So last Friday you all got copies of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz to read. I know some of you have read it before (zillions of times in some cases, I gather), but some of you have never read it before. Enjoy it! If you know it very well, just skim it. But be sure to have fun with it. And be sure to fill up your little booklet. Something for each chapter, please. It can be a quote you like, a response you write, or a sketch you draw. Again, have fun!
As and after you read, you are going to watch a docudrama about L. Frank Baum and the writing of the book, the MGM movie, and some other stuff as well. Along the way I hope you write some fantastic blog posts!
So follow that Yellow Brick Road!
Published on
April 21, 2008 in
Pilgrims.
Welcome back! I know that you saw a lot and learned even more about the lives of Pilgrims on your recent trip to Plimoth Plantation.
Let’s make a list of the various aspects of Pilgrim life that you studied and experienced during your visit:
- Pilgrim meal (manners, utensils, food)
- Activities (games, writing with a quill, clothing, mystery home)
- Native American Home (several homes, hides, children, canoe)
- Mayflower II
- Fort and canons
- Graveyard
- Village doctor
- Main Street
- Build/plaster a house
- Worked in fields
- Craft center (making a sail, glazing pottery)
- Gardens
- Brewster and the firewood
- Alice Bradford cooking
- and much more!
While you were away, I listened to the descriptions of your pilgrim characters. Many of your characters left family behind. Knowing what you know now about life in a new settlement during the early 1600s, write a letter to those family members who did not travel on the Mayflower. Pick several of the topics we listed above and describe the living conditions in Plimoth. How does your character overcome the challenges of life in a new settlement?
Be sure to practice using some that Pilgrim vocabulary, too!
Things to keep in mind as you write your next post:
Scenes
Why did you decide to do one part of a chapter and not another? Go back and look at your favorite illustrator —all them had to make choices about what to illustrate. For example, John Tenniel doesn’t show her with the long neck in the clouds — maybe he thought it was too weird. But others do illustrate that part of the story.
Scripts
Write about revision. You must have shortened your scripts. I know (because I’ve worked with some of you) that you’ve had to make chances so that they worked better as comics. Some of you are updating things in the script, for example. How about Dinah coming down the rabbit hole in one case? (rc, is that yours by any chance?:)
Illustrations
Write about your characters. Some of you are doing some interesting things with the way you are illustrating — write about that! (Cheshire Cat as a rapper, for example.)
Published on
April 10, 2008 in
Pilgrims.
Over the last couple of days Edinger House students have been creating characters who might have (but didn’t because they are made-up) traveled on the Mayflower. Listen to them describe these characters:
Okay, ready for your second post? If you need a reminder about what to do, go here.
Last Friday we began reading Mourt’s Relation, one of the first and most important primary sources about the Pilgrims. We read a version that retained the original spelling and capitals and discovered that in 1622 (when it was published) there was no conventional spelling or use of capitals. They spelled anyway they wanted (and so we have Plimoth, Plymouth, and Plymoth) and used capitals anyway they wanted as well. Here’s the page we “translated” and annotated. (Pardon for the messiness, but I was unable to calibrate the Smartboard for some weird reason.)
Today each of you is going to illustrate a small section of this journal. I will give you Pilgrim Voices, a book where the creators have carefully combined parts of Mourt’s Relation and On Plymouth Plantation (William Bradford’s memoirs and the other major source about the Pilgrims) and illustrated it beautifully, They researched the illustrations from primary sources and so you can use them as secondary sources for your own.
Each of you will be given one quote to illustrate. Be sure to write the quote on the drawing and where it is from. For example:
“… there was the greatest store of fowle we euer saw.” (Mourt’s Relation)
You can also see what some of last year’s house did here, here, here and here.
Once you have finished your drawing (and had it checked by me) please scan it and put it on your blog as did last year’s students. (You should know how to do this, but if you forgot go here for reminders.)
I’ve marked the different sections (badly, using the Smartboard pen:). Each section is numbered, but below the images I will give an easier-to-read quote for each.
Here are the sections (but they are from a version with the corrected spelling/capitals so use the one we annotated so you can get that old spelling!)
- Wednesday, the sixth of September, the winds coming east north east, a fine small gale, we loosed from Plymouth, having been kindly entertained and courteously used by divers friends there dwelling.
- and after many difficulties in boisterous storms,
- by God’s providence, upon the ninth of November following, by break of the day we espied land which was deemed to be Cape Cod, and so afterward it proved.
- And the appearance of it much comforted us, especially seeing so goodly a land, and wooded to the brink of the sea.
- It caused us to rejoice together, and praise God that had given us once again to see land.
- And thus we made our course south south west, purposing to go to a river ten leagues to the south of the Cape
- but at night the wind being contrary, we put round again for the bay of Cape Cod; and upon the 11th of November we came to an anchor
- the bay, which is a good harbor and pleasant bay, circled round, except in the entrance which is about four miles over from land to land,
- compassed about to the very sea with oaks, pines, juniper, sassafras, and other sweet wood
- it is a harbor wherein a thousand sail of ships may safely ride
- there we relieved ourselves with wood and water, and refreshed our people
- our shallop was fitted to coast the bay, to search for a habitation
- there was the greatest store of fowl that ever we saw
- And every day we saw whales playing hard by us, of which in that place, if we had instruments and means to take them, we might have made a very rich return, which to our great grief we wanted.
- For cod we assayed, but found none, there is good store, no doubt, in their season.
- Neither got we any fish all the time we lay there, but some few little ones on the shore.
- We found great mussels, and very fat and full of sea-pearl, but we could not eat them, for they made us all sick that did eat, as well sailors as passengers; they caused to cast and scour, but they were soon well again.
- The bay is so round and circling, that before we could come to anchor we went round all the points of the compass. We could not come near the shore by three quarters of an English mile, because of shallow water, which was a great prejudice to us, for our people going on shore were forced to wade a bow shot or two in going a-land, which caused many to get colds and coughs, for it was nigh times freezing cold weather.
- This day before we came to harbor, observing some not well affected to unity and concord, but gave some appearance of faction, it was thought good there should be an association and agreement that we should combine together in one body, and to submit to such government and governors as we should by common consent agree to make and choose
From Ms. Younge:
Here is a GREAT website for you to check out at home. You can tour the Mayflower, compare the daily lives of the Pilgrims and Wampanoag, and watch a slide show on the Thanksgiving Feast. It has lots of great pictures and a Thanksgiving Web Quest quiz. Enjoy!
Starting today you are going to do a series of posts called “All About Alice” in which you will document your work with Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Bloggers do this often. These are sort of like columns in magazines or newspapers. Sometimes a blogger will do this weekly so yours will be on Tuesday, right?Now let’s look at one of my series at my blog called “Teaching with Blogs.” After that you will be ready to begin your own series. (Later on you might want to even put in sketches, storyboards, and such to illustrate these posts. Hey — you might even want to do a little interview of your partner as a podcast!)Your first post should have the title, “All About Alice: What I Did First.”In the post I hope you will describe what we have done with Alice so far. To make that easier, let’s brainstorm together first.
What We Have Done With Alice’s Adventure’s in Wonderland
- Read the book (how did you read it? Ms. Edinger read it, looked at different illustrated versions each time).
- Watched videos about it and from its time (1900 House, Betty in Blunderland, The Young Visiters)
- Learned about Lewis Carroll
- Learned Alice Liddell
- We learned why he wrote the book
- Chose chapters today and began working with a partner on the start of a comic. (May want to explain what this is.)
Now go and write your post. Hopefully it will be thorough so that I am inspired to write about this on my blog and people will then come to see yours!
Okay, folks, you did a great job yesterday reading and (in most cases) annotating the first section of the packet with Ms. Stokien.
(Here is what last year’s class did to remind you.)
Now you need to do the rest in preparation for our Pilgrim Jeopardy game (which we will do as soon as you are all done!).
Here are your group assignments.
Group 1: c16hh, c16ts, c16as1 (blue cards)
Group 2: c16rc, c16km, c16sh (yellow cards)
Group 3: c16cl, c16mm, c16tf (purple cards)
Group 4: c16cw, c16tb, c16rb (green cards)
Group 5: c16uw, c16ac, c16sb (pink cards)
Group 6: c16kd, c16tk, c16sh1 (white cards)
As a group:
1. Go through your section and read it carefully (annotate and underline as necessary) and be sure EVERYONE in your group understands the whole section. If you are doing this during Lab and some of your group members are missing, go ahead and do it on your own and then go back over it with your group members when they are available. You must ALL be experts on your section for the game.
2. Once you’ve finished reading, as a group, come up with AT LEAST SIX good questions and answers from your section (and write them down on scrap paper).
Ex. (From first section Ms. Stokien did with you);
Question: What was the third religious group to form (in England) and what was their main goal?
Answer: The Puritans/Separatists who wanted a more “pure” form of religion.
3. Check your questions/answers with Ms. Stokien or Ms. Edinger.
4. Write each question on a card (question on one side and answer on the other).
5. Decide on point value for each question. (Hard, Medium, Easy).
As an individual:
Carefully read the rest of the packet so you know it and can play the Jeopardy Game. You may get questions from other sections than your own.
