Role play and Things Fall Apart

Role play day in the 11th grade. My brow was furrowed all day yesterday and from the moment my alarm went off this morning, as I worried about what prompt to give them. Monica taught me that the hardest part of teaching is asking the right question. When I pose a prompt for role play I am asking a question that will dictate the rest of that class period, and hopefully the discussion and writing of the next class as well. The stakes are high.

I wanted the students to consider both the rigid nature of Umuofian society in Things Fall Apart, and the powerful fear Okonkwo, the main character, has of ending up as unsuccessful and disrespected as his father was.

Prompts I considered:

1. Unoka. This might encourage them to think about the father's legacy. But in fact this was too narrow, because we get a lot of information in the exposition about Unoka that doesn't reveal his impact on Okonkwo. So we would get a lot of text-based acting that didn't quite hit on what I was hoping to draw their attention to.

2. No prompt, but a single prop: Photo of an ancestor. This was phenomenally successful with the twelfth grade before we read Raisin in the Sun, in which the deceased patriarch's legacy wields influence on each character individually and on the family as a whole for the whole play. But again, this wasn't quite right, because Unoka has a very specific effect on Okonkwo, which he doesn't have on the rest of the characters, and which does not remain relevant the entire novel. So again, we'd get a lot of great ideas about ancestors that would never feel connected to our story's core.

3. This is what I decided on: Village life. I hoped it would reveal some of the forms of structure that exist in this community, and hoped that issues of respect and reputation would arise that would allow for connections to Okonkwo's determination to be seen differently from his father.

Bingo. It was amazing.

The role plays were stupendous. We saw children offered up for sacrifice for the sake of the village, we saw multiple wives receiving, in order of rank, their portion of palm wine during a ceremony. We saw labourers singing songs of war while harvesting yams. We saw native dances. We saw wise elders sought for advice. We saw ancestors praised and implored.

But the best part was how well the audience watched, reacted and supported. We sailed through five groups, with so little time spent in transition. I was so impressed. What has helped with the role play procedures is rewriting and reiterating verbally, on the board, the expectations of the activity:

Everyone participates

Watch without talking (important to emphasize it's talking we don't want. Laughing, gasping: OK)

Two claps (two clap treatment after each role play)

Feedback (comes after all groups have presented)

These are the notes from the feedback session

Once the discussion had run enough of its course, I spoke to the class for a few minutes about governance in a community. The challenge of any governing body, I said, is to figure out how to get citizens to follow the rules of the community.

"Imagine you are moving to a new apartment," I said. "You need some lamps and light bulbs. What stops you from walking out of this school building, going across the street to the lighting store, and walking out with an armload of merchandise without paying a shekel?" 

Dana offered this explanation: "Well, first of all I wouldn't do it because it's disrespectful, but if I did, the police would follow me and I would get in trouble."

Perfect. She set us up perfectly to understand the two forms of enforcement I wanted to touch on: 

Oh my goodness I misspelled coercion!

We then read two passages, one of which showed Okonkwo's intense fear of being like his father, the other of which showed a wife's reaction to Okonkwo's threat of violence. In discussing the wife's situation, Sewar noted that the wife seemed to be reacting to both forms of coercion, internal and external. She wanted to avoid Okonkwo's violence, but she also had internalised that her role as a wife was to work hard to bring honour and respect to the compound, and she felt that was important. Beautiful. 

The class earned my sincere praise at the end of the session, and a round of Basket of Doom, in which no points were won because exhaustion and encouragement were misspelled (hence the correction on the board in the last photo).

Driven to the ridiculous

Dee-lightful couple! Charming woman! Gifted lad! Remarkable talent! Graceful outlines! Perfect evening! Great success! Interesting case! Glorious night! Exquisite scenery! Capital dinner! Stimulating conversation! Restful outing! Good wine! Happy ending! Touching gratitude! Lucky Ridgeon --

Thus spake the colorful character Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington in The Doctor's Dilemma, after an evening dinner party on a terrace in London in 1906.

We explored the idea of satire and burlesque today, talking about the effect of seeing rather ridiculous things on stage, like this rotund character, chummily nicknamed BB, making seventeen saccharine exclamations in a row, the golden contents of his port glass growing more agitated with each evaluation.

Sometimes I think I am my own brand of ridiculous after a class that has gone well. Great class! Good comments! Phenomenal pairwork! Meaningful contributions! Critical listening! Masterful analysis! Respectful dialogue! Fruitful discord! Salient takeaways! Lucky Mimi --

Mind, this is not me after every class, but I did feel mighty bouncy after three of my four classes today.

Hesitations lingered after my HL literature class, where I tried a new exercise with writing, and am cautiously hopeful about the results. We followed a Bard Writing Institute method for developing ideas that are dealt with in a certain text. It's structured, but it also gives the students a wide breadth for diversity of thought, which these guys are not used to in writing. They usually respond to a specific prompt. Even if that prompt allows for diversity of interpretation, it provides a sense of structure and theme.

My concern is that the students walked out thinking "Why did we do that?" I'm trying to decide how much to try to justify class activities. Hopefully as they write their essays and use their in-class preparation they'll realize that they have done much of the intellectual heavy lifting involved in writing a paper. Students think that writing an English paper should be easy if you speak English. On the contrary, the more capable you are in English, the harder good writing gets! Would that be encouraging or discouraging to hear?

Curtain up

Good riddance Eid! It's so good to be back in the classroom.

We're starting a new unit in the 11th grade: What sort of language do we use to talk about the "other"?

Margaret Mead at her site for field research in the Samoan Islands. Photo used to introduce the idea of Anthropology and talking about "the other". 

As part of this unit we'll be reading Chinua Achebe's Things Fall Apart, paying close attention to his use of language.  

I taught Things Fall Apart (TFA) last year. It's a pleasure to return to a text and get to teach it using the techniques that worked well and trying new approaches as well. 

This weekend I read a load of teacher support material for TFA, most of which recommended having students read Achebe's essays on the problems with how Africa is represented by non-African writers. The goal, I suppose, is to teach students that "the image we have of Africa is not accurate, and it's not ok." But I think we ought to have more faith in the students' abilities to determine what is OK and what is not. Role plays often reveal the nuanced opinions students have about morality, and where the line denoting what is "acceptable" lies. 

I decided to have the eleventh graders start their exploration of African literature by looking at anthropological research done in Africa, and noting how language is used in a scientific context to describe something "other". We read excerpts from:

We pointed out the use of quotes to identify new, unusual or difficult to define words like "good" "evil" and "witch". They noted that the scientific language was non-emotional, didn't convey any opinion, depended on facts, referred to other research, relied on statistics, offered concrete examples from interviews with subjects, and used fairly simple language that a reader unfamiliar with anthropology or the studied culture would be able to understand. Hazem, who has a way of moving the conversation ahead by leaps and bounds, noted that anthropologists place a lot of trust on the words of their subjects. "The little boy they interviewed said some pretty crazy things," said Hazem, and then read aloud from his excerpt: "At night, I changed into a cockroach to get out through the bars and meet up with my uncle, who had changed into a cat (Bangui, December 2008)." Hazem then continued: "The researcher just took his word that it was true." We discussed whether the researcher necessarily agreed with or believed everything he was told. We concluded that he was presenting the data and withholding judgment about whether it was true. We also discussed the quality of data in anthropology - Hazem had raised the point that the data points are only as reliable as the sources are. That little boy might say something different to another researcher tomorrow. So yes, trust in the human impulse to tell the truth underlies anthropological research. 

At the end of the session we talked about the occasion for the study: Why had researchers looked at this topic now? Because there had been an in crease in the frequency of accusations of witchcraft in the past 60 years. I asked the class why they thought there might have been a rise in witchcraft accusations during this period. More good ideas: changes in wealth distribution might have led some people to be jealous of others, and accuse them of witchcraft (Zein); a rise in poverty might cause more people to be seen as suspicious or "different" (Mutaz); the witches are often accused of having caused diseases, so a rise in disease might be to blame (Nada); a change in the rule of law in post-colonial states might play a role: people who were "other" used to be put to death at the first sign of dissent by the ruling European powers intent on keeping order. Those people are now living in politically unstable countries where they are not controlled by an oppressive colonizer (Hazem - see what I mean?) 

That was when the bell rang. Tomorrow we'll look at how Achebe talks about Africans differently from white writers, and differently from anthropologists. The goal for the lesson is to establish the stylistic choices that describe Achebe's Nigerian English. 

In the Twelfth Grade we are starting our second of four pieces of drama in our genre study. A Raisin in the Sun will be proceeded by The Doctor's Dilemma by George Bernard Shaw. The play is a commentary on the debaucherous medical industry of 19th century England, where, in Shaw's words, "the medical service of the community, as at present provided for, is a murderous absurdity."

In the play, a doctor who believes he has found a cure for tuberculosis must choose between saving two patients, a moral friend who has made little of his life, and a brilliant artist who is also a died in the wool rapscallion.

We started class by imaging that the cast of A Raisin in the Sun were ship-wrecked and the life boat could only hold four. In groups they decided whom they would save, and defended their choices before the class. We discussed what we value a human life for, and we noted that "likeability" and "entertainment value" were surprisingly common justifications. Are our choices about who to save rational, we asked? Hardly. They were also perceptive to the degree to which we romanticise the promise inherent in youth. Everyone, for instance, saves the 12 year old Travis because "his whole life is ahead of him," even though we have no indication of his character or his likelihood to contribute to society. In fact many groups that saved him left his father, Walter Lee, to drown because Walter had not been successful in life. Here's to the hope that the son will outshine his father.

We read the first conversation between the affluent doctors in Shaw's piece, and can already perceive that Shaw is not a fan of these people. The most humorous indicator, is the way he identifies one of the doctors: Leo Schutzmacher, L.R.C.P.M.R.C.S.

What the heck do those letters mean? They acknowledged that those letters were surely used to make him seem smart to potential customers, without really indicating anything of substance. Yasmin pointed out that hey, maybe he is smart. He's the one who's sign outside his office says "Cure Guaranteed."

A shot from the opening scene of the movie, featuring all five doctors in Ridgeon's cushy reception.

Eid Imagery

I may not know Instagram, but I know imagery. This holiday has been full of it.

Last night, the eve of Eid, I shaped ma3mool, (no idea how to transliterate that!) at Manar's house.

The semolina dough pleasantly gritty and oily against my palm as I flatted it into a pancake, then use it to enfold a nub of date puree in yellow, scented with rose water. I also smelled lots of Chinese food, which the family ordered to break their day-long fast as the evening call to prayer sounded. It's a much easier time of year to fast than Ramadan was because of the shortened days, all the same, going until 6:50 without water is tough. We gulped together.

This morning a chanted refrain of "Allahu akbar" rose, unusually, from the east of our apartment. I couldn't tell what was going on.

On the way to meet Manar's mother at the mosque for the morning Eid prayers at 6:45, I passed the most glorious jasmine plant, wafting its scent across the fruit-smashed sidewalk. A woman, also in prayer clothes, said "salam alaikum" which I believe means peace be upon you and is how people greet groups of people in the mosque or when they enter a room. She and I walked together, until she joined the group of people gathering in a big parking lot with mats to pray. The people already gathered there were the source of the chanting.

I join Im- Abed at the mosque, and felt both the tug of the prayer clothes under my chin and the sensation of praying right up against other worshippers. I asked Manar's mum about this once, and she said in the Quran is says that God is pleased when his worshippers are together in a visually appealing manner. So in the mosque people don't just pray wherever they want to - there is a flurry of activity to keep rows neat and unbroken. When I drift, in my unconscious, American quest for elbow room, away from the woman next to me, she flaps her hand in the empty space until I close it. The visual effect certainly is impressive, even in a small mosque.

Im Abed explained that the parking lot is for people who are praying for Al Aqsa mosque. She said Muslims are instructed to direct their prayers toward the major mosques, including Mecca, Mohammad's mosque next to Mecca, and Al Aqsa. Al Aqsa has been under Israeli fire in the past few weeks, and no Muslims are permitted to go there, so it's an object of fervent prayer, she told me.

I've now dispatched with the prayer clothes and am sitting in a cafe, about to prepare next week's lessons on George Bernard Shaw's The Doctor's Dilemma. 

What happens to a raisin in the sun?

Today we finished talking about A Raisin in the Sun in the twelfth grade. 

A few of Mama's speeches towards the end produced fascinating comments. One of them she makes after the most emotional moment in the play, in my opinion: Walter Lee, the man of this African American family, agrees to sell the house he bought in a white neighbourhood back to its other residents, who are so keen to keep blacks out that they offer to buy the house back at a financial gain to Walter's family. The shame and humiliation implied by such a "sell-out" is heavily dramatised in his speech and his body language, in such a way that his wife, sister, and mother are appalled. After this lowest of low points for Walter, Mama delivers this speech to his sister, who has just declared that Walter is "no brother of mine." 

There is always something left to love. And if you ain’t learned that, you ain’t learned nothing. (Looking at her) Have you cried for that boy today? I don’t mean for yourself and for the family ‘cause we lost the money. I mean for him: what he been through and what it done to him. Child, when do you think is the time to love somebody the most? When they done good and made things easy for everybody? Well then, you ain’t through learning – because that ain’t the time at all. It’s when he’s at his lowest and can’t believe in hisself ‘cause the world done whipped him so! When you starts measuring somebody, measure him right, child, measure him right. Make sure you done taken into account what hills and valleys he come through before he got to wherever he is.

We talked about the nature of this monologue, how it comes rather as a sermon delivering a moral message at the end of the play. We considered how Mama might want every audience member to consider how he might show more love to a person in his life who has been "whipped" by the world, and who is having a hard time "believing in hisself." 

Then we considered whether we had been measuring Walter Lee fairly -- whether we had taken into account the valleys and hills he's come through in order to get where he got. I asked the class to consider moments in the play that informed our opinions of Walter, and to consider whether we had been sympathetic to the hills and valleys he'd come through to get to that point. In one class, Amr championed Walter. He brought us back to the moment when Walter took three days off work to tool around in a car and go drinking and listening to jazz. "He took the car and drove away, but then he came back," pointed out Amr. I had had absolutely no sympathy for Walter at that moment, but Amr's comment highlighted that many men who are as frustrated as Walter is don't ever make the literal U-turn Walter did.

In the other class, Anas pointed to Walter's strong father, the man who worked hard, provided food and shelter and education for his son, and believed in his dreams. "Walter should have it together more," Anas said, since he came from a stable family environment himself. Anas's comment brings up the difficulty of identifying what goes wrong when a child struggles to succeed, even according to his own measures of success. Is it the parents? Why do good parents have kids who can't seem to gain traction in this world?

Opinions differed over whether the end is uplifting or foreboding. I am firmly in the foreboding camp. Look at the final stage direction for Mama, as the family packs to move to the new house:

Mama stands, at last alone in the living room, her plant on the table before her as the lights start to come down. She looks around at all the walls and ceilings and suddenly, despite herself, while the children call below, a great heaving thing rises in her and she puts her fist to her mouth to stifle it, takes a final desperate look, pulls her coat about her, pats her hat and goes out. The lights dim down. The door opens and she comes back in, grabs her plant, and goes out for the last time.

Curtain.

We spent time today discussing the "great heaving thing" that rises in Mama. I love how the students expand my understanding of the text though. I thought Mama was reacting in fear of all the problems that her family still faces: stigma, or even violence, in the white neighbourhood; financial struggles, especially meeting their mortgage on the house; unease in Walter and Ruth's marriage; how to provide for Ruth's coming baby; how to pay for Beneatha's medical school; how to help Walter pursue his dreams of starting a business. 

I always pose the question first, and only sometimes share my interpretation afterward. Today I was surprised and enlightened when the students traced Mama's anxiety to leaving the apartment she'd bought with her husband so many years ago. She was, after all, leaving the house she shared with him, the house in which she had watched her family grow into what it was. I am impressed that they were immediately perceptive to her matriarchal connection with her house itself. I feel so little connection to my current house that I can't relate to Mama in that moment as well as they might be able to, as seniors looking at leaving for college in less than a year.

The Instagram edition

I don't actually know how Instagram works, but I know it has photos. Here's my Instagram from this week:

The arrival of books in the West Bank is always a special occasion - these copies of The Duchess of Malfi arrived this week. We ordered them in June.

My new favourite place to go for Friday morning work session is Vintage cafe, with striking red tables and, this week, horde of Germans. 

I was allowed to work in the bright and quiet library on Friday afternoon - a serious treat. 

Ambiguous endings

This week with the 11th grade it's been all about Eveline, a short story from the Dubliners collection, by James Joyce. Eveline was the most frequently referred to story during the Oral Commentaries with last year's lit students. The students like the protagonist, the 19-year-old Eveline who has a chance to escape her abusive father and many domestic responsibilities (which fell to her when her mother died) to explore a new life with the kind, open-hearted and manly sailor Frank, who has a home for her in Buenos Aires. Here is the magnificent ending of the story:

A bell clanged upon her heart. She felt him seize her hand:

"Come!"

All the seas of the world tumbled about her heart. He was drawing her into them: he would drown her. She gripped with both hands at the iron railing.

"Come!"

No! No! No! It was impossible. Her hands clutched the iron in frenzy. Amid the seas she sent a cry of anguish.

"Eveline! Evvy!"

He rushed beyond the barrier and called to her to follow. He was shouted at to go on but he still called to her. She set her white face to him, passive, like a helpless animal. Her eyes gave him no sign of love or farewell or recognition.

                             

I wanted to explore the ambiguity here. Why does Joyce leave the ending open? What does he want us to think about? There are also very few details about Eveline's household - there is a reference to two children that she takes care of, but we never understand where they come from.

As always when important and subtle themes are at play, I wanted to turn to role play, and after discussing options with Monica, decided to have them act out the scene after the end of the story - what happens when she returns home from the dock where she parted with Frank?

The results were fascinating. Each household featured the drunk father and a timid Eveline who came home and mumbled excuses about where she had been and suffered her father's ire. The most poignant went like this:

The father was on stage, wavering back and forth in a clearly inebriated state. Suddenly four children come scampering through the door to the house, dash across the stage and past the wobbly father, and hide under the desk. Next Eveline comes through the door, and her father yells at her and slaps her. He grows violent and she hits him with a bottle (a frozen plastic water bottle in this case - perhaps standing in for his own liquor bottle?) and he falls unconscious to the floor. The young kids creep out and chatter around the fallen foe.

I was amazed at the impact of the children's anxious and hastened entrance. What an effective dramatic device to have their cowering presence first as foreshadowing of Eveline's fateful entrance and then of their father's clumsy wrath. I brought the class's attention to the effect of this decision afterward, and the back group beamed. Role play exposes genius in them they didn't even know they had.

Another golden moment for role play relating to this story this week was in made-up conversations they created between Eveline and her (deceased) mother. Monica and I had several exchanges about what role play scenario would help them analyse the strange and stifling nature of Eveline's relationship with her father (he has been tender at times, and somehow her sense of duty toward him and the family outweighs her desire to live free from his tyranny). We decided on the conversation between Eveline and her mother, thinking the dynamics of the complex father-daughter relationship might be revealed through that avenue. I went to bed on Tuesday not knowing what role play scenario to give the students (I was starting to consider reporters interviewing people who choose to live in a tornado zone!) At 5:35 a.m. on Wednesday I picked up my phone and saw an email response from Monica affirming that the mother-daughter conversation was a good idea. Hamdulilah!!

The role plays were indeed revealing. In one, Nour was Eveline and Sari was the mother, and they rather flapped and floated around the stage as if in a drama queen dream. The dialogue went like this:

Mother: How are you my daughter?
Eveline: Bad!
M: Why?
E: Because of Dad!
M: Why don't you leave?
E: I can't!
M: Why?
E: Because of Dad!

And there you have it - the paradox of Eveline's relationship with her father succinctly and perceptively conveyed in nearly improvised drama. The next day, when the students wrote the letter that Eveline writes to her father (mentioned in the story but whose contents are never disclosed) they expressed with uncanny ease the sense of anguish she feels in making the decision to leave her family, something native English speakers would be hard-pressed to convey in writing.

The best actors are the least punctual

Tardiness is a recurrent problem at the Friends School because there is no enforcement of the consequences for being late to class. Last year my colleague Olivia stuck to her guns with a policy requiring late students to furnish a note from the principal's office. At the end of the year she acknowledge that despite her (herculean) consistency, the students continued to arrive late. What's the solution? I haven't figured one out in my eleventh grade classes, where students continue to arrive late.

But recently a solution presented itself in the 12th grade, where we are studying drama. Almost every class has at least a snippet of reading aloud or genuine acting on stage, and Friends kids love to read and act. The recently-established rule is: Come after the bell rings, and you forfeit your opportunity to act.

For the sake of the class's comprehension, I like to have certain students read particularly challenging speeches. There are a handful of students I can count on to deliver nuance the many others would gloss over. As it turns out, the best readers are also the least consistently punctual. During the initial days of this experiment in student behavior, I had a hard time maintainin my own rule, because sometimes the kids that arrived on time read terribly. No inflection in the voice, exclamation points blown past without consideration  - let's not even hope for a facial expression or gesture.

But it was worth the slog. This week the good readers are arriving before the bell, and killing it on stage. My heart soared when I saw Nadia reach the third floor landing before the bell rang, since I hoped she would read a challenging stretch of A Raisin in the Sun, lines by a white man in a black household, who is very uncomfortable.

Raisin has exceedingly detailed stage directions, and for this scene I gave students the dialogue without the directions so they could determine just how Mr. Lindner would behave in the Youngers' apartment. They did beautifully, and Nadia interpreted the new directions, read by Mahdi, spectacularly. She was wiping sweat from her brow, shifting her seat, edging away from the hostile Beneatha, in a performance compelling enough to keep her classmates rapt in a 34 degree room.

Just one other note of triumph today - There is a student in the 11th grade who despises doing something she feels she has done before. She keeps me on my toes, since as I plan I think "OK, will this challenge Noor?" Yesterday I had a small "party on the inside", as my roommate Elaine would say, when, during an activity where Noor's class tried to put scrambled sections of a short story in order, I heard Noor complain to her group "Mish fahma!" which is my sloppy transliteration of the Arabic phrase for "I don't get it!" By the end of the activity Noor had gotten it, and had solid reasons for having ordered the sections the way she had. I love learning -- theirs and mine.

Self-Care Commentary

On Saturday night my sister and I spoke on Skype, and she asked me what self-care I was planning to take during the weekend. I said I would do some knitting and some listening to music. That evening I had set a goal to grade 10 of my 12th graders' commentaries before bed. As soon as I picked up the first one my conscience told me - "How can you properly evaluate their commentaries if you haven't written your own on this poem?" I write my own not in order to set a benchmark for theirs, or to establish what the correct interpretation is, but to establish for myself how a student could show "knowledge and understanding" of the passage, and to get an idea myself of how the "stylistic devices contribute to meaning".

So I set about reading and writing about Ted Hughes's poem Thistles. Writing that commentary, working through that poem, was the most therapeutic action I took this week! Here's the poem, and my commentary (unedited, just like a real paper 1!)

Thistles by, Ted Hughes

by RachelHam

Against the rubber tongues of cows and the hoeing hands of men
Thistles spike the summer air
Or crackle open under a blue-black pressure.

Every one a revengeful burst
Of resurrection, a grasped fistful
Of splintered weapons and Icelandic frost thrust up

From the underground stain of a decayed Viking.
They are like pale hair and the gutturals of dialects.
Every one manages a plume of blood.

Then they grow grey, like men
Mown down, it is a feud. Their sons appear,
Stiff with weapons, fighting back over the same ground.

"Thistles" Commentary

Thistles, by Ted Hughes, throbs with the anger and hostility of noxious weeds baked by summer. The speaker uses diction associated with hard labor and painful imagery to evoke a feeling of fraught, perhaps futile effort. The thistles are in constant combat with everything, from cows to mowers to age, but, for all their bravado, seem to achieve nothing.

From the first word the poem is unapologetic about its presentation of masculine, unattractive imagery. The unpoetic title makes no promises of a gentle ballad, and the first word introduces the essence of the main subject’s existence, as it is portrayed as constantly fighting “against” outside forces. Among the thistles’ first enemies, the heavy “rubber tongues” express blunt hostility and the alliterative “hoeing hands” sound like the “huh, huh” of the farmer wielding the weapon. Not to be outdone by its uncharitable neighbors, the thistles “spike the summer air”, feistily claiming their space from their lowly, rooted vantage point. When they “crackle” it is under their own “blue-black pressure,” as if they are “cackling” with mirth to be participants in the fight (later a thrilling “feud”) for dominance that is the farm field.

The second stanza reveals the fraught history of the thistles’ ill temper; they exist in protest of some past injustice, since each is a “revengeful burst / of resurrection,” implying that their motives for malevolence can be traced back to an era passed but not forgotten, just like the “decayed Viking”, who “underground,” inspires today’s “dialects” with a “gutteral” quality. The harshness of gutteral sounds is reflected in the uncomfortable imagery of a “grasped fistful of splintered weapons” which, for those hardy enough to take hold, feel like “frost” as they are “thrust up” above ground. While the underground is often considered the more threatening setting, the thistles emphasize that life just above the surface offers no escape from the horrors of the underworld, since their existence bears still the “stain” of those who died before them. The simile comparing the thistles to “pale hair” also evokes images of the pale skulls of the dead. Here one of the most euphonic words in the poem, “plume” describes a monstrous image of spreading “blood” which the thistles “manage” as if with pride, indeed as if worn like a “plume” or feather in their cap.

These dauntless warriors “grow grey” however, and here we get the first direct comparison with “men”. The enjambment allows the reader to guess whether the men or the thistles are “mown down.” Even with age the intensity of the battle doesn’t subside, but remains a “fued” against an uncompromising enemy (a mower). Defeat is not dwelt upon, as the suggestion of battle is followed in the same line as the replacement generation of “sons” appears, prepped for battle, “stiff with weapons”. “Stiff” implies these sons know what is in store and have been conditioned for the same fighting life over the same ground. As the torch passes so seemlessly to the next generation, the chance at reconsidering the conquest seems lost.

This poem would provide an energetic portrait of the fight for life in the natural world, but Hughes’ war-inspired imagery and references to the human arguments with history and death, make a comparison with men hard to escape. Not only are we on a path of vengeance for past wrongs, but so “stiff”ly are we set in our ways that we cannot choose a path other than violence. Our sons are doomed to fight back over the same blood-stained ground; the word “back” both emphasizing the combat-like nature of life and the impossibility of moving “forward” with such a cycle. Violence is at first glorified in the poem for its bravery and robustness, but the image of fighting degrades as it gets lost in esoteric references to forgotten history as in “Icelandic frost” and “decayed Viking”, and the incomprehensible nature of death felt in “plume of blood”. Finally the thistles seem pathetic and mindlessly belligerent as innocent sons march without hesitation into the same gnarly battle for a prize that, significantly, is never identified. The poem powerfully conveys the futility and pervasiveness of violence.

Never thrown a marker at a student before

This morning at 6:45 I was at my desk working on one of my presentations, and Ibrahim walked into the classroom. He was at school for an extra session of Biology class, and happily discussed his hopes to start up a student dance troupe (he wanted to borrow my speakers).

In class, Ibrahim made great contributions, but also kept talking. I have been adamant about my no talking rules this week, and so I gave him a warning, then sent him to the back of the room to the time out desk. When I invited him back, he kept talking, and there was a student role play going on, so I didn't want to interrupt it. From where I was standing I had a clear shot, and I threw my white board marker at him. It sailed right in front of his face (indeed, I was astonished at how perfect my aim was. Beginner's luck.) and it took him several moments to figure out where it had come from. He looked finally at me. "Did you throw that?" he mouthed. I nodded. I'm not sure what expression I had on my face. I hope it was a "Yeah, do you see now how exasperating your talking is?" but it was probably more along the lines of "I know! I can't believe it either! What am I thinking?" Anas and Nadia were aware of what had happened and thought it hilarious. So launching an item is probably, when all is said and done, just as disruptive as sending Ibrahim to the back. OK, lesson learned.

The role play that the class was doing was inspired by Monday's horrendous chapel, which featured an episode of Dr. Phil on Sexting, the practice of adolescents sending provocative photos of themselves and others to one another. While I was offended by the exercise in chapel, I couldn't help think of it and its high drama tactics as I read Raisin in the Sun this week. We're looking at a scene in which the matriarch has bought a house for the family. Great, except for that both her children wanted to use the money she spent for their own endeavours, and feel betrayed. On top of that, she bought the house in a white neighbourhood. The family drama unfolds, and today in class we welcomed the Younger family from Chicago's South Side onto Dr. Phil.

It was awesome. The students got not prompting questions, but the interviews unfolded beautifully between host and family members, with Arab attempts at black accents all over the place, and some impressive references to the text, especially from Reem. Amr was the first Dr. Phil, and in true Phil fashion wrapped up the session by offering some patronising advice: Well, (in an exaggerated southern accent) I think y'all should just become white." It was the kind of intuitive, "right-on" comment which spoke to some of the unacknowledged desires of the characters, and which would likely not have come out in discussion or in writing. I love role play.

Here is Amr as Dr. Phil, Yasmin as Walter, Ramzi as Mama and Tareq as Ruth. Photos courtesy of Bisan.

Note how Tareq's legs are crossed like all female talk show guests' legs are crossed. 

It was a fascinating day elsewhere too. In the 11th grade there was a Paper 1 practice. Paper 1 involves writing an analysis of a never-before-seen text. 

Earlier this week I had no idea what text I was going to use. The exam usually uses short articles, essays or diary entries. Then on Tuesday morning this article appeared on Al Jazeera: 

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2015/09/denmark-advert-lebanon-newspapers-warns-refugees-150907225146384.html

The Danish Ministry of Immigration published an advertisement in Lebanese newspapers alerting readers (refugees) to its newly hostile policies toward refugees. Spread the word! Denmark is not the place to turn your boat! So I decided that document would be our Paper 1 text. Thus the flurry of refugee texts and discussion yesterday. I look forward to reading their papers. 

A last word on Formative Assessment. I tried to cram too much content into the Lang and Lit HL class today. We looked at a scene from Raisin and compared it with a piece of writing by Booker T Washington. By the end of class I wanted them to be able to write a letter from Walter (who dreams of the life of a wealthy American businessman) to Booker T Washington (who promoted common labour work for blacks, concerned that aiming too high would set them back) or vice versa. I laughed reading the letters this evening, to see who got any shred of the idea of the class, and who was repeating random phrases that I or other classmates had offered. 

Having the students write quick letters at the end of class turns out to be great formative assessment! Here are a few of the responses:

Dear Booker T,

I think your thoughts are completely right, people should always stick to their labor roots so our history would not be forgotten. However I believe we should dream and work to get to a higher place in society, to become like the white people and maybe even higher. We shouldn't put ourselves subjective to what the whites want us to be and what we want to stick to. I think we should work and evolve and hopefully become better. 

Dear Booker T,

I hear you like people to go in labor and doing something you love is better than the school education. Let me tell you that going to school allows you to get more money and less physical work in the future. While labor gives money but it does not give a person enough to support his family. The more money you get through school education allows you to have extra and spoil the ones you love.

Dear Walter, 

I have looked into your dreams, and I think our dreams are similar. Just use what you have and succeed and don't depend on anyone else. 

Dear Mr. Booker T

I think your ideas about education and how should it be, or what is important is so shallow and wrong, I think you should be more smart and open-minded. 

Thank you.

Dear Booker T Washington,

I think you should be concerned about money more so you life could be better. 

PS: I don't believe in what I wrote.

OK, really the last thing is a photo of Anas's homework from this week. I made another mistake and asked analysis questions without giving nearly enough space on the page for a sufficient response. Anas wrote all over his in his tiny but legible writing, and said "Sorry miss" in the upper right hand corner. 

Jacked up on the day

I can't even sit down to eat my lunch properly. I stand up to walk around the room, then realise, no, I have no capacity to do anything productive right now, no task that I could successfully accomplish. I'm in a jittery, energised state that comes from having a day full of dynamic classes. Like today oh my goodness.

In the first period eleventh graders wrote diverse responses to this quote:

Upward mobility is still alive out there, and hard work will get you there. You don't necessarily need to have an Ivy League education or to have millions of dollars startup money. It can be done with an idea, hard work and determination.

Bill Rancic

Some thought it was accurate, some thought it was too rosy. We've been discussing dreams of upward mobility and what language we use to describe dreams of moving up, and what influences whether it's ok to dream of having more than you have at present.

I love the Lang and Lit curriculum because current issues can easily be woven into the course content. After this writing, we went to Al Jazeera's home page to examine the headlines on the Syrian refugee crisis and how Europe is responding.

Then, they looked at political cartoons about the refugee crisis, (examples below)

 and compared them with the extract of poetry engraved on the Statue of Liberty:

"Give me your tired, your poor,

Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,

The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.

Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,

I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

(Emma Lazarus)

The best feeling comes from walking around the room while students are engaged in a task that they find challenging. Analysing these cartoons was just that task for the students. What I found fascinating was that each group that had the first cartoon above identified the guys in the boat as "British immigrants" arriving on American soil and confronting the Native Americans. Even when pushed to consider other possible scenarios, no one mentioned colonisation of Africa. When I suggested Africa to Hanna, he said, "No one went to Africa." Hmm. We brought it up later in full class discussion and established that indeed Europe did turn its helms toward Africa. What's neat is that by the end of this year Hanna will have read Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe and he'll have a grasp of the European influence in at least one native community.

The punchline of the study on political cartoons was that they are examples of Satire. Oh my goodness also, in both classes we discussed the tone of the poem by Lazarus. I called on Nadine, and she did beautifully, describing a tone that's "not aggressive, because it's positive, but it's strong". We came up with the word "entreating" which, I was delighted to see, several groups used in the written pair work they did later on.

The second 11th grade section is usually the feistier one, but today they were totally on task and excellent. I sent Basel to time out for talking, and was glad to have an opportunity to be seen sticking to my consequences. I really like Basel, and he participates well, so I didn't want to enforce the rule, but I am determined to be consistent this week. At the end of the period we had a bit of a debate between one bold boy, Michel, who argued that refugees are a serious problem for Europe, and two girls who argued that Europe has no right to shut the doors on refugees. It's hard for me to know how to direct or temper these debates. I think they're good, but they do not include the whole class, and seem exclusive to those who feel comfortable sparring in that setting. Next week we'll have a formal debate and let more voices in on the action.

The 12th grade examined Walter Lee's character in Act II scene i of A Raisin in the Sun and the source of his anger, humiliation and shame. We looked at a scene where, Hamdi recognised, his bravado ("I'm a volcano! I'm a giant surrounded by ants who don't even understand what the giant is talking about!") veils what is perhaps his deep humiliation at his own inability to succeed. It was fifth period and the dust and heat were high in the classroom, which is why I'm was so impressed with the level of participation, especially from Ibrahim and Sama at the end.

Now how long will it take me to be able to sit down for more than three seconds???????????

Tweets and twits

What do you do when a student blurts out something disrespectful and poorly timed at the beginning of class? Today a student came in intent on exhibiting her disregard for authority, and loudly made disrespectful comments to me, that everyone could hear. I responded calmly, but I told her we could talk after class "No, during this class is good. I want to talk now." At this point, I realize, I should have had her leave the class, and I should have waited until she did so, no matter how long it took, before starting the lesson. I needed to send the message that it is not ok to speak to me that way, and I missed that opportunity. Her energy affected the whole classroom though, and behavior was off kilter for the whole period.

But, and as Monica often reminded me last year, even when behavior is imperfect, learning is often still happening.

We watched the clip from season 1 of Downton Abbey in which it is revealed that Gwen, a ladies' maid, has been taking a correspondence course in shorthand, has purchased a type-writer, and intends to leave service to pursue a career as a secretary. Many of the other servants, including her two supervisors Mr. Carson and Mrs. Hughes, are flabbergasted at her desire to leave her respectable post in a wealthy and well-respected household. "What's wrong with working in service?" demands Ms. O'Brien.
"There's nothing wrong with it. And there's nothing wrong with mending roads neither. It's just not what I want to do." replied Gwen.

We were talking about how society views dreamers, and whether those who want to improve their position are encouraged or reprimanded. Ayah commented on the unwritten rules that govern what's OK, and Michel pointed out that political context plays a role: in capitalist societies "it's all about" getting ahead and going to the next level. Some role plays between people with jobs and people without jobs also pointed out that the economic context influences whether a "better" job is a socially acceptable dream. (Noor surprised me by using the phrase "socially acceptable" before I had written it on the board.)

At the end pairs were given the assignment to write a Twitter post from either Gwen's perspective or that of another servant about the incident, and to attach to it a hashtag. Here are some of the responses:


They think I can't do it #Idc [I don't care]

OMG! I don't have any privacy in this house! they literally went through my stuff!! #upset #free_the_typewriter   #Bless_UK   #Say_no_to_Mrs. O'Brien

What is up with maids these days, thinking they can "follow their dreams"?! Pathetic isn't it? I hope they can wake up to reality #nevergonnahappen     #sorrynotsorry

I can't believe they don't want me to pursue my dreams #rude

I was cleaning downstairs when I heard Gwen's screaming and Gwen NEVER SCREAMS but it turned around that someone took her 'typewriter' whatever that is    #you'regoingtoloseyourjob

I'm a Diva #Out of the box

Genres, genres

The twelfth grade will study four dramas this year:

A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry

The Doctor's Dilemma, by George Bernard Shaw

The Duchess of Malfi, by John Webster

All My Sons, by Arthur Miller

This week we're starting Raisin and yesterday in HL we combined some of the opening stage directions with an exercise in commentary writing on prose. 

In May these students will write a commentary on an unseen extract of prose or poetry. We've worked a lot with poetry, but not so much with prose. They are reluctant to try the prose because it contains more words and looks less manageable on the page. I wanted to show them that the tools we use for poetry transfer to prose analysis. 

The opening stage directions and character descriptions in Raisin are quite lengthy and detailed. At some points they are even poetic. Here for example is the prologue:

I had the students look closely at these non-dialogue passages to identify which words felt important and contributed significantly to  the feeling and meaning of the passage. 

Then they wrote poems using only words from the passage. 

The group that wrote about the prologue came up with this:

No longer remembered

The furnishings of this room were already selected with taste and color

But living itself has long since vanished

Weariness

Its furnishings typical,

Undistinguished

That was a long time ago

Too many people for too many years, a depressing uniformity

No longer remembered

Those writing about the character Mama, wrote

She is beauty
She is grace
A dark brown face
Lights a rather dark place
Slurry words
Around the world 
Hair so white
She can fight
In her sixties
Looks like she's sixteen
She is beauty
She is grace
A raisin in the sun
Just as delightful as a bun

(They added a few words)

Those writing on Beneatha captured her nicely:

She is about twenty 

Slim and intense 

Her face had a handsomeness of it's own 

In an intellectual sense

Her speech permeated the room with sleepy vengeance 

Those writing about Ruth, the caring mother, used the words to describe an alternate scenario in which this loving mother smothers who child! That's what I call productive counter script! Here's what they wrote:

Ruth enters,

Closes the door,

Passes an alarm clock,

reaches down,

muffles his face,

the boy feebly shakes,

life has been little,

settled

They then wrote body paragraphs on the passages of stage directions, incorporating significant evidence as they worked linearly through the passages. I wonder about collecting writing like this. I like to think that it can be useful for them to practice writing even if they're not going to have feedback on it, but last year I discussed with Monica that it feels useless from their end if they write something that won't have other eyes on it. I'd welcome input. 

Hughes and the eleventh graders

This week we're looking at Hughes' poetry in the eleventh grade.

Yesterday we looked at the following excerpt from a Langston Hughes poem called "Mother to Son."

It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor --
Bare.

The task was to identify literary devices and to determine what "it" might be. New concepts: extended metaphor and imagery as descriptions that appeal to one of the five senses. 

Ameer wanted to know "What's the big deal with a floor with no carpet on it? Hands shot into the air. I'm fortunate to teach students who don't to answer each others' questions, rather than let 'teacher' answer. They want their voices heard!
"It's uncomfortable on your feet, but the carpet is soft," "Carpets keep a house warm, so it makes it seem like the house is cold."

Jeneen had a great comment about the way the word "Bare." seemed to demonstrate its meaning by being set on a line all by itself, which led someone from last year's tenth grade class to add "enjambment" to the list of literary devices present. We also included the "anaphora" of "and" at the beginning of consecutive lines.

They then looked at Langston Hughes' poem "Harlem", which they discussed today most fruitfully. In fact, OK, I wasn't going to write about this but their comments were so good. Here's the poem:

Harlem

What happens to a dream deferred?

     Does it dry up

     like a raisin in the sun?

     Or fester like a sore—

     And then run?

     Does it stink like rotten meat?

     Or crust and sugar over—

     like a syrupy sweet?

     Maybe it just sags

     like a heavy load.

     Or does it explode?



After identifying the devices present, we established the structure of the poem. They were far more articulate than I expected about this: we've got an opening question, and then a series of "solutions" or "possibilities". The question of the day was, "OK, if this is our scenario, that the dream is deferred," and these are the possible outcomes, do we feel like it's ok for a dream to be deferred or not?

The task was to determine whether the outcome of a dream being deferred was ok or not. In pairs, they analysed each simile for whether it seemed like a positive or negative outcome.

Some of the straightforward stanzas didn't prompt debate, but some prompted great output. Everyone thought that something "festering like a sore" was a terribly negative image, but then Zain pointed out that "even a sore heals, and gets better again, so the dream isn't lost."

The image that the dream might "crust and sugar over -- like a syrupy sweet" also prompted debate. Ameer expressed himself well describing how a sweet that it left out and develops a crust is not something you want to eat later. Yes, it's still sweet, but no longer something you're interested in. The excitement, as with the dream deferred, is lost. Murad remarked that sometime described with so much sweet language would be overly sweet, and we learned the phrase "cloyingly" sweet.

Toward the end of the discussion, Nour argued that a dream sometimes isn't deferred, it just dies. When prompted for an example, she said "What if I want to be a doctor, but the hospitals where I want to work in Europe can't give me a visa to leave Palestine?" I asked whether anyone saw, expressed in the poem, the possibility that a dream can change when it's deferred. Ayah added a winner comment, pointing to the line about the raisin. The raisin starts out as a grape, but when it dries up, some of its essence has been transformed into a gas. It's not gone, but it's been changed in shape. The raisin that's left isn't garbage, it's not supposed to be thrown away, and it can even be useful, nutritious and sweet. But it's not the same as the grape it once was.

Helu.

Hoping to end on a high note, I saved the last few minutes for Basket of DOOM, a spelling bee challenge where the two sections of 11th graders compete. To earn a point, the student whose name I draw must correctly spell three of the words drawn from the Basket of DOOM. I drew Kareem's name and many soft "Yes!'s" sounded. However he misspelled exaggerated, his first word. Next drawn was Dalia, who correctly spelled

develop
donating
saddened

and earned the class a point. The sections are now tied.