Ideas for the essay on identity inspired by Zitkala – Sa ‘s essay from the School Days of an Indian Girl
Class 1
Motivational writing:
1. Point – of – View - introduce the term and ask students to define what it means to them and how POV is used in writing. This definition will reinforce students understanding of a literary term and also reinforce the theme of the course finding your own voice i.e. coming to your own understanding of things and generating your understanding of things such as literary terms.
2. Once students have established the meaning of the term ask them to consider how writers use POV and to give a concrete example of POV from a text they have read.
3. Once this discussion has been completed ask students to consider an aspect of their identity that has not been understood by someone from their family, school, society or a specific institution. Ask students to consider why the misunderstanding arose – was the other party missing information? If so, what was the missing information? Was their communication that needed to take place and did not occur? Why did this communication not occur? Was there a cultural gap? Generational gap? Class gap? Why did this gap exist?
4. Ask students to choose one of the examples that is most memorable or had the greatest impact on them from # 3 (in case they generated more than one instance). Ask students to consider the POV of the other person who did not understand them and to consider from that person’s POV why the misunderstanding occurred. Students should give very careful consideration to the possible reasons why this other person or institution misunderstood them and ask them to try to avoid letting their personal feelings about the situation influence the other’s POV. Ask students to become observers of the situation and to try to maintain objectivity so as to convey clearly this other person’s or institution’s POV. Have a brief discussion with them of how to accomplish objectivity – be an observer, make no judgments, simply document what occurred, how this person was influenced to have this POV. Discuss Language choices with them – would this person or institution use the same language as they do? How would it differ? Ask them to try to use the language the “other” would use to convey their POV more accurately.
5. Give students 25 minutes to complete the writing. Ask them to keep writing as a means of generating as much material as possible. Give them artistic license – allow students to use dialogue, description, and definition – as long as the focus remains on the other person’s or institution’s POV.
6. Have students share their responses. When having a shared reading all students should participate. This participation encourages community and also encourages students who might not feel like their ideas are “good” to share and validate their experience, their ideas, and encourage them to be active members of the class.
7. Once students have shared their responses, ask them to discuss how it felt to express this other person’s or institution’s POV and exclude their own?
8. As the concluding exercise of the class, ask students to write a response to the other’s POV. Give students 25 minutes. The response should express the student’s understanding of the situation and the impact it had on their identity. How did they feel? How did they respond? Did they react against the situation or shut down? Did they feel violated? Cheated? Misunderstood? Were they content with their response or angered by not responding? Once the 25 minutes have passed conclude the class and ask students to bring this writing with them to the next session.
HW: Assign students to read Prentice Hall section 6 A - Writing Paragraphs and complete exercise 6.1 and 6.2 (discussion is on the topic sentences, its purpose and placement within the paragraph)
Class 2
Students will continue their inquiry into a time or a situation when a person or institution misunderstood them. Students will move from thematic station to thematic station generating more writing and then following the writing by conversation with their classmates.
The stations will be set – up as follows:
1. There will be 3 stations replicated – one group will be designated A and the other will be designated B. This set – up is designed simply to keep the group sizes to 3 – 4 students depending on class size.
2. Each station will have one of the thematic ideas listed below on construction paper with the following questions: (15 -20 minutes to respond)
A. How does this idea relate to your own situation?
B. Describe the idea in context to your situation – where were you?
What were others saying or doing? What were you thinking as the
event unfolded?
C. How did this aspect of the situation make you feel?
D. How did you react to this idea?
E. How did you find resolution?
3. Go around – question and answer (15 – 20minutes to complete)
A. Ask students to take turns sharing their responses in turn and once
each student has completed their portion allow group members to
ask the student questions
4. Teacher Role: Teacher will be facilitator and listener. Once students have completed the writing, the teacher will circulate in groups and listen to student responses and participate in the question portion of the exercise once students have finished sharing. The teacher should move continuously from group to group to reinforce students remaining on task.
5. Thematic ideas:
Change - the expectation when we experience change and the reality of what we experience.
Difference – individual and societal reaction to difference and its acceptance of the difference or the individual’s acceptance of societies treatment of him or her.
Displacement – maintaining culture when you are removed from it and accepting new culture and finding a place within it.
6. Conclusion: Ask the class to come together as a whole and ask students questions: did you discover anything about the experience? Yourself? What caused the experience? How did it feel to share this experience? These ideas or discoveries with others? These questions will conclude the class and also allow students to reflect on the experience of searching into an experience and how it feels to make this experience public (to some degree, in this case, the classroom).
The exercise will take one and a half hours (completing each of the three stations). The first and second class will have allowed students to generate a significant amount of thought and prewriting for the cause and effect essay that they will eventually write. In the next class, the class will read Zitkala – Sa’s essay and discuss how her experience is similar to theirs and how she, as a writer, conveys her experience to the reader.
HW: Assign Prentice Hall 6B # 8 and 9 on definition and cause and effect respectively and ask students to write a paragraph related to their experience using one of each of these modes.
Class 3
Materials: copies of Zitkala – Sa’s essay The School Days of an Indian Girl
1. Read through the whole essay.
2. Read section by section and pause after each section to discuss the choices Sa makes in her essay – theme, language, situation, point – of – view and ask students to consider their own experiences they have been discussing and how her choices relate to the choices they have already made:
Section I:
Focus on the use of language, note several examples of instances where Sa uses language that is reflective of her culture. Example, 1 – Young Braves, 2, the Red Apple Country, Iron horse. Once the class has reread the first section, discuss what impact on the essay this choice of language has.
POV – Have students consider the various POV’s that are included in this section Sa’s as a little girl and her understanding of the other children’s and their mother’s POV
Reaction – what is Sa’s reaction to leaving her home and the treatment she faces as someone who is different? Misunderstood? Mistreated?
Sa’s Observations – how does she become an observer of a foreign land, even though she is from this place? How does she observe the people? The place?
Section II
Discuss the following issues while continuing to have a conversation about POV and use of language:
· Sa’s sense of place and belonging in this place when she is a stranger to it
· Her observations of her own people who have assimilated to this foreign place
· How Sa learns to know this place through observation
· How the foreign place violates culture because they do not understand it or honor it i.e. the cutting of the hair
Section VI
· Sa’s reflection on her experience and how this experience of leaving her home and in essence her culture allows her to connect with it and relish it more
Class 4 and 5
Cause and effect writing workshop
Students have generated a significant amount of information in the classes prior to the workshop and at this point they are left with organizing the information into an essay rather than beginning from scratch. Students should begin to make choices
1st Choice:
Will the opening be – Dialogue
Definition
Statement of Fact
Observation
Contrasting POV
Body – Choice of Detail – telling little, saying much