Synthesizing the Layers: January 31, 2017

Focus: How do the layers of this project work together?

Shortened Class: Tribe/PLC

1. Warming up with Grammar Quiz #4: Modifiers

2. Taking a close look at how the layers of our original commercial example works:

• What visual patterns can you find among the photos when we watch it without sound?

• What is the poem about? Where does it shift?

• How do the layers work together to create something greater than the parts? In other words, how do the photos enhance the poem, or how does the poem enhance the photos, and how does the music tie in?

3. Working on your Harlem Renaissance Little Projects with a focus on synthesizing the layers to create something greater than the parts

4. If needed, perusing the rubric once again on your own to make sure you understand the expectations

HW:
1. Continue working on any parts of your project that need to be done outside of school. Projects are due at the beginning of class this Friday; late projects will lose points in Academic Character Habits.

2. HARLEM RENAISSANCE LITTLE PROJECTS DUE AT THE BEGINNING OF CLASS THIS FRIDAY. THEY MUST BE PUBLISHED TO YOUR PERSONAL BLOGS BEFORE CLASS.

Refining Your Theme: January 30, 2017

Focus: How can I refine my theme to fortify my personal connection to the Harlem Renaissance?

1. Warming up with a quick refresher on Grammar You Must Know #4: Modifiers

2. Perusing the rubric together

3. Setting goals and refining your theme: What complex ideas do you want your classmates to understand better or differently from your project?

Rough theme: Hope is important.

Refined theme: Genuine hope arises from a place of desperation and is the only way to claw yourself out of that dark place.

• I want the tone of my project to be...

• I want the class to understand that this is my theme:

• The title of my project will be..

• By Friday, here are the tasks I need to accomplish to make sure my tone and theme are clear:

• By the end of class today, here's what I will accomplish: 

4. Working on your Harlem Renaissance Little Projects

HW:
1. Continue working on any parts of your project that need to be done outside of school. Projects are due at the beginning of class this Friday; late projects will lose points in Academic Character Habits.

2. This Wednesday we will have an open-note quiz on Grammar You Must Know #4: Modifiers.

HARLEM RENAISSANCE LITTLE PROJECTS DUE AT THE BEGINNING OF CLASS THIS FRIDAY.

Fleeing from Terror: January 29, 2018

Focus: What was the role of lynchings in the Harlem Renaissance?

*If you still need to turn in your blue reflection sheet on Making a Way Out of No Way, please do so today.*

1. Warming up with three good things and updating your virtue charts (almost done)

2. Understanding what many Harlem Renaissance artists were fleeing from: Racial lynchings

• Listening to Billie Holiday sing "Strange Fruit" (1939); using the MMM approach to discuss it

• Click on this lynching map to get a sense of scope.

• Click HERE to hear people's stories.

• What does this make you understand better or differently about the Harlem Renaissance?

3. Working on your Harlem Renaissance Little Project; please make sure your project plan is complete, as I will be walking around and conferencing with you on them today

HW:
1. Continue working on any parts of your project that need to be done outside of school. Projects are due at the beginning of class this Friday; late projects will lose points in Academic Character Habits.

2. This Wednesday we will have an open-note quiz on Grammar You Must Know #4: Modifiers.

HARLEM RENAISSANCE LITTLE PROJECTS DUE AT THE BEGINNING OF CLASS THIS FRIDAY.

Developing Your Theme: January 26, 2018

Focus: How can we develop our theme using different media?

Winter assembly: Shortened class

1. Warming up with your reflections on "Making a Way Out of No Way"

2. Using the checklist to figure out what aspects of your Harlem Renaissance Little Project you need to work on today

3. Working on your Harlem Renaissance Little Projects

HW: 
1. If you were unable to complete the reflection sheet, please watch the documentary over the weekend and complete your reflection sheet by Monday.

2. Complete what you need to get done for your Harlem Renaissance Little Project. They are due by the beginning of class on Friday, Feb 2; late projects will forfeit five points in your weekly "Academic Character Traits."

Discovering Your Theme: January 25, 2018

Focus: What's your theme?

1. Warming up with Grammar You Must Know #4: Modifiers

2. Understanding Langston Hughes' "Theme for English B"

3. Composing your own "Theme for English B" on your blogs; finishing yesterdays activity with gathering and reflecting upon at least three pieces of Harlem Renaissance art on your blog

4. Taking your theme and running with it: Working on your Renaissance Little Projects and developing a project plan

Click HERE for the project plan!


HW:
1. By Monday, finish your project plan. Renaissance Little Project due by February 2.

2. Next Wednesday: Short assessment on Grammar You Must Know #4: Modifiers

3. By TOMORROW, please watch the Harlem Renaissance documentary linked below. It will give you the background on the Harlem Renaissance that you need to succeed this week. You can start the documentary 15 minutes into it. 

*WARNING: If you choose to watch the first 15 minutes (not required), there are upsetting photographs of lynchings between minutes 5 and 7.*

Documentary link: Making a Way Out of No Way

On Friday, you will be asked to take about 15 minutes to fill out a reflection sheet on the documentary. It will be divided into Level 1, 2, and 3 thinking. As long as you watched the documentary, you will be just fine. No need to memorize anything.

Contemplating Your Theme: January 24, 2018

Focus: What's your theme, and how may art contribute to it?

1. Warming up with Vocabulary Quiz #1: Fences

2. Exploring the multidimensional message your poem might become!

Watching a commercial example.

• What's the first part of this poem/commercial about?
• What's the shift?
• What's the overall message, and how do the photos contribute to it?

Perusing the overview of this mini-project.

3. Investigating "Song of the Towers" by Aaron Douglas (my favorite) with an MMM approach and extra step: Which figure is you? Why?

Song of the Towers, by Aaron Douglas (1934)

4. Exploring other Harlem Renaissance artists you may wish to use in your Renaissance Little Project

Aaron Douglas
Jacob Lawrence
Palmer Hayden
Lois Mailou Jones

Your goal: Use your blog today to start collecting paintings that you might want to use in your Renaissance Little Project. Maybe they relate to the poem you wrote yesterday. Maybe they remind you of something we've watched/read/talked about this semester. Maybe you just like the look of it.

• Paste the paintings and their links into your blog. 

• Be sure to include their titles, artists, and if possible, dates.

• For at least THREE of the paintings, try an MMM approach (moments, movements, meanings). You can type this on your blog underneath the paintings.

• Click HERE for an example from last year.

5. Enjoying Grammar You Must Know, Lesson #4: Modifiers

HW:
1. By Friday, please watch the Harlem Renaissance documentary linked below. It will give you the background on the Harlem Renaissance that you need to succeed this week. You can start the documentary 15 minutes into it. 

*WARNING: If you choose to watch the first 15 minutes (not required), there are upsetting photographs of lynchings between minutes 5 and 7.*

Documentary link: Making a Way Out of No Way

On Friday, you will be asked to take about 15 minutes to fill out a reflection sheet on the documentary. It will be divided into Level 1, 2, and 3 thinking. As long as you watched the documentary, you will be just fine. No need to memorize anything.

2. We will have an open-note, open-friend "quiz" on modifiers next Wednesday, Jan 31.

3. Renaissance Little Projects due February 2.

What Will Your Verse Be? January 23, 2018

Focus: What will your verse be? 

1. Warming up by wrapping yesterday's Venn diagram and "What Will Your Verse Be"?

2. Contemplating other Whitman's Hughes' verses: "I Hear America Singing" and "I, Too" with the MMM approach

3. Composing your own response poem to "I, Too"

HW:
1. Please finish your response poem if you did not finish in class.

2. Keeping studying the Fences vocabulary on www.quizlet.com; assessment TOMORROW.

3. By Friday, please watch the Harlem Renaissance documentary linked below. It will give you the background on the Harlem Renaissance that you need to succeed this week. You can start the documentary 15 minutes into it. 

*WARNING: If you choose to watch the first 15 minutes (not required), there are upsetting photographs of lynchings between minutes 5 and 7.*

So you could watch about 15 minutes a night, you could watch it all in one gloriously informative off hour, or you could FLIP class--you can watch parts of the film in class and do the in-class stuff for homework. Do what works for you and your schedule.

Documentary link: Making a Way Out of No Way

On Friday, you will be asked to take about 15 minutes to fill out a reflection sheet on the documentary. It will be divided into Level 1, 2, and 3 thinking. As long as you watched the documentary, you will be just fine. No need to memorize anything.

Three Views on Social Power: January 22, 2018

Focus: At the turn of the 20th century, what were the different views on race and rising to power? 

1. Warming up with three good things and updating your virtue charts

2. Find someone who read the same speech/essay that you did last week (Booker T. Washington or W.E.B. DuBois) talk through it:

• Which parts did you understand? Explain them to each other.
• Which parts confused you? Form questions about them and talk through them.
• Which THREE lines were the most central to this text? Why?

3. Mental jousting with yesterday's speeches by Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois

• Find a partner who read the OTHER speech/essay (NOT the same one you did).

• We'll use mental jousting to teach each other the speeches and discuss them.

4. Becoming groups of three to synthesize the points of view of Washington, DuBois, and Hughes using a big Venn diagram (if you can do this well, we'll skip the reading quiz tomorrow)

5. Introducing your "Harlem Renaissance Mini Projects" and gathering a little background info

HW:
1. Continue looking through your Fences vocabulary on www.quizlet.com to prepare for a short quiz on Wednesday.

2. By Friday, please watch the Harlem Renaissance documentary linked below. It will give you the background on the Harlem Renaissance that you need to succeed this week. You can start the documentary 15 minutes into it. 

*WARNING: If you choose to watch the first 15 minutes (not required), there are upsetting photographs of lynchings between minutes 5 and 7.*

So you could watch about 15 minutes a night, you could watch it all in one gloriously informative off hour, or you could FLIP class--you can watch parts of the film in class and do the in-class stuff for homework. Do what works for you and your schedule.

Documentary link: Making a Way Out of No Way

On Friday, you will be asked to take about 15 minutes to fill out a reflection sheet on the documentary. It will be divided into Level 1, 2, and 3 thinking. As long as you watched the documentary, you will be just fine. No need to memorize anything.

How To Rise, Part 2: January 19, 2018

Focus: What is the best way to rise in social power?

1. Warming up by updating your virtue charts and meeting the Fences vocabulary on www.quizlet.com
(You shouldn't need to rejoin the class, but in case you do: https://quizlet.com/join/GmEMFkrpJ)

2. Find someone who read the same speech/essay that you did and talk through it:

• Which parts did you understand? Explain them to each other.
• Which parts confused you? Form questions about them and talk through them.
• Which THREE lines were the most central to this text? Why?

3. Mental jousting with yesterday's speeches by Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois

• Find a partner who read the OTHER speech/essay (not the same one you did).

• Become a group of four with a partnership who read the other speech; we'll use mental jousting to teach each other the speeches and discuss them.

4. Reading Langston Hughes' "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain" around the circle; making it personal with a little Friday Freewriting, Hughes-style.

Click HERE for the Friday Freewriting starters.


HW:
1. If you have not finished reading and marking up the Booker T. Washington piece or DuBois piece, please finish by Monday.

2. Peruse your Fences vocabulary once a day; we will have a short assessment on Wednesday.

3. Consider purchasing your own copy of the play, Fences.

How To Rise: January 18, 2018

Focus: What's the best way to rise up in social power?

1. Warming up with a quick recap of 1st Semester Grammar

2. Considering your own stances on rising up in social power

3. Reading Booker T. Washington and/or W.E.B. DuBois

• Before you read: Just looking at the titles, what do you predict Washington and DuBois are each going to argue? How will their arguments oppose each other?

• As you read, mark up any lines that respond to our focus question of the day: What's the best way to rise up in social power?

• Click HERE to listen to Washington deliver the "Atlanta Compromise."

• After you read, summarize Washington's or Dubois' argument in a single sentence. What's his purpose in writing this speech/essay?

4.  Find someone who read the same speech/essay that you did and talk through it:

• Which parts did you understand? Explain them to each other.
• Which parts confused you? Form questions about them and talk through them.
• Which THREE lines were the most central to this text? Why?

HW:
1. Make sure your packet (except for the very last essay) has been read and annotated;if you typed your Ethnic Notions reflection sheet, make sure it's in your shared folder. I'll hold mini-conferences with you next week on these.

2. If you were rusty on today's grammar review, look back through your old grammar lessons from first semester. This semester, we will build on the grammar you've already learned.

3. Consider purchasing your own copy of the play, Fences. Some people find it much easier to mark up their own copy than to keep separate notes.

Confronting Dangerous Stereotypes: January 17, 2018

Focus: What power do 19th century stereotypes hold?

(Shortened Class Period)

1. Warming up by testing your pre-existing background knowledge on 19th century stereotypes

• Turn to the Ethnic Notions reflection sheet on page 19 in your blue packet.

• Or, if you'd prefer to type, click here, make a copy, and save in your folder.

• What do you already know about these stereotypes?

2. Viewing an award-winning documentary and understanding the underlying dangers of black stereotypes

• Warning of graphic image 20 and 22 minutes in, after "offense to civilization" and watermelon images.

• Skip from 26 to 42 min.

3.  Discussing historical stereotypes in small groups/as a class (if time allows)


HW:
Finish responding to the questions at the bottom of your Ethnic Notions reflection sheet if yo did not finish in class.

If you're feeling stuck, here are some links that might help get you thinking:
Comments on Michelle Obama
2016 Prison Statistics
Aunt Jemima and other Commercial Objects
Little Black Sambo (look at what it's used for and the comments underneath)
Tom and Jerry cartoon and discussion of Amazon warning
Children's Songs with Racist Histories

The Myth of the Happy Slave: January 16, 2018

Focus: What is the power in telling your own story?

1. Warming up with three good things, a short reading quiz on the Jacobs narrative, and your first week of Academic Character Traits

2. Questioning the myth of the happy slave

The myth of the happy slave: 19th century and early 20th century images

• Make a copy of this and save it in your "Race and Power" folder.

• Look carefully at the depictions of slaves in these images. What details strike you?

• What story of slavery do these images tell, and how?

• Why do you think these images were so popular (well into the 20th century)?

• Open the slavery images from Wednesday. Flip back and forth between those images and these. What is problematic about the myth of the happy slave?

Frederick Douglass addresses the danger of the "happy slave" image

Children's book promotes the happy slave

3. Discussing "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" in grid groups (click HERE if you'd prefer to type)

Topic #1: Myth vs. Reality
Each member of the group picks one line from Harriet Jacobs' narrative that undercuts (exposes the falseness) of one of the images from the warm-up. Read the lines aloud, look at the images, and discuss what happens when the myth is partnered with the reality.

Topic #2: Your Questions
Pose a Level 1, 2, or 3 question about "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" to your group. Focus on the parts of the text you most wish to discuss.

Topic #3: The Power of Telling Your Own Story
Brainstorm as many reasons as you can as to why it was significant that Douglass and Jacobs told their own stories. What is the power of their particular narratives, and of all slave narratives?

4. Updating your virtue charts--how'd you do this week?

HW:
1. If you fell behind in the reading or rushed through it, please (re)read any pages from Douglass and Jacobs that you missed. After today, hopefully the importance of reading their narratives is beginning to sink in.

2. Take a look over last semester's grammar; we're going to do a little first semester review.

From Slave to Man: January 12, 2018

Focus: How does a person reclaim power?

1. Warming up with Academic Character reminders, updating your virtue chart, and your first Friday freewrite of 2018: MLK, Jr. and The Strength To Love

2. Exploring a painting by a different Douglas: "Into Bondage," by Aaron Douglas

*Make yourself a document for "In-class Thoughts" and place it inside your "Race and Power" folder.

Which part of the painting is your eye drawn to? In other words, what's the focal point? Why?

How would you describe the patterns of color in this painting?

If this painting tells a story, what's the story?

Describe one aspect of the painting you find symbolic and explain what you think it symbolizes.

Which figure in this painting best captures Frederick Douglass before his battle with Mr. Covey? How so? Find one line from Chapter 10 that shows your thinking here.

Which figure in this painting best captures Douglass after his battle with Mr. Covey? How so? Find one line from Chapter 10 that shows your thinking here (be ready to read your line out loud).

3. Understanding how Douglass empowered others: Check out what he did after he escaped!

History (video)

Bio (video)

Frederick Douglass Honor Society (website--scroll down a little)

4. Observing the life of a female slave: Reading Harriet Jacobs' "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" and marking up lines that reveal anything about power dynamics:

• How is Harriet (the narrator) disempowered? 
• Why is she disempowered?
• How are the master and mistress empowered? How are they disempowered?
• According to Jacobs, "Slavery is bad for men, but it is far more terrible for women." What do you think she means by this? How does her narrative compare to Douglass's?

HW:

Please finish reading and annotating Harriet Jacobs' "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl" by Tuesday. Since we're not keeping blogs or having graded discussions on these excerpts, you will have a short reading quiz on the Douglass and Jacobs narratives on Tuesday.

From Man to Slave: January 11, 2018

Focus: What does it take to disempower a human?

Please turn in your signed class policies.

1. Warming up with original excerpts from slaves, slave owners, 19th century documents, and historians (travelling groups of 3-4) with this reflection sheet

2. Following up with discussions of yesterday's images, today's quotations, and last night's Douglass reading:

• How were slaves physically disempowered?
• How were slaves socially disempowered?
• How were slaves mentally/emotionally disempowered?

• Tricky question: How did slavery also disempower slave masters? In other words, what did the practice of slavery take away from the slave owners? Take a look at Chapter 6 in Douglass.

3. Getting set up for Chapter 10 by exploring at least 4 definitions of the word "root"

4. Reading Chapter 10 together, marking up lines that reference...

• The root: Which definition best applies to the root's role in this chapter?
• Power lost and gained

5. Quick exit ticket: Completing the Thursday column of your virtue chart

HW:

If we did not finish reading and annotating Chapter 10 in Douglass, please finish it tonight.

Powerful Narratives of the Disempowered: January 10, 2018

Focus: What does it take to disempower a human?

1. Warming up with the Wednesday column of your virtue chart and a brief recap of yesterday's Empathy Quiz results :

• Consider adding an "empathy practice" to your virtue chart if you don't already have one, or use one to modify one of your virtue explanations).

• If you didn't get to read your "empathy quiz" results yesterday, have a look at "6 Habits of Highly Empathetic People."

2. Observing images of slavery

Inside your 2nd semester folder, make a folder that has the words "race" and "power" somewhere in the title.

Inside that folder, save the Google slide presentation above (images of slavery).

Peruse the images at your own speed. Underneath each one, make some notes on your specific observations of each image:

• What are you looking at in each one? What details strike you? What story is being told here?
• Which images surprise you/are new to you?
• What is your reaction to each one?
• What does each image reveal about the practice of slavery?
• What do the images reveal about specific ways in which slaves were disempowered?

3. Starting the first chapter of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass

• Mark up lines that connect to the images/quotations from today's class.

• Mark up lines that respond to our focus question: What does it take to disempower a human being?

• Mark up lines where you feel empathy for Douglass.

HW:
1. Signed class syllabus due tomorrow (Thursday, Jan 11).

2. Finish reading the Chapters 1 and 6 in Douglass (through page 5 in your packet) annotating for passages that reveal something about power, disempowerment, and/or hegemony in the practice of slavery.

Kicking off the New Year! January 9, 2018

Focus: Are you powerful? Are you empathetic?

1. Warming up with three good things (or more)

2. Enjoying a lightening round of "Yes, No, Maybe" with follow-up Grid Group discussions

• Topic #1: Which practices (from these slides) empower you and how?
• Topic #2: Which practices disempower you and how?
• Topic #3: How would you define "power"?

3. Witnessing Benjamin Franklin's attempt to find power in perfection: Rationalism and Franklin's 13 virtues

4. Setting up your own virtue charts, which you'll be keeping until January 31

• Set up a 2nd Semester folder inside your American Lit folder.

• Start a document called "Virtue Chart" and place it in your 2nd semester folder.

• Click here to check out mine (feel free to use it as a template if you wish).

• A few suggestions on your virtue charts:

• When choosing verbs, go with "I will..." (studies show this leads to greater success in attaining goals).
• Explain carefully what each goal personally means to you.
• Aim for goals that empower you.
• Be specific in your expectations; make them as measurable as you can.

5. Perusing the second semester syllabus and website

6. Considering empathy vs. sympathy

• Watch this short, animated video to start forming a definition of empathy. 

• Take this Berkley quiz to find out how empathetic you are and read the results.

• Use the results explanation from the quiz to add at least ONE GOAL to your "Virtue Chart"that involves practicing empathy.

HW:

1. Please have your parents/guardians sign the class syllabus. Due Thursday, Jan 11.

2. Consider purchasing your own copies of Fences (August Wilson) and The Great Gatsby (F. Scott Fitzgerald).