November 2022
November 18, 2022
Today we made the Mystery Books and completed the City Planning document. Your group EITHER completed the Utopia side OR the Dystopia side, depending on what sort of society you set up. The Utopia side asks what you will do to prevent a dystopian underside in your city. The Dystopia side asks what makes your society a dystopia.
After completing the handout, cut out each box and glue it to one of the checkerboard squares in the Mystery Book.
Have a great break! No homework, but make sure you have turned in all outstanding assignments, especially the JS Paragraph!
No Red Ink is due on Nov 30.
November 16-17, 2022
We moved through three modes today. We started with reading and annotating one of the stories from the Power and Dehumanization packet. Each group picked one story to annotate for
– Elements of dystopia
– Evidence that the society either tried to solve a problem OR that the society is the result of ignoring a problem
– Evidence of types of control or power imbalance.
– Evidence of dehumanization or alienation in the characters.
Then, groups discussed the stories for 20 minutes, adding in evidence from their summer reading novels as well to address these questions:
How do dystopian societies evolve from the problems of society? Consider the desire to evolve a perfect, utopian world vs the danger of ignoring specific problems in a society.
Are there types of modern problems or situations that might be more likely to lead to a dystopian society?
How does a dystopian world use dehumanization and alienation to create power imbalances? Use evidence from summer reading and your short story.
Finally, I introduced the Utopia/Dystopia project, in which groups will build cities based on issues or problems they have researched. The city will either try to solve the problem or ignore the issue until it spirals into a dystopian world. Today's task was to research the topic and complete a summary frame that responds to the prompt "Explain how the article will provide a base or connection to your world."
Frame: The article ______ describes [name problem]. This story will connect to our dystopian world because…
– Describe how you hope to connect to the specific problem
– Describe how this problem could lead to a dystopian world
– Describe how you could solve this problem in a Utopian world and what the potential problems might be.
Frames will be due on Friday. We will work on a planning document for the city on that day as well.
Turned in today: Annotated stories + Discussion Notes; Nonfiction Article Frame (or complete tomorrow).
Reminder: If you have not turned in your DJ + JS pasragraph or your NRI assignment, Friday is the last day for full credit!
November 15, 2022
Today's lesson was all about power and power balance. In a dystopian world, there is often some sort of imbalance of power contributing to or forming the dystopia. We watched this TedEd talk on types of power and how it is controlled. From the video, we took six types of power: physical, wealth, state action, social norms, ideas, and numbers. We then created webs that brainstormed ways these types of power could become unbalanced, and some concrete examples of that. I provided each group with a news article about that type of power, and they read it, annotated for the impacts of power imbalances, and completed this frame:
The article “____” details a [type] power imbalance between _______. This imbalance is revealed by [evidence]. A power imbalance like this can lead to problems such as _______. Our group thinks one way to counter a power imbalance like this might be ____________. Bonus: Include an explanation or evidence of why your solution might work.
November 14, 2022
Sorry for the long gap in updates! Today in class, we worked on the DJ + JS assessment for your summer reading novels. We started with discussing in your group how the novel showed Characteristics of Dystopia, and then looking for specific passages that exemplified some of those elements of dystopia. Then we looked at the dialectical journal question:
How do specific details of language like imagery or word choice in [summer reading novel] reveal a specific dystopian characteristic?
You should have filled in the title and the specific dystopian characteristic you intend to explain. The TS should mention these things AND the element of language you intend to discuss. Here is an example using Brave New World:
“The introduction to Alduos Huxley’s Brave New World uses cold, impersonal language and sentence fragments to create a dehumanized and isolated dystopian world.”
Notice that I have specifically described the type of language: cold and impersonal, and sentence fragments. This tells you that my CD sentences should include sentence fragments that use impersonal language-- for instance, referring to people as machines or numbers, sterile or cleanliness, or neutral, unfeeling language. The commentary should be about how these references are dehumanizing or isolating. If you had the passage (the introduction) in front of you, you might be able to write this paragraph even without reading the whole text! A strong TS should give you that much information.
We started on the dialectical journals. Remember to be specific and precise in your text evidence. If you find yourself putting in longer quotes, then highlight the most important pieces that show your point. Remember that the first question to ask is always "How does this quote show the main point?" In this case, "How does the image/word choice/other language show the element of dystopia?"
I am looking for a paragraph that uses the format correctly and clearly, contains commentary that makes sense and gives some insight into the topic, and demonstrates a solid grasp of the novel.
November 9-11, 2022
We watched Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? to wrap up our Odyssey unit. There was a handout to complete, and I was absent two of those days. You should also have previewed the DJ + JS for the summer reading/dystopian elements.
November 8, 2022
We complete the NearPod for Characteristics of Dystopia. Hold on to your handout for future reference!
November 7, 2022
ASTROS WIN!!! World Series parade, no school!
November 4, 2022
I was absent and students worked on an assignment in Canvas.
November 2-3, 2022
We had socratic seminar.
November 1, 2022
Today was the last day to work on maps. There were many questions about the playlist, so I wrote an example paragraph to help clarify my expectations:
We paired Taylor Swift’s song “Antihero” with Odysseus’s adventure on Helios’s Island, because the song lyrics can give a different view of the hero’s internal conflict. Swift’s song includes the lyric, “I stare directly at the sun/but never in the mirror,” as an admission that the “anti-hero” in this case refuses to accept responsibility for their own tragedies; but the irony of this admission is of course that internally, the speaker realizes their own hubris. By singing about their failings, they reveal to the audience a sense that the actions they take lead directly to the consequences. This pairs well with Odysseus on Thrinacia, because of course in this adventure, he tells us about falling afoul of Helios, the sun god. In this adventure, Odysseus tells his listeners that he “groaned and told the gods,/ ‘O Zeus, and all you deathless gods! You blinded/my mind with that infernal sleep. My men/ did dreadful things while I was gone’” (12.370-3). Odysseus fails to control his men, having gone off “to pray, in case some god would show me how to get back home,” but he does not look at his own failings as a man and leader; rather, he groans that the gods and his men have once again ruined his chances of going home. Just like the speaker in the song, he fails to look “in the mirror”; while his story shows only his outer blindness, we can use the song to imagine his inner turmoil, as well as to understand Odysseus as the author of his own fate. The difference in speaker perspective gives us new twists on an old story.
This paragraph was written with the Oral Tradition lens in mind, but it could also work for Heroes and Monsters.
Tomorrow will be Socratic Seminar for archetypes and The Odyssey. These are the questions:
What traits of Odysseus make him likeable/unlikeable to a modern society? Why? Would Odysseus be capable of the great deeds he performs if he did not also possess some of the unlikeable traits? How can they benefit him?
Why do we still read stories like The Odyssey and other Greek myths? What do these stories have to do with us? How can you connect to the text of The Odyssey?
How does the pervasiveness of the Hero's Journey archetype in Western literature influence our societal beliefs and relationships, positively an negatively? What stories exemplify these impacts?