English Confronting Modernity: Becoming Citizens of the World: Discussion and Inquiry

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Discussion and Inquiry

Goals:
1. Speaking about reading
a. building off the ideas of other
b. textual support of claims
c. use of topic-specific vocabulary
2. Inquiry/Research

1. Today, we will do a fishbowl to discuss the study guide questions from chapter 1 of Tree Girl. The "fishbowl." The “fishbowl” is a teaching strategy that helps students practice being contributors and listeners in a discussion. Students ask questions, present opinions, and share information when they sit in the “fishbowl” circle, while students on the outside of the circle listen carefully to the ideas presented and pay attention to process. Then the roles reverse. This strategy is especially useful when you want to make sure all students participate in the discussion, when you want to help students reflect on what a “good discussion” looks like, and when you need a structure for discussing controversial or difficult topics.

The discussions went well today. Something interesting that came up when we talked about the protagonist's ethnicity was that students wanted to name her "Hispanic."

Q. What is Gabi's enthnicity?
S1: Hispanic
Teacher: No, let's go to the text. What does Gabi say.
S1: Oh, she is Maya. Isn't she also Hispanic.
S2: Wait, didn't the Spanish invade that part of the world? So...
Teacher: Right, so what does it mean if Gabi is not Hispanic and does speak Spanish. How is that possible if it is a Spanish speaking country?
S1: And this book is set in the 1980s? And they still don't speak Spanish?

As you can see this was a great development in the discussion. Students were putting some of the pieces together (e.g. Guatemala is not in Mexico).

2. Chapter 1 of Tree Girl lends itself to doing inquiry. We learn about Maya clothing, language, life, traditions and get a hint of the war. Today, students will do an open inquiry -- no notes yet, just an exploration of a variety of topics on which they will later do a multigenre project.

· Ancient Maya

· Spanish Conquistadors and Maya Survival

· Famous Mayans who Changed the World

· Music of the Maya

· Stories of the Maya

· Government of Guatemala

· Farming of Guatemala – Maya corn versus the Big business of coffee and bananas

· Weaving

· Languages and Cultures of the Maya

· Religions and Sprititual Ceremonies of the Maya

· Maya foods

· Education of the Maya

Here is a picture book, Hands of the Maya, that provides a nice overview of Mayan life. Students will see that their lives require cooperation. Is this democratic living? What can they teach us about living with others?

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Re-imagining the English Classroom

This unit is an example of what English teachers can do to explore global issues of social justice through reading and writing. This is specifically designed using eighth grade Common Core Standards, but the units are appropriate for middle through high school students. The essential question that began this blog is this: How have the Maya responded to signs of change, and what can the Maya teach us about tradition, cooperation, and democracy? However, it expanded to other units that also seek to find the lessons of modernity -- or the belief that knowledge, the economy, technology and even our selves are capable of never-ending improvement. That said, our work is to uncover the darker side of such progress, which is also complex and shows how we are implicated in the lives of people all over the world. The format of these units is mostly inquiry-based, but we hold onto the core of our discipline, which is narrative. History is a narrative just as stories are, so we need to see any story as having gaps that prompt questions and further inquiry.

For the Maya unit, students will learn about cooperation through inquiry by beginning with a central text, developing comprehension and literary analysis skills while reading the central text, and then filling in the narrative gaps with additional inquiry researching a variety of genres. The summative assessment will enact this principle by presenting their research through multiple genres and then sharing their findings in a oral presentation and gallery walk. I try variations of this with each unit.

1. Thus, the first learning goal is to understand that knowledge is constructed by and through multiple sources. For this reason, we will do fishbowl and socratic seminars throughout the 3 weeks . The summative writing and speaking assessment is a multigenre project (see Romano’s Blending Genre, Altering Style or many websites) that synthesizes various sources to answer our essential question using multiple genres. Students are free to select from a variety of topics.

2. The second goal is to consider what different genres do to help us understand Maya experiences; thus, students will be able to examine the structure, authorial language, and authenticity of historical fiction and testimonio and to analyze what impact each has on the reader’s experience.In reading various texts, students will practice comprehension skills, identify and analyze literary devices, and trace the theme of cooperation. The summative reading assessment is a written assessment about figurative language, vocabulary in context, dialogue, and genre.

3.The third goal is to enact inclusivity, participation and critical engagement -- pillars of thick democracy. The texts in this unit captures the resilience of people and the value of cooperation. By focusing on Maya genocide of the early 1980s and exploring their culture, American students can learn the true meaning of cooperation and gain a greater sense of democratic living while also celebrating the resilience of a people. We will see how the Maya maintain their cultural foundation while making modern adaptation.

The novel, Tree Girl, is the central text, so the study guide here follows this book chapter by chapter indicating places for additional inquiry. Students will do inquiry during workshop time and keep notes in their research journals. The testimonio of I, Rigoberta Menchu, and numerous documentary and other media resources capture the social structures that created oppression in Guatemala and the mechanisms people used to resist and maintain traditions such as coops for farming and weaving and integrating Catholicism with indigenous religion. The two books are also a source of comparison as we think about how we learn about history.

As we see in Grandin's book, "Repression severed alliances between reforming elites and popular classes, disaggregated powerful collective movements into individual survival strategies, extracted leaders from their communities, and redefined the relationship between human beings and society" (196). However, individuals, especially activists like Rigoberta Menchu, while extracted did not remain isolated. Out of such manifestations grew a new way of thinking that resisted oppression –granito de arena. This metaphor for cooperation is a powerful message for any democratic society and is particularly relevant for developing classroom ethos. Guatemala advanced democracy not through autonomy or isolated freedom but rather a "collective action laid bare the social foundations of self" (181). This, I think, is what is worth knowing and teaching in our schools; this notion of democracy is worth contemplating, and so this unit attempts to explore these notions by using stories as points of access for these young thinkers.

Ganito de arena – a humble phrase that says “ I alone can’t change things. But I can HELP to change things." It’s a collective concept of change! It signifies a process that change can take many forms. It comes through struggle that unites collective rights and individual rights. What I give is only a tiny contribution (as with all the people we will meet in this unit). There are no heroes, but when the hand of destiny touches you, you have to act – you don’t have a choice.

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Tuesday, September 18, 2012

Discussion and Inquiry

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