New Class Idea: The Ambiguous Hero

I’ve been captivated, almost forever, with the ambiguous hero; the good guy who does bad things (and, conversely, the bad guy who does good things) and what role he plays in our psyche and, in a larger sense, in our culture.

A friend of mine wants to teach a summer class with film, and we were talking about this idea over dinner the other day.  I haven’t been able to let it go, and here’s what I’ve come up with.  I’m going to need some help zeroing in on the specifics – the assignments, the competencies and objectives, that kind of thing -  but here’s what I’ve got for materials so far:

The Dark Knight: the second of Christopher Nolan’s Batman trilogy – this is the one with Heath Ledger as the Joker.  Christian Bale’s Batman is the perfect example, I think, of the ambiguous hero.

A Dry White Season:  This is based on a novel written by a white South African who gets involved in the anti-apartheid movement after someone he knows personally dies in police custody.

Gandhi:  You know this story, and I keep coming back to it as a conversation about civil disobedience and the question of how resistance is characterized on the different “sides” of the debate in question

Gone Baby Gone:  PLEASE tell me you’ve seen this movie!  It’s about a kidnapping, and centers around HUGE issues of “right” and “wrong” and where the law clashes with morality

Harry Potter:  I want to investigate Snape.  The idea of the double agent is always an interesting one.  I’m not sure which film I’d use, though; likely the last one.

Iron Jawed Angels: Another civil disobedience film – this one focuses on women’s suffrage and the outrages that some women suffered at the hands of law enforcement.

Milk:  About Harvey Milk and the early struggle for GLBTQ rights and recognition

Mississippi Burning:  This remains one of my MOST favorite films, mostly because of Gene Hackman’s REALLY complex character.  This scene alone is worth the film:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlzaBi_QxPw

The Negotiator:  This is the story of a cop who takes hostages in order to reveal corruption in his department – a good guy doing a bad thing for a good reason.

Leon, the Professional:  A hit man who adopts his 12 year old neighbor after her family is killed by a corrupt cop (played terrifyingly by Gary Oldman).  He’s a good guy who does bad things, and we have to reconcile his work with his personality.

Schindler’s List:  You know this one, too, I’m sure.  I think that Schindler started out as a bad guy doing a good thing (though for selfish reasons) and evolved into a good guy.

Shawshank Redemption:  Andy as a wrongly convicted man who becomes a criminal in prison, but who never gives up his humanity.

Tsotsi:  I haven’t seen this one in a LONG time, so I’m not sure if I’m remembering it correctly, but I think it’s about a boy who steals a car and discovers that he’s also stolen a baby.  The film tells the story of what he does after he realizes he’s got a tough choice to make.

Unforgiven:  This is a Clint Eastwood western.  Eastwood is a retired gunslinger who gets called back into the life of crime for reasons that he thinks are honorable.  His character is a tough one to suss out, and the film really makes the viewer work for the payoff (plus, it stars Gene Hackman and Morgan Freeman, which makes it that much better).

I was also thinking that I would have the kids read Bel Canto (which asks the “terrorist or freedom fighter” question) and, if they’re given permission from their parents, to look at a couple of episodes of Dexter (a serial killer in a Showtime series who only murders murderers who get away from the legal system).

I think there’s a lot of richness to be mined in this “good guy doing bad things / bad guy doing good things” question, I just need to think about it a bit more before it takes on any kind of substance that resembles a for-credit class.

What do you think?

First Draft Friday

I love alliteration!

SO!  The first draft of The Paper is done!  It clocks in at 22 pages (plus 5 pages of sources), the conclusion is pathetic, and I still have to go back through and cite some sections, but it is a complete draft.

Who wants to read it?  Email me at mrschili at comcast dot net and I’ll send you a copy.  Be forewarned; I want good, constructive feedback on this bad boy; if you’re going to read this (and I’ll be very grateful if you do), I’m going to ask that you be clear and specific about what I need to do to make it better.

My goal is to have it in front of my professor in second-draft form sometime early to mid next week (I’m aiming for Wednesday, but since she hasn’t given me a deadline, I’ve got some flexibility).  The final is due on the 15th (my deadline, not hers; I think she gave me through the 18th, but I’d rather put it to bed sooner rather than later).

Angry Love Letter

I subscribe to Letters of Note.  You should, too.

This was today’s offering.  It’s a letter from Pat Conroy, the author of, among other things, The Prince of Tides, in response to hearing that a school board in West Virginia had challenged the inclusion of that novel and another of his works, Beach Music.  The letter was published in the local newspaper, and the challenges later failed.

Letters like this make my proud to do what I do.
To the Editor of the Charleston Gazette:

I received an urgent e-mail from a high school student named Makenzie Hatfield of Charleston, West Virginia. She informed me of a group of parents who were attempting to suppress the teaching of two of my novels, The Prince of Tides and Beach Music. I heard rumors of this controversy as I was completing my latest filthy, vomit-inducing work. These controversies are so commonplace in my life that I no longer get involved. But my knowledge of mountain lore is strong enough to know the dangers of refusing to help a Hatfield of West Virginia. I also do not mess with McCoys.

I’ve enjoyed a lifetime love affair with English teachers, just like the ones who are being abused in Charleston, West Virginia, today. My English teachers pushed me to be smart and inquisitive, and they taught me the great books of the world with passion and cunning and love. Like your English teachers, they didn’t have any money either, but they lived in the bright fires of their imaginations, and they taught because they were born to teach the prettiest language in the world. I have yet to meet an English teacher who assigned a book to damage a kid. They take an unutterable joy in opening up the known world to their students, but they are dishonored and unpraised because of the scandalous paychecks they receive. In my travels around this country, I have discovered that America hates its teachers, and I could not tell you why. Charleston, West Virginia, is showing clear signs of really hurting theirs, and I would be cautious about the word getting out.

In 1961, I entered the classroom of the great Eugene Norris, who set about in a thousand ways to change my life. It was the year I read The Catcher in the Rye, under Gene’s careful tutelage, and I adore that book to this very day. Later, a parent complained to the school board, and Gene Norris was called before the board to defend his teaching of this book. He asked me to write an essay describing the book’s galvanic effect on me, which I did. But Gene’s defense of The Catcher in the Rye was so brilliant and convincing in its sheer power that it carried the day. I stayed close to Gene Norris till the day he died. I delivered a eulogy at his memorial service and was one of the executors of his will. Few in the world have ever loved English teachers as I have, and I loathe it when they are bullied by know-nothing parents or cowardly school boards.

About the novels your county just censored: The Prince of Tides and Beach Music are two of my darlings which I would place before the altar of God and say, “Lord, this is how I found the world you made.” They contain scenes of violence, but I was the son of a Marine Corps fighter pilot who killed hundreds of men in Korea, beat my mother and his seven kids whenever he felt like it, and fought in three wars. My youngest brother, Tom, committed suicide by jumping off a fourteen-story building; my French teacher ended her life with a pistol; my aunt was brutally raped in Atlanta; eight of my classmates at The Citadel were killed in Vietnam; and my best friend was killed in a car wreck in Mississippi last summer. Violence has always been a part of my world. I write about it in my books and make no apology to anyone. In Beach Music, I wrote about the Holocaust and lack the literary powers to make that historical event anything other than grotesque.

People cuss in my books. People cuss in my real life. I cuss, especially at Citadel basketball games. I’m perfectly sure that Steve Shamblin and other teachers prepared their students well for any encounters with violence or profanity in my books just as Gene Norris prepared me for the profane language in The Catcher in the Rye forty-eight years ago.

The world of literature has everything in it, and it refuses to leave anything out. I have read like a man on fire my whole life because the genius of English teachers touched me with the dazzling beauty of language. Because of them I rode with Don Quixote and danced with Anna Karenina at a ball in St. Petersburg and lassoed a steer in Lonesome Dove and had nightmares about slavery in Beloved and walked the streets of Dublin in Ulysses and made up a hundred stories in The Arabian Nights and saw my mother killed by a baseball in A Prayer for Owen Meany. I’ve been in ten thousand cities and have introduced myself to a hundred thousand strangers in my exuberant reading career, all because I listened to my fabulous English teachers and soaked up every single thing those magnificent men and women had to give. I cherish and praise them and thank them for finding me when I was a boy and presenting me with the precious gift of the English language.

The school board of Charleston, West Virginia, has sullied that gift and shamed themselves and their community. You’ve now entered the ranks of censors, book-banners, and teacher-haters, and the word will spread. Good teachers will avoid you as though you had cholera. But here is my favorite thing: Because you banned my books, every kid in that county will read them, every single one of them. Because book-banners are invariably idiots, they don’t know how the world works—but writers and English teachers do.

I salute the English teachers of Charleston, West Virginia, and send my affection to their students. West Virginians, you’ve just done what history warned you against—you’ve riled a Hatfield.

Sincerely,

Pat Conroy

Reading Response Essay #1

I’m going to admit to being a little nervous about this.

The assignment says, in part (I’ve left out the insignificant details),  “each student will maintain a weekly reading response journal that is based on the reading response questions that are posted on BlackBoard… Students should respond using examples from the readings to illustrate your points.  The format of the response should include the following: 1) date and response question, 2) discussion and response of the question using at least two examples from the assigned readings to illustrate points, 3) response and discussion of the question based on your personal opinion/experience, and 4) demonstrated critical analysis of the question and integration of the assigned readings into your opinion/experience.

Since I’m still not sure about what the expectations are for written assignments beyond what I’ve got there, I’m not sure that I’ve met them. Regardless, here’s what I’ve come up with for the first attempt.  Critique the hell out of it, wouldja?

 

Reading Response Question
September 1, 2012

In reading #1, Diana Gittins asks “what is a family and is it universal?”  Based on all of the Ferguson readings for 9/7/12, how would you answer Gittins’ questions?  Finally, define traditional notions of “the family” and discuss why we cling to traditional notions of family if, in reality, they represent such a small percentage of families today in the US?

The readings from Ferguson make clear that the notion of “family” is, at best, nearly impossible to define.  While it is true that every culture has an expression of “family,” no single, coherent definition can be applied to the structure that can be expected to encompass every permutation of family; there are simply too many factors to consider that make the composition a universal definition impossible.

The “traditional” notion of family, at least in this country and at this moment in time, is a heteronormative, male-dominated structure consisting of a bread-winning father, a caretaker mother, and the natural children of that couple’s state- and church-sanctioned marital union.  Seen from the outside, it could be argued that my family is the white, Western archetype; my husband (though not always the primary decision-maker) is currently the primary breadwinner; I left my job teaching high school to pursue a post-graduate certificate and, as a consequence, am only working part-time.  We were legally wed in a church, though neither of us subscribes to an organized faith.  Our two daughters were conceived and borne in wedlock.  For all intents and purposes, my husband and I are representative of the “perfect” middle class American family.

There are a number of ways in which the day-to-day of our family differs, though, from what I understand the “conservative” narrative concerning families should be.  Our division of labor isn’t based on traditional gender roles; though it’s true that my husband mows the lawn and snow-blows the driveway, he does those things not because I’m not able to or because he thinks I can’t, but rather because he’s the only one of us who can finesse those machines to do his bidding.  He is just as likely as I am to do dishes or run a few loads of laundry.  I see to the care and keeping of the vehicles and often execute home repairs myself.  We saw – and continue to see – equally to both the emotional and physical care of our children; we each bathed and diapered the babies, we each help with homework, we each provide for the varying needs of our growing children (in fact, my husband is the one who cares for the girls when they’re vomiting; I simply haven’t the stomach for that kind of sickness).  Decisions about household expenses are shared between us, as are the continuing demands of parenting teenage daughters.  While there’s a lot about our family that looks “traditional,” there is much about our relationships that deviate from that idea (at least, as I understand the current conservative narrative).

Ours is a unique situation, though, and there are as many expressions of family as there are individuals who make them.  Considering the components of race, class, sexual orientation, educational level, profession, and physical surroundings and the effect that these influences have on the ways in which domestic arrangements are made and maintained, one needs also to take into account the impacts of faith, “traditional” definitions, social expectations, and governmental policies on the ways in which we arrange ourselves into family units.

My sister and her wife are an excellent example of a family that finds itself outside the sanctioned definition of “family,” though admittedly that definition is changing.  I find it interesting that even those who are accepting of their union as a marriage will still ask them when they plan to have children (and the more bold will ask how they plan to have them); the expectations placed on even non-traditional families to adhere to a socially acceptable pattern of behavior is pervasive.

In her article, Gittins makes the argument that while we may think we have a working definition of “family,” the reality of the various lives that people lead renders that definition unworkable.  She argues that the standards for behavior change with time and situation, that any number of forces affect the customs and social acceptability of certain practices, and that marriage and family customs have been fluid throughout human history.  To try to apply one rigid definition of family leaves out all but a wrenchingly narrow representation of people and, further, denigrates and marginalizes nearly everyone.

As to the claim that we cling to a narrow definition of family despite evidence that so few people actually live in conditions that would be recognized as meeting that definition, I’m not entirely certain that we do.  As our nation becomes more diverse, as children grow up in a more accepting and tolerant environment, and as culture and customs continue to evolve – however slowly that may be happening – so, too, do our definitions of “normal” change and adapt.  My husband and I are raising our daughters to both accept and understand that there are a number of different ways to express love and care, and that no one way is the “right” way.

I understand, because I am reasonably conscious and attentive to the political environment, that there are an alarming number of people who do cling desperately to a codified and proscribed definition of family, and who are at best deeply suspicious of and, at worst, outright hostile to people whose practices do not meet with that standard.  My thinking is that these people are either afraid of losing their privileged position as members of sanctioned institutions – and whatever control or influence that position grants them, whether real or perceived – or they are operating under the mistaken belief that allowing other ways of being to be officially condoned and recognized will somehow threaten their own rights to live as they please.  Sadly, I do know of people who genuinely believe that the acceptance of homosexual marriage will, in fact, threaten hetero marriage, and it seems that no amount of logic or placating will allay their fears.  Fortunately, these are not fears that I or my family share.

Quick Hit: Vignette

I gave my juniors a bunch of short story prompts inspired by a compilation of “either/or” choices in a book one of the students brought to class this morning.  The one I chose was “would you rather always lose or never play?”

I’m giving it to you just as I wrote it; it hasn’t gone through any revision or workshopping.  I’ll take whatever feedback anyone feels compelled to give.

Stacey sat in the bleachers, watching her little brother’s baseball team lose… again.  They were oh-and-19 going into this game, and the future didn’t look good.  At least this time they managed to get on the scoreboard; the run the Ducks brought in on a laughable error by the other team’s outfielder brought the number of runs scored by the team for the entire season to exactly two.

Bottom of the 9th; two outs.  Jameson was at bat.  At 13, he was still an awkward kid, and despite his 6 years in Little League, he never quite got the hitting stance right.  He held the bat like a weapon, Stacey could see Jamie’s fingers turning white in the death-grip on the thing, and he bent his knees so much that his ass stuck out at an impossible angle.  He stared at the pitcher with what looked to Stacey like a mixture of wide-eyed fear and blazing fury, and she was sure that, at any moment, the kid might storm the mound and beat the pitcher to death.

The ball came screaming toward her little brother, and he did what he always did.  The bat came flying around his body, wielded more like a broadsword than a baseball bat, and missed the ball entirely.  Stacey heard the ball thump securely in the catcher’s mitt, watched the umpire signal strike three, and watched as her brother and his fellows came to the infield to line up to congratulate yet another vanquishing team.  Stacey gathered up her bag and her jacket and thought to herself that the kids didn’t even look all that dejected.  Losing, it seems, is something that they’ve gotten comfortable with.

Quick Hit: It Works!

Every morning, my English classes are expected to write for about 10 minutes on a bumper sticker quote I put up on the board.  The first class, they just get the quote; I want them to approach it fresh and as they would on their own.  They find critical thinking questions and prompts from me on the board when they arrive for subsequent classes.  My hope is that these will nudge them to think deeper or more carefully or from a different angle; my goal is for them to practice critical thinking skills, then to transfer that thinking into their writing.

For the most part, these exercises seem to go over okay.  The kids grumble about having to do them – especially the first-thing-in-the-morning kids – but with the exception of a couple of recalcitrant kids (who don’t write on principle, anyway), I get pretty decent engagement.

I had to kinda drag Hatcher through these last year; not exactly kicking and screaming, but for a while there, I was working harder than he was.  This kid is SO smart and SO insightful, but he would give me bullshit responses to the prompts, and it made me CRAZY.  I pushed him and cajoled him and harassed him all year, and he only once in a while let slip how brilliant he really is.

He ended up leaving the school this term (I’m not sure why, and it saddens my heart; I miss him every day).  This morning, I got this message on my facebook page:

Dear Mrs. Chili,

After the second day of [standardized testing], I can honestly say that I would have had an incredibly hard time on the writing sections without the daily quote writing from your class.

Thanks,

Hatcher

I live for these notes.

Schizophrenic

I teach freshman writing courses at Local U. in the fall terms.  I’ve been doing that for a couple of years now, and over the course of staff meetings and walking the hallowed halls of the English building (most notably in the dungeons where all the adjunct offices are), I came to have a passing relationship with a number of my fellow adjuncts.  One fellow in particular made an impression on me.

Mike is one of those people who’s hard to read at first.  He presents a pretty imposing first impression; though he’s not particularly tall, he is broad and solid.  With a mane of reddish hair and a long beard to match, he reminds me of a cross between How to Train Your Dragon‘s Stoick

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and Barbosa from Pirates of the Caribbean

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No, really.

Anyway, there was something about Mike that just resonated with me, so when it was decided that CHS needed a part-time English teacher, he was the first person I thought of and the only person I wanted.  I hunted him down (no small feat, given that I couldn’t, for the life of me, remember his name.  Fortunately, being as noticeable as he is, the secretary for the English department at LU was able to discern my description and get me his email address), and started stalking him on email.  He consented to an interview that went far better than I was expecting, and within a week or so, he was ours.

I was beside myself with happy.  I had SUCH a good feeling about this guy, and I just KNEW he was going to be perfect and you know what?  He is.  I have fallen professionally head-over-heels, crazy in love with this man; he’s smart and funny, he’s got a rapport with the kids that strikes the perfect balance of freedom with responsibility, and he manages the sticky or uncomfortable conversations that happen in discussion-heavy classrooms with a nimble agility that delights me every time I witness it (and I get to witness it a lot; I tend to use his teaching period to grade my own work, so I’m camped out at my desk behind a half wall in the room).  He challenges my thinking, too; I delight in the conversations we have outside of class, I love the way he looks at the goals and challenges we face, and he inspires me to keep pushing myself when I start to despair.

There should have been red flags.  NOTHING in my life that happens with such ease and grace should be accepted on face value, so it should have come as no surprise to me that this perfect professional marriage wasn’t going to last.

Mike has applied, and has been accepted to, an MFA program in writing.  This program wants him so badly that they called him to ask him to come to their school, they’ve offered him a full scholarship and a teaching gig.  They would be idiotic not to want him – he’s dedicated and talented and would be an outstanding addition to any academic community – and he would be an idiot not to take it – how often do liberal arts people get their advanced degrees paid for?  (In case you’re wondering the answer to that question, it’s “never.”)

So here’s my problem; I am DELIGHTED for Mike.  I know that this is what he really wants – unlike me, who is a teacher first and a writer second, Mike is hellbent on being an artist.  Writing is what he does – he works it and loves it and celebrates and agonizes over and wrestles with it.  He keeps files and napkins and notebooks, he lies awake at night chasing down stories – he wants to hone and perfect his craft, and this is the perfect opportunity for him to do just that.  I know this is what he wants (perhaps more than he wants anything else), and I’m thrilled that it’s worked out so well.

On the other side, I’m petulant and cranky and just shy of a temper tantrum because this wonderful opportunity is in… wait for it… OREGON.  As in, how-far-away-can-you-be-and-still-be-on-the-continent Oregon.  I got this wonderful coworker for exactly long enough to fall completely in love with him, to start imagining the kind of kick-ass English department we could design for this fledgling school, and the bastid is going to pack up and move literally across the country.

Sigh.

 

The search has already begun for Mike’s replacement.  I had a candidate visit yesterday and, while there’s a lot to recommend this man, I’m not convinced he’d work.  Since we are a department of precisely two, I need to know that I can work well with whomever we choose, and I’m not sure that this guy is it; his vision seems narrower than I’m comfortable with, and I could sense, even in that brief meeting, the potential for tension.  I’m trying to keep a very open mind and to go with the flow of this change and to not let my adoration for Mike cloud my judgment of the applicants vying to replace him, but I also have to listen to my gut.  Maybe I should let MIKE choose the next person to hold his job…

Interview With the Vampire

Actually, it’s “Interview with the Writer of Interview with the Vampire!”

You want to know how much I love technology?  Let me tell you how much I love technology, People!  A girlfriend clued me in a little while ago that Anne Rice had announced that she is willing to come to classrooms via Skype to talk about her books and the craft of writing.

She didn’t have to tell me twice!

I got right on the computer and emailed Ms. Rice to tell her that, yes, please, my seniors and I would like very much to have her “visit” our class and talk about writing.  Her assistant and I have been emailing for a while now, and we’re circling in on a date in March.

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I assigned Interview With the Vampire today – the kids have to have their books by this time next week and we’ll start reading then.  I’m up against a couple of students who have pre-conceived notions of Rice and the novel, so I’m having to get them to start thinking like scholars about this novel instead of looking at it as consumers of entertainment.  I’m probably not going to hook a few of them, but I know for sure that I’ve piqued a LOT of interest in this class; my boss is tickled that this could actually happen (she wants to call the local paper), and a number of my former students are begging to come back to school so they can partake in this class, too.

Technology rocks.

Finding My Stride

We’re into our second week in school, though neither week has been a full five days (because of the Labor Day holiday last weekend, last week was Tuesday through Thursday, this week is Tuesday to Friday).  I’m coming to realize that I had no idea how much I missed my job until I came back from summer vacation.

I’m teaching four classes this year; freshman, junior, and senior English and a Film and Literature class.  So far, they’re all going really well, though I’m still trying to adjust my brain to how much work I should reasonably expect from the students.  I’m settling into the routine of taking attendance in the new platform our Tech God launched for us this year, and that same Tech God got my (messed up) classes set up (correctly) in the class management system we started playing with last term and are running full-time this year.  In terms of logistics, I think I’ve got it figured out.

We’re running a college-inspired schedule this year, which, so far, is working out GREAT.  On Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, my professional life is almost obscenely leisurely to look at from the outside; I’m only scheduled for the freshman class first block and the freshman portfolio advisory right after lunch.  I’m finding, though, that my M/W/F is packed much fuller than my Tuesday/Thursdays where I have a class literally every block.  Those “easy” days are the ones where I’m doing all my grading, planning, copying, and scheming, not to mention trying to keep up with three reading assignments (and that’s one fewer than there’ll be soon; I doubled up the English III and Film and Lit readings for the first outing).

My freshmen are reading Lois Lowry’s The Giver and are trying to figure out the writing process ahead of composing their own personal narratives.  Most of the kids have read the novel already – most in 7th grade – but I think they’re going to be pleased, and not a little surprised, by how much they DIDN’T see in the story two years ago.  I’m going to get them started on their personal essays at the end of next week with an eye for having a finished draft before the end of the first grading period in mid-October.

My English III kids are reading The Secret Life of Bees (as are my Film and Lit kids).  I’m thinking that I’m going to use the same lesson plans for both classes for this novel, and of showing the film to the core class kids, as well.  I’m dying to start talking about this book; a couple of students have come in and boldly declared that Lily is a little girl with daddy issues and I think it’s going to be fun to watch them come to the realization that her issues are all mommy (as are, consequently, her daddy’s issues.  Yep; that’s going to be a great conversation!).

My English IV kids are reading Frankenstein, and I absolutely cannot WAIT to see where they go with it.  I got a lot of complaints during the first reading day; they couldn’t get behind the language and they were completely confused about what was going on.  A couple of the kids came back to me today, though, and told me that once they got going, the ride smoothed out a bit.  I figured it would, but it was good to hear it from them.  I’m trying something different with my seniors this year in that I’m giving them, right off the bat, free rein to decide how they’re going to approach this novel.  I’ve told them that they’ve got to come up with some other supporting experience that they can interpret to show me that they’re engaged with Frankenstein on a level that goes beyond just the plot and setting, but that they have complete autonomy in how they do that.  While I’m expecting them to fall on their faces this first time out – they’ve never really been given this kind of absolute freedom before – I’m hoping that they’re observant enough of the text to be able to come up with some academically substantial ideas.  Maybe some of them will choose to examine some excerpts of Milton’s Paradise Lost or Wollstonecraft’s Vindication on the Rights of Women, or they might investigate the current issues in medical and scientific ethics that Shelley so presciently wrote about in her novel.  I’m also hoping that some of them will go off and do something creative and original; one long-ago student, when faced with the same assignment, decided to write two more chapters to the book in which the Creature returns from the Arctic and confronts Ernest.  It was delightful, imaginative, true to the voice of the novel and completely in keeping with the characters, and I’m hoping that someone sees fit to try their hand at that kind of creative effort.

We just finished Willow in the Film class, and the kids are tasked with writing a short essay in which they argue who that story is really about; my interpretation is that it’s NOT about the main character, and I’m eager to see not only who they choose, but also how they defend those choices with evidence from the movie.  They’re also finishing The Secret Life of Bees, and next week will be spent in conversation about the ideas of prejudice, faith, confidence, connection, and determination that the novel forwards, as well as in discussion of some of the creative choice the director made in the adaptation of the book to the screen.

See?  Busy!  How’s YOUR school year going?

Kicking Around an Idea…

Dear Readers-Who-Are-Also-Teachers, I have a question/favor to ask.

I’ve been thinking a lot – as I am wont to do – about connection and communication. The other day, while willing myself to get out of bed, I had a thought. Please keep in mind that it is still in its nascent stage and that any and all suggestions are cheerfully and gratefully welcomed.

I would like to get my (white, mostly affluent, suburban) high students in touch with kids whose lives are different from theirs. Sure, we read about experiences that other people have, but I think the act of having real contact with a real person who lives differently than you – of having a connection with an actual person with whom you can form a genuine human bond – is far more profound and meaningful.

What I would like is to connect with a teacher in another part of the country (or the world, even; isn’t the internet da bomb?) and get our kids in touch as part of our language curriculum this year (if this works with even a modicum of success, I would like to make this kind of cultural outreach a component of the English curriculum going forward, but that, as they say, is another bridge). What I originally envisioned would be a sort of sister-classroom scenario, but if we end up connecting to more than one school in more than one place, that will work, too (and, I think, can open up a lot of really great opportunities for discussion and research).

I’m imagining all kinds of communication; email, blogs, Skype, and (gasp!) letters written on paper and sent through the post (Mrs. Chili, can people still do that?!). I don’t know yet how often this communication would happen, but I would like for it to be an organized thing for the classroom – whether or not the kids get in touch on their own time is up to them.

I teach in a teeny-tiny school – no, really; we’re expecting slightly fewer than 80 students this year – so my classes are never going to be more than 20 students (my normal class size is between 15 and 18 kids). If this is something you’re interested in (or something you think a colleague might be willing to play along with), leave a comment. I’ll happily answer any questions you ask (though do make sure you enter your email address with your comment; I’ll only answer some questions privately as I’m maintaining the illusion for myself that I’m protecting my anonymity here).

Do you think this will work?