Multi-Modal Literacies: Speak

   Despite all the final projects at the end of the semester I have managed to find time for a little bit of pleasure reading.  I'm reading "Speak" by Laurie Halse Anderson and I'm very impressed with the book so far.  I read this book when I was a freshman in high school and I decided to reread it now since it is a young adult book that is commonly used in high school language arts classes.  Also, I always find it interesting to reread books that I've read in high school because my perspective and opinions on the books always change and I think it's interesting for me to see that change.  I think "Speak" is a great book for high school students because the main character, Melinda, is so believable.  The book has a prefect balance between humor and seriousness and I think it has an important message for students.  This book can help teenagers to see that they shouldn't judge somebody based on what they see on the outside, because they ultimately don't really know what's going on in the inside.  Also, this book encourages students to seek help if they've gone through any kind of crisis.  I think this book has a lot of potential for classroom discussion and I would really like to teach it in my future classroom. I've attached a link to a website with a youtube video of Laurie Halse Anderson's poem based on reader responses to her book.  It's very interesting.

Laurie Halse Anderson on Speak

Multi-Modal Literacies: Les Miserables

     Last Tuesday I was lucky enough to go see Les Miserable at Playhouse Square in Cleveland.  It's a musical that centers around the French Revolution but also deals primarily with human relationships and the human spirit in times of trouble.  Although, I've seen this musical twice before it had been about ten years since the last time I saw it.  To me, it was interesting to see how the show has changed in the past ten years including the new uses of technology in lighting and background images that were used.  I also thought it was interesting how I understood the show as a whole so much better.  Last time I saw it I was eleven and I didn't understand a lot of the adult content in the storyline.
     Overall, I think theatre is a great example of a type of text that people don't often utilize.  This show made me think so much about human nature and the human story and the costumes and music were beautiful.  I think people could really benefit from seeing these shows.  Playhouse Square is only about fifty minutes away in Cleveland and there are tickets sold at cheaper prices.  I also think it would be a great idea to do a unit involving theatre with my future students.  I think this would expose them to a different element of culture and allow them to explore different themes in a variety of ways.

Teaching Literature in Secondary Schools: Jago Chapter 6

I found this chapter interesting in a number of ways.  First, I liked the fact that Jago brought up the importance of collaboration between teachers.  I think teachers are often left to their own ideas and I think they could really learn from other people.  More people create more ideas and I think more collaboration between teachers should be done.  I also liked her lesson plan on the Odyssey.  I think she included a lot of great examples of different ways to make sense of the work.  I agree with the idea that students should write their own notes because it helps them learn better than when they're given a handout.  I also like that she has her students organize the characters and setting so that they can all be kept in order.  However, I did wonder about the pace of her classes.  I'm worried that her classes hold little room for struggling readers and that they wouldn't do well in her class because it's so fast paced.  I think it would be better to slow down the reading a little bit so that students of all ability levels will be able to actively participate.

Teaching Literature in Secondary Schools: Jago Chapter 4

     This chapter discussed the elements of literature and the ways in which stories work.  I found it particularly interesting because Jago's approach to teaching different topics such as story structures, literary devices, and story analysis is so different from the approach of many language arts teachers throughout the country.  I really liked the fact that she recognized that having students fill out dry worksheets asking them to fill in the blanks about setting, climax, theme, etc. does little good.  Jago stressed the importance of including these terms as well as many other literary terms as regular classroom dialogue.  I think this is a great way to not only teach the students these words, but to also give them the tools to use these words everyday in the classroom.  I think it's important for teachers to teach literary terms and devices so that students don't see them as abstract, useless ideas that have little relevance to everyday life.  If teachers use these terms everyday in the classroom their students will become more literate and more educated in the study of literature.  They will be able to engage in educated discussions about the literature they read and they will gain a better understanding of every text they read if they have a detailed knowledge of story structures and literary devices.

Teaching Literature in Secondary Schools: Jago Chapter 2

     I thought this chapter was really interesting and it helped to address some questions I've had about the teaching of vocabulary.  During my tutoring experience at Firestone, I noticed that a lot of students seemed to really struggle with comprehending texts because they didn't understand the vocabulary used.  This was surprising to me because some of the words they struggled with seemed to be fairly simple words in my opinion.  This taught me that I shouldn't just assume that students know something and I should always ask students what they are having trouble with so I can help them better.  I agree with Jago's approach to teaching vocabulary because it isn't just rote memorization and it makes words relevant to the texts they are reading.
     I really liked Jago's "personal vocabulary list" bookmarks.  I think this is a great way to get students to realize what words they don't know and how they can learn them.  I also liked how she used "The Fall of the House of Usher" and "Julius Caesar" to not only teach vocabulary, but also to teach tone and focus on characterization.  Furthermore, I also agreed with Jago's idea that vocabulary taught in classrooms should be relevant.  I definitely agree with this.  Students should learn words that they will likely see multiple times throughout different types of literature.  Overall, I really like Jago's approach to vocabulary because it seems that it will really help students learn.  Rote memorization and vocabulary tests are never effective and simply cause students more headaches than they need.  I plan on incorporating many of Jago's ideas into my own classroom in the future.

Multi-Modal Literacies: I Am Sindhutai Sapkal (Cleveland International Film Festival)

When I went to the Cleveland International Film Festival I saw the movie “I Am Sindhutai Sapkal.” The movie tells the story of Chindi who was born in India in the 1950s to a poor farming family.  Despite the fact that Chindi wants to get an education she is only allowed to pursue school through the fourth grade.  She is forced into an arranged marriage at the age of twelve and is eventually wrongfully accused of adultery and thrown out of the house by her abusive husband.  However, despite all struggles she faced, she was eventually able to create orphanages all over India and help hundreds of Indian children find a home.

 

A.    Personal Issues: One of the things that really resonated with me throughout this movie was the fact that Chindi was not allowed to get an education.  When she was young, she was only allowed to go to school if she completed all her farm chores which usually caused her to miss at least half of the school day.  Furthermore, once she got married she was forced to read in secret because her husband did not approve of reading and didn’t consider it the duty of a wife.  I was very surprised by this because I come from a culture that values education for all people and I couldn’t imagine being denied an education because of my gender.  I also grew up in a culture that promotes equality between men and women which was definitely not the case in this film.  I think this film really opened my eyes up to different issues in other parts of the world and the fact that there are probably a lot of problems that I’m not even aware of.  I think most Americans that see this film would probably have a similar reaction to the film as me because they were raised in a similar culture.  However, I think people from other parts of the world with different backgrounds would have different reactions to this film because it would hit them in different ways.  I think one of the great things about any text is that different people can interpret it in different ways based on their own life experiences.

B.     Technique: Overall, I thought the movie was very well done.  I particularly liked the music because a certain song would play every time something bad was about to happen.  I also thought the dialogue between the characters really allowed viewers to get a glimpse into the lives of the characters and their values and beliefs.  I think one of this film’s biggest strengths is its music which really helped add to the characters’ emotions and trials in life. 

C.     Acting: I thought the acting in the film was excellent.  There were three different actresses that played the role of Chindi because of the different ages of the character in the film.  I thought all three actresses did a good job of portraying a single character by using the same mannerisms and speech patterns.  I also thought the other actors in the movie did a great job of making their characters’ real.

D.    Plot: One of the things that made this movie so great was that it was a true story.  I think that really made it interesting to see the plot unfold.

E.     Themes: There are a lot of themes presented in this movie.  Most importantly, I think the film speaks towards women’s rights and promotes the improvement of life conditions for women all over the world.  I also think the film speaks towards the importance of getting an education and feeling a sense of belonging in the world.  This is illustrated in the film when Chindi goes on to help orphans who need some adult guidance in their lives.

F.      Genre: I think that if this film were to belong to any genre it would be a drama. The movie is serious and the characters are realistic conveying an overall inspirational message of the perseverance of individuals.

G.    Representation: Different characters were represented in different ways in this movie.  The men were represented as chauvinistic and controlling and the women were represented as sad and hard-working.  Furthermore, the poor class was represented as hard workers struggling to make a living and the rich were portrayed as powerful and greedy.  I think the characters are represented in this way because that’s how the main character saw the world and that’s the way people in her life acted.  The different representations of different groups of people were based off of the main character’s own life experiences.

H.    Ideology: This movie really challenged the false idea that men and women are not equal and spoke towards the importance of equality between men and women.