Leigh83's Weblog

Words, Words, Words

leigh83 — Tue, 20 Nov 2007 19:40:30 +0000

Annotation:

This assignment will use the animated short film “Solo” as a starting point for persuasive essays for an 11th grade English class. The smart board will be used to show the clip and essays will be typed. Students will confer with both the teacher and their peers at some point before turning the essay in. The essays will focus on the importance of language or images, or any other implications they find in the short film (class discussion 10-15 minutes).

Video:

Solo

Directors: Ricardo Moyano, Maria Calatayuel, Ysabel Castro

Procedures:

Students are shown the video and asked to jot down their initial questions and thoughts. They group into threes to discuss their thoughts on the short film while they are asked to focus on anything significant as well as what the possible message may be (5-10 minutes).

Afterward, the instructor leads a class discussion making sure to cover the following questions as well as any others:

1. What might the piece say about artists or people in general?

2. Why do you think the creator chose not to use words?

3. Would you have liked the film better with words? If they were French?

Hopefully the video will lead to discussion on cross cultural concepts, the power of image, audience, and the difference between message, language, image, and words. It will be interesting to note for students that the comments made on youtube to this particular video are in several different languages including French, English and Spanish. Other possible discussion topics are author’s intention and title (10-20 minutes for discussion).

Students are asked to draft a three to five page, double spaced persuasive essay that addresses any of the questions above or any other questions the video brought up for them. They may pull from other souces if they choose. They may write from any point of view and should engage the guidelines for good persuasive rhetoric (as outlined previously). They will be given time at the end of class to brainstorm and outline their paper (15 minutes).

Students are given a grading rhuberic, and the drafts are due for peer evaluation in two days. That day will be a workshop for peer evaluation. Students must have their papers read by three classmates. This will also be a time for the instructor to work with students on the content of the papers. The second half of the 55 minute period will be spent in the computer lab for work on editing and revision. The final draft of the paper will be due on the following class meeting.

Grading Ruberic for Persuasive Essays:

In-Class Time Management 10 pts.

Use of at least 3 rhetorical divices 25 pts.

Strong thesis and argument 25 pts.

Grammer/ Structure 15 pts.

Required length (3-5 pages) 15 pts.

Works Cited 10 pts.

Total Possible Points 100

Extension:

Students may chose another film or other work of art or literature that takes a position similar to “Solo” or opposite it. They will argue which makes the better argument or is more effective.

Remediation:

Students may be given worksheets to fill in about the film. Each can address different aspects of the film: 1. The film credits are in French, but we can still understand what is going on. Why is this significant? 2. Does the film ending represent a cliche pertaining to artisits (hint: we are no more than the art we create)? 3. Does the film offer a moral to ordinary people (life is what we make of it)? 4. Does the film make an arguement about lonliness? What might be the significance of the title “Solo”?

Also, rhetorical elements may be reviewed more thoroughly from previous lessons.

Timeline:

Two 55 minute class periods will be given to this assignment. Students will be required to work outside of class in addition.

Primary Learning Outcome:

Students will exercise their knowledge of persuasive rhetoric. They will apply this to the given media and pull in outside sources as they see fit.

Assessed GPS:

ELA11W1 The student produces writing that establishes an appropriate organizational structure, sets a context and engages the reader, maintains a coherent focus throughout, and signals a satisfying closure. The student

a. Establishes a clear, distinctive, and coherent thesis or perspective and maintains a consistent tone and focus throughout.

b. Selects a focus, structure, and point of view relevant to the purpose, genre expectations, audience, length, and format requirements.

c. Constructs arguable topic sentences, when applicable, to guide unified paragraphs.

d. Uses precise language, action verbs, sensory details, appropriate modifiers, and active rather than passive voice.

e. Writes texts of a length appropriate to address the topic or tell the story.

f. Uses traditional structures for conveying information (i.e., chronological order, cause and effect, similarity and difference, and posing and answering a question).

g. Supports statements and claims with anecdotes, descriptions, facts and statistics, and specific examples.

Dr. Crovitz’s Article

leigh83 — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 15:51:03 +0000

I found Dr. Crovitz’s article Scrutinizing the Cybersell: Teen-Targeted Web Sites as Texts to give a great description of what our class is all about. All of the exercises we have done in familiarizing we’ve done with the read/write web will help us to understand what our youth is up against, in terms of advertising, in the sensory stimulating world of the web. The time a child might spend interacting with one of these sights is frightening. If we, as secondary English teachers, don’t help our kids siphon through tactics thesse sights are using who will? Hopefully the early grade teachers.

Dr. Crovitz raises a tricky question: “Do snack food companies have a responsibility to inform their customers, many of them children, about the nutritional value of their products?” (p. 53) I say yes. At the very least they should follow in the footsteps the tobacco industry was forced to make and have an emboldened space on the front of the package with a warning such as, “This product contains corrosive material”, Genetically Enhanced”, “High levels of pesticides”, or “Made from bugs”. At least we couldn’t warn us. Responsible adults can find this information out for ourselves, but if we don’t go through the trouble it’s easy to ignore.

I also agree with Killing’s statement on the use of revolution to sell products. There does seem to be a mockery of the idea of revolution in this country. Perhaps it is due to its commercialization, perhaps it is because our younger generations have been fortunate enough not to have faced the struggle of a big social change, perhaps both. The fact that advertisers are selling to the interactive web trend, I agree, creates new obligations. Through the web, they have so many more avenues to influence and impressionable youth. I definitly foresee lines being crossed, and the companies themselves should, at some point, be held accountable. Ultimately, the responsibility falls on parents and educators to pass the tools of critical analogy. To do so, we have to be critical ourselves. Good article.

Dr. Tim Tyson

leigh83 — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 15:45:17 +0000

Wow! What an inspiring video. It seems that all the students at Maybury Middle School needed was a little encouragement and support from the faculty to go above and beyond expectations. Dr. Tyson begins with an assertion that students need to teach and the principal needs to be able to learn. I was amazed by the creation of these students who were given an “international voice that matters”.

It is a very human emotion to desire to make a difference in the lives of others and in our world. It is amazing that when these kids recognized that they could be heard through the internet, this latest window to the outside world, they felt that they needed to say something important. The most rewarding part of wathching this video was the humanitarian efforts of these middle school children. The issues they dealt with in their movies, organ donation, genetically modified foods, child slave labor in the Ivory Coast of Africa, embryonic stem cell research and celebrating the great daily acheivements of people with disabilities, are gripping issues that adults struggle with.

Another thing that stands out about this video is the respect the kids have for the connection at their finger tips. One boy even said that the technology is a waste of money if you are using it to goof off. The intention is that the real purpose of the venue is in education, connection, change, and the like. By ignoring the web in schools, not only do we ignore the potential of our future generations, we endanger them (as well as ourselves) by withholding lessons of ethical responsibility and duty.

The Streaming Net

leigh83 — Sat, 15 Sep 2007 01:06:48 +0000

I have subscribed to some good blogs, but I’m still not getting the video. I definately want the video feature. Can somebody tell me where I can find the program that will convert the files for me? I know it was mentioned in class. Thanks-Leigh

Response to Neil Postman’s “The End of Education” Ch. 1 & 2

leigh83 — Thu, 30 Aug 2007 15:58:21 +0000

In reading the first couple of chapters of Neil Postman’s “The End of Education”, I found I found plenty of the material to be agreeable enough. I’m interested to hear his views on technology and education in chapter three. He is right in his statement that America, collectively, has no myth, no story that links us to a higher power. The stories that children bring from home disappear when they walk into school, as schools fail to nurture these individual differences. Of course, no child should be made to pray to a god who is not there own. Still, schools should not be a sterile place where faith and religion is taboo. It puts a stamp on so many opportunities for children to develop a better understanding of their friends and peers as well as themselves.

I don’t know quite where Postman is going with this thought, but I disagree with his statement on page 10 that: “the technology-god speaks only of power”. Everything that man creates can be used for a variety of purposes: some good, some bad. Who knew when the television was invented that years later Christopher Whittle (p. 35) would use them to pump our children full of consumerism while they sat in their public school-rooms. How can we teach the dangers of technology and consumerism, if we have exposed our students to them that very morning? Perhaps the school systems, parents and media should have gotten together and pressed Mr. Whittle for a donation of his resources.

Wikipedia

leigh83 — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 20:49:29 +0000

Ok, I’ll admit it. I’ve used Wikipedia lots over the past year to get background information for my literature classes, but I did not know that it could be added to and edited by anyone (gasp, it’s true). It must be cool for these Wikipedians to contribute to such a hudge online database. Personally, I’d have to really want to make a contribution to force myself through all the tildes and brackets that are involved in editing one of these articles.

This may be stretching it, but the Wikipedia link I would like to include goes to the page on Ben Harper. I could include a book author, but songwriters are certainly poets themselves. As far as Ben Harper goes, I recognize the beauty and artistic endeavor in his work more than many others. The site is nice because it shows the success of his albums. I’m happy for his success in Europe, and I’m glad to know that the new album comes out next week. I wouldn’t have otherwise been aware.

leigh83 — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 19:35:50 +0000

leigh83 — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 19:34:27 +0000

leigh83 — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 19:27:41 +0000

New Blog Links

leigh83 — Wed, 22 Aug 2007 19:16:28 +0000

I have come across a couple of blogging links that I fing to be both useful and insightful. Blogging Pedagogy is a blog by the University of Texas at Austin Computer Writing and Research Lab. It’s current and holds an interest in the evolution of technology and the classroom.

The English Blog by Jeffrey Hill is fabulous! He posts links to helpful sites as he finds them. There is nothing chatty about this blog. For each post there is information about the site and the link to it.