Sequence and Meaning - Jamaica Kincaid's "Girl"

Today we'll read "Girl," a short piece by Jamaica Kincaid.  Here is a link to a copy of it.

After we heard it out loud a few times, I asked you to select one of the phrases and do a little writing to explore what it means, either looking deeper into the actual meaning or thinking about what it is implying.

We made a list of the "voices" in the piece.  On one wall we listed all of the "things" present in the piece - people, food, objects, etc.  On the other wall we listed all of the "topics" the piece discusses - instructions it gives or issues it raises either implicitly or explicitly.

Then, you selected one of the "things" and wrote in the first person of that "thing" to explain one of the "topics."  So for example, the "flies" might explain "how to act in church" or "wharf rat boys" may explain "being independent."

Sequence - How the order of events shapes our understanding of them

Last week we did a few different activities to help us explore the idea of sequence and story.  We wrote our own stories and cut them into pieces to re-arrange.  We looked at the Justin Bieber - Anne Frank story that slowly revealed more information with each step and talked about how it shifted the focus of the story.  We read "An Occurrance at Owl Creek Bridge" and explored the way Ambrose Bierce changed the sequence of events to give his story power and mystery, and help us connect with the protagonist in deeper ways.

Today we will return to current events and look at the ways in which the media coverage of last week's bombing of the Boston Marathon played out.  In many ways it was rather controversial, from falsely reporting information to blaming innicent people to stirring up fears about people and parts of the population.

Here are links to a series of articles:

• MediaITE - "10 Absolute Worst Media Reactions"
• Huffington Post - "Media Criticize..."
• The New Yorker - "The Saudi Marathon Man"
• Salon.com - "Let's Hope..."
• Huffington Post - "Reddit Apologizes..."
• and here's a link to the Jon Stewart clip we watched

Using Setting to Understand Poetry

When we talk about setting, we can think in terms of some basic questions:
- where is the poem taking place?
- who are the people in the poem?
- when is the poem taking place?
- what is happening in the poem - event, occasion, etc.?

We can use these to help us answer two other questions we can ask about the poem:
- How is it creating meaning(s)?
- Why are the ideas and events in the poem there?
- What are the meaning(s) / message(s)?

We'll continue to use these four poems for our work.