AP Language Class Notes
Seniors and juniors, second period saw Marie tell us about Zoroastrianism; Sam, Baha’i; Andre, Mormonism; and Elise, Hinduism; fifth period processed the anti-Pride Time rhetoric plastered all over campus today and began watching The Persuaders .
Fifth period meted out the speaker, context, audience, argument, presentation (logos), common grounds and values (ethos), emotional anticipations and manipulations (pathos), call-to-action, and effectiveness of the shellacked handbills, though I reminded everyone that while the non-violent pamphleteering-style resistance was admirable, the flyposting aspect was troubling―the custodians, not the posters, will be responsible for scraping the handbills off the concrete.
But note that while you, students, are taught in school to admire and emulate the spirit of the status-quo-resistant activist-reformer (Paine, Wilberforce, Wollstonecraft, Douglass, Anthony, Gandhi, King), the guerilla act was little admired by the-powers-that-be, one going so far as to call the posters “poison”.
I snapped a couple of photos of part of the scene. I’ll post those and a recreation of the mocking pamphlet itself (along with its original positive counterpart) later, and I’ll further address the frustration at the lack of voice Chloe mentioned and possible solutions for interested students to explore.
Bring food to our last class. (I like the bacon, egg, and cheese burrito from Nico’s.)
MOZART’S BALLS: Yes, the confection bearing the name is real. Popularly known as Mozart’s Balls by travelers and tourists, the Mozartkugeln (Mozart balls) (pistachio, marzipan, nougat, and chocolate) were introduced by an Austrian confectioner in the closing years of the 19th century. They don’t taste very good.
National Grammar Day
Students, imagine I was teaching you astronomy and I instructed you that our sun and planets revolve around the Earth. Or consider I was teaching you history and I advocated the oppression of the lower class because I believed its constituents socially and economically incapable of functioning autonomously in society. Or imagine even that I was teaching you biology, and instructed you that certain races of people were inherently physically and intellectually superior to others. At best, you’d think me ignorant and bigoted, at worst, stupid and racist.
Unfortunately, many pop-grammarians and even educators happily perpetuate the unscientific, incorrect, and prejudiced belief (as unscientific as the Ptolemaic conception of the relationship of heavenly bodies, as incorrect as a class of people’s ability based upon its economic disadvantage, and as prejudiced as the idea of inherent racial superiority) that certain grammars are better, purer, more acceptable and palatable than others. Ideas like these that give rise to such inanities as National Gammar Day, sponsored by the Society for the Promotion of Good Grammar.
Nathan Bierma, at the Chicago Tribune, weighs in on the dubious festivities and admits his ambivalence: “Don’t get carried away on National Grammar Day”. Arnold Zwicky, linguist at Stanford, is a bit more pointed, though: “National (OMIGOD) Grammar Day”.
So what’s the controversy? Well, it has to do with the distinction between grammar and usage and the surrounding language myths. These myths began many centuries ago and persist to this day and vex the uniformed usage-police (who curiously give Shakespeare a pass) and hurt the usage-violators who suffer under the scornful red pens of the former.
Well, what’s grammar? And what’s usage? Objectively, grammar is the machine that makes capable, drives, and accounts for human speech. Usage is a list of prescribed rules of written English and has to do with mere matters of taste and preference, for example, that one should not split infinitives. In her book Ancient Rhetorics for Modern Students, ASU rhetoric professor Sharon Crowley argues that “usage rules are the conventions [. . .] Americans use to discriminate against one another” (282).
For the real story about how language and how it works, PBS’s site Do You Speak American?, born from Robert MacNeil’s documentary of the same name, and inspired by his previous work on The Story of English, is a rich resource for earnest, curious, amateur linguists and for ill-informed, pretentious, pietistic pop-grammarians alike. A good place to start is with Edward Finegan who describes the differences between prescriptivism and descriptivism in “What is Correct Language?”.
Other contributions to the site include John Algeo’s chapter from the book Language Myths (I have a copy in my room) in which he tackles the idea of language decay, “Americans are Ruining English”, and Walt Wolfram’s article in which he describes processes of linguistic evolution, “The Truth About Change”. And if you don’t believe these linguists, who can doubt trustworthy NPR contributor Geoff Nunberg who discusses the “the decline of grammar” in “Language Diplomacy”.
I encourage you to begin to really examine your own assumptions about the relationship between language and society by further investigating language prestige and prejudice at the PBS site. Then check out Peter Patrick’s Linguistic Human Rights page, particularly his Ten Linguistic Axioms (and see also his page on African American English).
Happy National Grammar Day!
Linkjam!
Charity and goodwill aren’t fixed to the holiday season. Here’re some items I found (some that go back to November that I just didn’t have time to post) that may provoke thought or even inspire action for the new year:
There’s the curious story from CNN I mentioned tp some of you before break that highlights an ironic coming-together of the word’s three great monotheistic faiths: “Muslim helps Jew attacked on New York suway”.
In effort to get technology into the hands of learners in underdeveloped nations, One Laptop per Child was highlighted on the NewsHour: “Laptops Offer High-tech Hope in Developing Countries”.
Of course, kids need to be healthy in body as well as mind, and you can help feed families and expand your vocabulary at the same time at FreeRice.com. (Kind of chintzy, but every little bit helps.) And Country Crock has partnered with America’s Second Harvest to help feed families right here in the States, but they need you to tell your story of sharing.
And still back at home, the Alliance to End Homelessness released a study claiming that our veterans make up one quater of the of America’s homeless. While this and other shames are perpetrated on our doorsteps, conditions are even worse in other parts of the world. Doctors Without Borders released it annual Top Ten Most Underreported Humanitarian stories of 2007, and NPR followed up with a piece on the same.
There’s plenty going on in the world boy and girls, but you’re not helpless when it comes to taking action by digging in and helping out.
See you soon.
“Student Collapses”
No homily, no lesson, no comment―just a sad story: “Student collapses, dies after taking test”.
“Pushing the Limit”
Something new to be added to the annals of high school jackassery, some members of the student body at Oyster River High School in Durham, New Hampshire tried to pull a fast one on the rest of their graduating classmates. Many decided not to participate in the idiocy that their money was used for. Good for them. Here’s the story: “‘Pushing the Limit’: High School Senior Tee-Shirt Features Concerning .08 Image”.
Gotta Problem with Our Monitors?
This is what’s happening to your peers in the state next door.
More here, “School guard assault”, and here, “Mothers seek action from school after children suspended”.
Schools’ Roles, Education’s Goals
Here’s an interesting piece of rhetoric from a self-acknowledged liberally-slanted blog: “Got a problem? Ask the public schools to solve it!” The post is a summary of and commentary on a Harper’s piece “Schoolhouse crock: Fifty years of blaming America’s educational system for our stupidity” (which unfortunately requires a subscription to access; may be I’ll find it at Bookman’s next month). Anyway, “Morbo’s” summary seems thorough enough in its brevity, but it’s always important, if possible, to find the original source.
If you’re interested in commenting, since it deals directly with the establishment and environment you find yourselves in nearly 190 days of the year (seems like more), you might begin by taking your questions for rhetorical analysis to the text and see where it leads you. Then distill your answers into the tight points of the rhetorical triangle and decide on the effectiveness of the text itself.
Anyone care to try?
Open House
Excellent! That’s the best way to describe CDO’s open house last night. The campus was alive with parents and students and faculty, and room T-12 was packed almost every period. I enjoyed seeing many of you (students) and meeting you (parents).
I’m here to make myself as available to students as I can, and my classroom door is always open for parents, faculty, and administrators to come by and observe and participate. I’m looking forward to working with you all this year, my first at CDO.
Paid to Study
How much is an education worth? Youth Education Security, Incorporated, the organization behind First Job Project in Tuson think it’s so worthwhile that it’s paying students to attend class, study and maintain their grades. Students at Amphitheater and Rincon High Schools were randomly selected for participation in the program and can earn up to $25 a week, with the potential to earn bonuses if they meet certain benchmarks. Said Adelita Grijalva, TUSD board member, in the most telling line of print from the Arizona Daily Star article linked above, “I haven’t heard about it, but it sounds like a great idea”.
What do you think, boys and girls? Is money the proper incentive for students? Is this different from other educational programs where students are given stipends and travel incentives for study at certain institutions?
Leave a comment by clicking the link above.
“It’s all about the grade”
A very good colleague and I were recently discussing the AP Language curriculum and English pedagogy in general over coffee in a very hip-, oh-so-chic-, totally me-cafe on Fourth Avenue, and she determinedly iterated her position that much controversy in classrooms, especially so-called “advanced” classes, revolves around “the grade”. ”It’s all about the grade”, she said, “It’s always about the grade”.
Then I came across this article, “A Teacher Grows Disillusioned After a ‘Fail’ Becomes a ‘Pass’”, about a senior student who missed days and days of class, failed to turn homework assignments, and didn’t show up for her final, but was allowed to graduate through the machinations of adminstrators. Note the remarkable comments by the student’s mother near the end of the article. Her remarks reminded me of a opinion I encountered at the Irascible Professor a few years back: “Stop Teaching My Kid”.
Leave a comment by clicking the link above.
Education for Africa’s Children
As the 2007-2008 school years begins, we begin to think of the new backpacks, the new folders, the new clothes, and the new everything we need to get the fall semester started of off right. We prepare for the rigors of what’s to come in the classroom and prepare for brighter futures, but we forget, if we ever knew at all, about the situation that other less fortunate students around the world are dealing with while we struggle to determine what we’ll wear on the first day of classes: “Africa’s children struggle for education”.
Leave a comment by clicking the link above if you wanna weigh in.
“The way to stop discrimination…”
“The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race”. So wrote Chief Justice Roberts in the majority opinion of today’s landmark ruling regarding Parents Involved in Community Schools v. Seattle School Dist. No. 1 (PDF of the justices’ opinions here), while Justice Breyer, disturbed by the implications of the 5-4 decision, lamented, “It is not often in the law that so few have so quickly changed so much”. Here’s more on the details of the decision from the International Herald Tribune, “U.S. Supreme Court rejects school diversity plans that take race into account” and “U.S. Supreme court votes to limit use of race in integration”, and some additional thoughts on the decision’s possible local impact from the Arizona Daily Star, “Justices rule out race in schools’ diversity“.
Additonally, less dramatically, but no less important, the justices upheld students’ freedom of politiial speech in Marineau v. Guiles, “Court Allows Student’s Anti-Bush T-Shirt”.
Juan Williams, NPR correspondent and FOX contributor, offered his opinion of the former decision, and the NewsHour analyzed recent trends ofthe Court under the leadership of Justice Roberts.
Important to know and understand. Leave a comment by clicking the link above.
Supreme Court Does “Bong Hits”
The Supreme Court of the United States released it’s decision today in Morse, et al. v. Frederick (PDF of the justices’ opinions here), and it’s one that high school students should pay close attention to. The case centered around student Joseph Frederick who unfurled a banner that read “Bong Hits 4 Jesus” during an informal school-sanctioned event, and it snowballed into an exploration of the limits of free speech in schools. The proceedings and its implications are ably summarized and analyzed in TIME magazine and also on the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer (RealAudio from the NewsHour).
Some teens maintain the belief that they enjoy all of the same rights and privileges of citizenship as others who’ve already reached the age of majority. At the same time, and I’ve discussed this with students before, many teens and post-adolescents are quick to declare youthful innocoence in defense of some of the choices they or their peers make (Monica Lewinsky’s decisions made at twenty-two, or some graduates decisions to join the military at 18, etc.). I don’t think you can have it both ways. You gotta choose: accountable adult or indiscreet youth?
TIME writer Holding comments further that “Making a Supreme Court case out of it [the offending banner] was all but frivolous, a move emblematic of how students and their parents are rushing to court to vent their smallest grievances with schools”. What think you? Leave a comment by clicking the above link. And check out “A Nation of Wimps”, from Psychology Today, 2004.
Military Recruiting on Campus
Here’s an interesting item from Seattle (one of my favorite cities on the planet): “Protest briefly halts School Board meeting” and here’s some video of the protest from KING TV news. It’s interesting that the students appear to be protesting military recruitment on campus solely because the United States is currently engaged in an unpopular military campaign in Iraq and that any graduate recruited would be sent to certain death? Are the protesters attempting to make a statement in favor of students’ futures or are they using expedient means to merely protest the war in Iraq? Would they be so vocal were we living in peace-time? If military recruiters aren’t allowed on campus, should college recruiters still be allowed to speak with students about their futures on school property? The answer, most likely, would be, “Don’t be ridiculous. Mr. Girard. Of course college recruiters should still be allowed on campus”. Would that mean then that college is always the only and best option for high school graduates under all conditions. Not all would assent to that idea, (see “College for All?”), and some would view it as elitist.
The issues and the answers are not so clear cut, and ideas can never be divorced from people. It’s one thing, as an academic and civic exercise perhaps, to engage in a protest and practice our Constitutional guarantees and flex our democratic muscle, but it’s important to keep in mind that real people are at the center of the debate so it doesn’t devolve into crass showboating by uniformed ideologues. It’s an issue that is particulary close to me because a former student, Pvt. Damian Lopez, was killed in an IED explosion in Baghdad on Good Friday of this year. Damian was my student in sophomore English, and he was tough, stubborn, and good. He didn’t take the college option.
What think you? Are the protesters’ arguments sound? Should military recruiters be allowed on campus? Is college the best option for all? Leave a comment by clicking the link above.
Teaching
The observation, however clichéd, that professional teachers play a unique role in shaping the lives of their charges is no understatement. And so I’m very conscious of the New Testament caution given in James 3:1 that, because of the power we wield, “We who teach will be judged more strictly”. There is vast opportunity for well-intentioned but poorly equipped educators to do irreparable damage to the students that depend on them for guidance. Some teachers, for example, believe it’s their duty to dump their brains’ contents into their students’ heads, teaching them what to think without question rather than how to think by questioning. Unfortunately, there are students have experienced classroom injustices such as these enough to believe similarly that it’s their duty to tacitly, trustingly receive the wisdom of the supposed sage adults who stand in front of them.
Certainly, there’s an equally vast opportunity for well-intentioned and very capable teachers to help facilitate students’ academic and emotional success. To that end, I believe it’s young people’s job to be the best students they can possibly be by exploring the limits of their knowledge and creativity, developing reliable methods of analysis, building their schemata to accommodate new models of understanding, and producing exquisitely crafted artifacts worthy of their efforts. It’s my duty as a teacher then to help young people in their endeavors by modeling the same behaviors and assisting their cognitive and affective growth. I encourage my students to think clearly and logically, but also, simultaneously, flexibly and creatively in their efforts to discover truth, and, likewise, I encourage my students to critically interpret all available evidence to effectively support and stylistically defend arguments for their discoveries. It’s my goal that once students leave my care, they’ll be discriminating consumers and producers of language, able to participate positively and productively in the agora.
I teach from established educational standards according to students’ needs; content material is a secondary concern. Some critics and skeptics are eager to decry standards-based education, but I’d ask them, without quality standards how could we be sure of the safety of the food we eat or the medications we consume? Without professional standards, how could we trust the expertise of our doctors or other professionals? Without engineering standards, how could we determine the reliability of the airplanes that carry us to our destinations? Our educational standards are baseline guides to creating instruction that attempts to build students’ basic skill sets in order that all students have at least an equal opportunity to succeed as citizens in the free-market after they graduate. Of course, these standards are only the minimum measurement of student ability; there’s nothing in the standards that proscribe teachers from helping students achieve higher.
I maintain exceedingly high but not unrealistic expectations of work and behavior for my students. I want my charges to be and do more than “good” or “good enough” work, for good is the enemy of great. So I encourage students to reach beyond their own and others’ estimations of their abilities; I respect students enough to offer them rigorous challenges and allow them to stumble if they need in the process of overcoming those challenges. If I didn’t create meaningful tasks for my students to complete, establish consistent procedures for them to follow, define clear boundaries for them within which to work, and set definite deadlines for them to meet, that is, hold them accountable for their learning, I’d be complicit in diminishing the quality of, even stealing from their educational experience.
My classroom is always open. All administrators, colleagues, and especially parents are invited to come and observe and question and even join in class interactions anytime. Most importantly, I’m available to work and talk with students whenever they need.
I used contractions as often as I could in this writing, and my prose is dense. Snap!