’t finish the work I assigned in class or tutoring.
See you Monday.
APELC Class Notes
Fourth APELCers, check yesterday’s notes for objectives and details. (The objectives never really change, just the details.)
Here’re the two examples of irony that I offered you and your peers, one for its humor, Life On Line Internet Consultants, and the other, “Swine flu shows need for science, Obama says” , for its fallacious implications, both for kicks.
English 9 Class Notes
Periods 2 and 6 freshmen, we did the same as your peers yesterday, but I offered you a clearer example of what your individual writing assignments can look like. I post it here as a model:
Subject: Character of Caroline Fisher
TS S1: Miss Caroline Fisher, Scout’s new elementary school teacher in Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird, is both cruel and naïve.
C1 S2 (EV): For example, Miss Fisher is critical of Atticus’s teaching Scout how to read and instructs her to tell her father that he’s no longer to read with her: “It’s best to begin reading with a fresh mind. You tell him I’ll take over from here [. . . .] Your father does not know how to teach” (22).
C1 S3 (EX): Miss Fisher doesn’t understand the relationship Scout has with Atticus and maybe is making assumptions about the level of education of the people of Maycomb.
C1 S4 (EX): She is a new teacher and is eager to show her skill as an educator and disciplinarian, but in doing so cruelly insults Scout and her father.
C2 S5 (EV): Then Miss Fisher becomes angry and impatient when Walter Cunningham proudly refuses her gift of lunch money so he can eat in town, and Scout comes to his defense against their teacher: “The Cunnighams never took anything they can’t pay back—no church baskets, no scrip stamps [. . . .] They don’t have much but they get along” (24).
C2 S6 (EX): Miss Fisher becomes defensive when Walter denies her gift because she doesn’t understand the Cunninghams’ situation.
C2 S7 (EX): She’s naïve to think she can help, but she’s new to Maycomb County and doesn’t realize the nature of the students and the families she’s come to serve.
CS S8: Miss Fisher’s presence is important in the novel because it’s her character about whom Scout makes the wrong assumptions and because of whom Scout begins to learn to understand others by judging them carefully.
And here’s how it would look rewritten:
“The Character of Caroline Fisher”
Miss Caroline Fisher, Scout’s new elementary school teacher in Harper Lee’s novel To Kill a Mockingbird, is both cruel and naïve. For example, Miss Fisher is critical of Atticus’s teaching Scout how to read and instructs her to tell her father that he’s no longer to read with her: “It’s best to begin reading with a fresh mind. You tell him I’ll take over from here [. . . .] Your father does not know how to teach” (22). Miss Fisher doesn’t understand the relationship Scout has with Atticus and maybe is making assumptions about the level of education of the people of Maycomb. She is a new teacher and is eager to show her skill as an educator and disciplinarian, but in doing so cruelly insults Scout and her father. Then Miss Fisher becomes angry and impatient when Walter Cunningham proudly refuses her gift of lunch money so he can eat in town, and Scout comes to his defense against their teacher: “The Cunnighams never took anything they can’t pay back—no church baskets, no scrip stamps [. . . .] They don’t have much but they get along” (24). Miss Fisher becomes defensive when Walter denies her gift because she doesn’t understand the Cunninghams’ situation. She’s naïve to think she can help, but she’s new to Maycomb County and doesn’t realize the nature of the students and the families she’s come to serve. Miss Fisher’s presence is important in the novel because it’s her character about whom Scout makes the wrong assumptions and because of whom Scout begins to learn to understand others by judging them carefully.
No need for you to rewrite it. I only put the finished product down so you might see how it would read off the template.
You have two official tutoring periods between the time I assigned the writing and the time it’s due. Please utilize me during that time to ensure your best work.
APELC Class Notes
Objectives: APELCers processed texts from multiple genres.
Third juniors and seniors, we tackled George Orwell’s “Shooting an Elephant” with its motifs of duty, suffering, and incursion and to it tried to tie Okonkowo’s, Uchendu’s, Obierika’s understanding of the same. Good talk.
Keep reading, and I’ll see you next class.
English 9 Class Notes
Objectives: Freshmen identified and explained character, setting, idiom, plot, imagery, irony, foreshadowing, point of view, motif, symbol, and theme in a novel.
Period 1 freshmen, we reviewed your reading of chapter 14 and moved to the dramatic events of chapter 15. We began to review your understanding of the text, but too many students didn’t seem to be engaging the activity, and I suspected many students were waiting for others to offer answers to avoid thinking through the literary issues presented in the story. So I set students to the task of individually writing an expository paragraph of a major character of their choice; this helped those less-motivated to be responsible for their own work rather than relying on a partner to carry them through, and it seemed to meet with some success. I hope your work bears me out.
I hope to see many of you in tutoring so I can help you create the best, most beautiful work possible.
APELC Class Notes
Objective: APELCers responded to their peers’ cause and effect drafts.
As the objective states boys and girls. I also mentioned briefly, unable to forget the discussion we had over relativism and cultural rights and wrongs, a piece I fortuitously came across earlier in the day about female circumcision or female genital cutting as it’s described by the US Department of Health and Human Services. The text, “A Cutting Tradition”, by Sara Cobett, appears with Stephanie Sinclair’s photo essay “Inside a female circumcision ceremony”, and below is one of the images of a 9-month-old girl after she experienced the procedure.
The photo reminded me of my daughter.
She’s ethnically Sidama, born in southern Ethiopia. Female circumcision is still practiced in this area which I find troubling (read more, “Turning the tide on female genital mutilation in Ethiopia”). The practice exists here too, as described in a 1995 The Atlantic piece: “Female Circumcision Comes to America”.
As an artifact of culture, I wonder how the practice fits into the framework described by Daniel Bell and the encyclopedia definition I asked you to note at the beginning of the year:
Culture is the effort to provide a coherent set of answers to the existential situations that confront all human beings in the passage of their lives. (qtd. in Daniel Yankelovich)
[Culture is] Behaviour peculiar to Homo sapiens, together with material objects used as an integral part of this behaviour. Thus, culture includes language, ideas, beliefs, customs, codes, institutions, tools, techniques, works of art, rituals, and ceremonies, among other elements. (Encyclopædia Britannica)
Study more at the World Health Organization’s information page on female genital mutilation and read about the “Debates about FGM in Africa, the Middle East & Far East” at ReligiousTolerance.org.
English 9 Class Notes
Objectives: Freshmen identified and explained character, setting, idiom, plot, imagery, irony, foreshadowing, point of view, motif, symbol, and theme in a novel.
Freshmen 1, 2, and 6, we covered chapter 14 in class today on the back of your reading of 12 and 13 over the weekend. I mentioned some of the details of the final which I’ll post the weekend and which we’ll go over next Monday.
Be ready to paragraph next class.
Peace until then.
APELC Class Notes
Fourth period, we covered most of what your colleagues did yesterday. We had a fantastic discussion today about the morality of the Ibo tradition of (formerly) leaving twins born in their midst in the forest, perhaps to die from starvation or dehydration, maybe to be stung to death and ravaged by insects, perhaps torn apart by eaten by animals, because of their supernatural superstition.
While some (non-relativists) argued that, as ostensibly disinterested observers (say, researching the culture for an advanced degree), they would intervene for the protection of the twins, others (relativists) stated they’d not, suggesting it would be better not to interfere with such practices because they are culturally protected, that is, the ideas are inherently above scrutiny because a particular group of people believes them. Since we weren’t able to attend these in detail in class, I’ll throw out these two ideas here (from notes by Chris Heathwood) and ask that you think them over the remainder of our time together:
An argument for cultural relativism, Cultural Differences:
- Different societies have different beliefs about right and wrong.
- If different societies have different beliefs about right and wrong, then morality depends upon the beliefs of society.
- If morality depends upon the beliefs of society, then cultural relativism is true.
- Therefore, cultural relativism is true.
An argument against cultural relativism, the Reformer’s Dilemma:
- If cultural relativism is true, then anyone who advocates reform is mistaken.
- It is not the case that anyone who advocates reform is mistaken.
- Therefore, cultural relativism is not true.
How do you evaluate these ideas in the real-world context of recent incidents in Sudan, “Sudan outrage at trouser arrests”, and Pakistan, “Taliban Video Shows Teen Girl Beaten for ‘Adultery’”.
Have a good, thoughtful weekend, and return on Monday with the second draft of your cause and effect paper.
English 9 Class Notes
Second and sixth freshmen, you read and listened as we discussed as we could the same as your first period peers did yesterday. Since we didn’t get the chance to view the brief clip about the murder of Emmett Till from the American Experience documentary “Eyes on the Prize”, so I post it here for you now. As we move into the second part of To Kill a Mockingbird and the trial of Tom Robinson, keep Jim Crow at the forefront of your minds.
And here’s Bob Dylan’s interpretation of Emmett Till’s story that a fan put together with photos and video.
Attend your homework and have a great weekend.
APELC Class Notes
Objectives: APELCers processed texts from multiple genres.
Third juniors and seniors, we discussed the matter of Ikemefuma’s murder in Things Fall Apart today and Okonkwo’s role in it which led to a broader discussion of Okonkwo’s fears, masculinity, and humanity. We compared Okonkwo and Ikemefuma’s story to the sacrifice of Abraham and discussed self-serving and faith actions. We considered tribal worldviews involving divination, witchcraft, and body-modification-as-rite-and-argument, the latter of which engendered discussion about the role of tattoos in youth culture. Neat stuff.
Here’re two links to National Geographic galleries on “Modern and Ancient Body Modification” and “Tattoos, Piercings, and Body Markings”, and here’s a video from the magazine on full-body tattooing as practiced by the Yakuza.
Obviously the way we present ourselves is important, and we seem to maintain a significant existential fascination with body modification.
There’s writing to be done for next week. Get to it.
English 9 Class Notes
Objectives: Freshmen will identify and explain character, setting, idiom, plot, imagery, irony, foreshadowing, point of view, motif, symbol, and theme in a novel.
Period 1 freshmen, you read along with the narration of chapter 10 and 11 of To Kill a Mockingbird today, and our discussion mostly focused on character and plot. I asked you to focus on Atticus’s definition of courage to Jem:
Real courage [is] when you know you’re licked before you begin but you begin anyway and you see it through no matter what. You rarely win, but sometimes you do.
This will help focus our attention Monday to the brief paragraph we’ll write as we continue on to the second part of the novel.
Please attend the homework on your class page, and have a fine weekend.
APELC Class Notes
Period 4 juniors and seniors, we covered the same material as your peers yesterday in third.
Continue Things Fall Apart.
English 9 Class Notes
Periods 2 and 6, you did the same as your peers yesterday. Check their notes for objectives and details, and please attend your homework.
APELC Class Notes
Objectives: APELCers processed texts from multiple genres.
Period 3 juniors and seniors, we processed the Gawande piece today as the paired selection to the Kolata piece from last week, and I mentioned again Lauren’s observation from our previous discussion people’s existential need to know, if not always understand, causes, and the natural (?) frustration non-understanding engenders. It reminded me and several of you of the cause and effect relationships in the CSI episode “Chaos Theory”.
We moved to Things Fall Apart, and I asked you to identify, analyze and evaluate aspects of the Ibo worldview and how the novel is grounded in post-colonial thought.
We’ll read from the selections in the back of the text next time.
English 9 Class Notes
Objectives: Freshmen identified and explained character, setting, idiom, plot, imagery, irony, foreshadowing, point of view, motif, symbol, and theme in a novel.
First period freshmen, we reviewed your reading of chapter 7, a brief chapter, and then we moved to the next. You answered questions over chapter 8, which we discussed in-class and, in particular the characterization of Miss Maudie, and attached were two questions for chapter 9, which you’re to read for next class.
See you then.
APELC Class Notes
Objective: APELCers responded to their peers’ cause and effect drafts.
Most of third period lacked their first drafts so we engaged in our trusty invention exercise; most of fourth period had their drafts and so engaged the peer response activity.
We had time to view a clip from Frontline/WORLD, “India: Calcutta Calling”, about three Indian teens who were adopted as infants by white families and who returned to India to explore their cultural birthright. In keeping with current mode, I asked you to consider the effect of adoption on the girls, and I asked you to consider the worldview conflicts the girls face in regards to how they understand their foundations, constitution, and cognition. Further, I encouraged you to make connections to our novel its ideas of tradition and identity.
Attend the homework details on your class page and be ready to talk more next class.
English 9 Class Notes
Objectives: Freshmen identified and explained character, setting, idiom, plot, imagery, irony, foreshadowing, point of view, motif, symbol, and theme in a novel.
Once again too many students didn’t complete the reading and so didn’t also complete the homework. We were able to discuss the questions I set you to consider last week as a means of contextualizing the novel; in particular, we discussed the character of Atticus Finch, the hero of To Kill a Mockingbird. I mentioned that Gregory Peck’s Atticus was named the American Film Institute’s top movie hero, ahead of even Indiana Jones and James Bond. We’ll talk about why this might be as we proceed with the book.
APELC Class Notes
Period 4 juionrs and seniors, we covered the same material as yesterday and, with Ben in a disputatious mood, a provocative discussion ensued about the causes and effect of the issues surrounding global warming/climate change,and cultural, or moral relativism.
It’s nice to see cognitive growth in all of my APELCers since the beginning of the school year. I’ve quite enjoyed experiencing your progress with you.
Have a great weekend, and please attend the homework details in your class page.
English 9 Class Notes
Unfortunately, periods 2 and 6, because too many students didn’t do the assigned reading in our novel I have to change the nature of the activity to match that completed by your first period peers yesterday.
Again, I would urge you to complete your work for your own educational and social well-being.
I have listed your homework on your class page; please attend it.