(no subject)
I've gotten into a comment discussion with someone on the internet, and I tell you what, I forgot how delightful it is to make friends on the internet.
I used to do it all the time (Celeste, Crow, Mew (still facebook friends with him), Lissa, Cat, Bon-Bon, Ree, Claudia, Nami, GhostofBambi), but it's been close to a decade since the last time I bothered interacting with a stranger on the internet. I didn't mean to start; she left a comment, I responded, and before I knew it we struck up a back-and-forth over the characters of Thor. It's fun; she said something I was unsure about, so I had to track down a copy of Thor to watch so I could verify her claims (she made a good point), and that launched us into a deeper discussion about character motivations.
It's fun analyzing the little things about a character. This discussion with this girl is a lot like the conversations I have with Wesley about the Wheel of Time. I like to be deeply involved in the things I care about, and am always down for a good discussion with someone who also loves the subject material (or, let's be honest, someone who will sit still for 20 minutes and let me prattle on about it (thank you Jennifer, Melinda, Johanna, Lary, and Erica)). Wheel of Time may have been completed some five years ago (WHAT), but Wesley and I still have regular discussions about characters, motivations, predictions, what-happens-nexts, and events from the books. I love it. Talking about literature or movies/shows this way encourages a deeper look at the source material, looking for nuances and subtleties you missed the first time around.
I wish I had more freedom in the literacy curriculum I teach, instead of being forced to follow a basal program with sometimes lackluster literature. I read a play with my students last week adapted from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and then we had a brilliant discussion about what it means to be a monster and whether or not Frankenstein's creature qualifies as a monster. My students were thinking deeply, and when they brought up a point they couldn't quite verify, they ran to the text to back up their theories. It was brilliant. I had my wee little 10-year-olds thinking deeply and discussing issues we normally don't address because our basal is so...dull. Then we capped it all off with a clip from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, because think what you will about that movie, that music is brilliant.
I want more literacy lessons like that, but when I am constrained by the basal I teach and the District tests handed down by the powers on high, there is only so much I can do.
Johanna and I used to dream about starting our own school. We'd only allow in teachers we like, she'd handle the PR front and I'd handle the crap out of organization, and we'd get to teach things we actually want to teach using resources that are actually enjoyable and not forced upon us because someone in the state legislature is in the pocket of a particular curriculum/program company. Fifth grade literacy would be completely integrated with US history (we did that one year, and it was the best literacy/social studies year we had. Plus a Native parent personally thanked me for respectfully including Native American history and not downplaying the terrible things that happened to them OR the terrible things they did), actual books could be used to teach comprehension skills, and science would be fun again. Oh, and fun wouldn't be illegal, like it is everywhere else in the education system.
Obviously never going to happen, because she abandoned me to be Maria von Trapp, and I hate people too much to want to interact with parents (THEY ARE THE WORST), but I still sometimes like to dream about being allowed to teach literacy with actual literature.
Sometimes I want to be a mom just so I can raise kids to read the books I want, and then train them to dissect and discuss them at great length. And then we get to have the fun fights! My favorite fight I ever had was with Eliza over who was better, Sirius Black or James Potter (James, obviously ^_~). I need more fights like that in my life.
In the meantime, at least there's the internet, where I can find random strangers who also care about the things I care about.
I used to do it all the time (Celeste, Crow, Mew (still facebook friends with him), Lissa, Cat, Bon-Bon, Ree, Claudia, Nami, GhostofBambi), but it's been close to a decade since the last time I bothered interacting with a stranger on the internet. I didn't mean to start; she left a comment, I responded, and before I knew it we struck up a back-and-forth over the characters of Thor. It's fun; she said something I was unsure about, so I had to track down a copy of Thor to watch so I could verify her claims (she made a good point), and that launched us into a deeper discussion about character motivations.
It's fun analyzing the little things about a character. This discussion with this girl is a lot like the conversations I have with Wesley about the Wheel of Time. I like to be deeply involved in the things I care about, and am always down for a good discussion with someone who also loves the subject material (or, let's be honest, someone who will sit still for 20 minutes and let me prattle on about it (thank you Jennifer, Melinda, Johanna, Lary, and Erica)). Wheel of Time may have been completed some five years ago (WHAT), but Wesley and I still have regular discussions about characters, motivations, predictions, what-happens-nexts, and events from the books. I love it. Talking about literature or movies/shows this way encourages a deeper look at the source material, looking for nuances and subtleties you missed the first time around.
I wish I had more freedom in the literacy curriculum I teach, instead of being forced to follow a basal program with sometimes lackluster literature. I read a play with my students last week adapted from Mary Shelley's Frankenstein, and then we had a brilliant discussion about what it means to be a monster and whether or not Frankenstein's creature qualifies as a monster. My students were thinking deeply, and when they brought up a point they couldn't quite verify, they ran to the text to back up their theories. It was brilliant. I had my wee little 10-year-olds thinking deeply and discussing issues we normally don't address because our basal is so...dull. Then we capped it all off with a clip from The Hunchback of Notre Dame, because think what you will about that movie, that music is brilliant.
I want more literacy lessons like that, but when I am constrained by the basal I teach and the District tests handed down by the powers on high, there is only so much I can do.
Johanna and I used to dream about starting our own school. We'd only allow in teachers we like, she'd handle the PR front and I'd handle the crap out of organization, and we'd get to teach things we actually want to teach using resources that are actually enjoyable and not forced upon us because someone in the state legislature is in the pocket of a particular curriculum/program company. Fifth grade literacy would be completely integrated with US history (we did that one year, and it was the best literacy/social studies year we had. Plus a Native parent personally thanked me for respectfully including Native American history and not downplaying the terrible things that happened to them OR the terrible things they did), actual books could be used to teach comprehension skills, and science would be fun again. Oh, and fun wouldn't be illegal, like it is everywhere else in the education system.
Obviously never going to happen, because she abandoned me to be Maria von Trapp, and I hate people too much to want to interact with parents (THEY ARE THE WORST), but I still sometimes like to dream about being allowed to teach literacy with actual literature.
Sometimes I want to be a mom just so I can raise kids to read the books I want, and then train them to dissect and discuss them at great length. And then we get to have the fun fights! My favorite fight I ever had was with Eliza over who was better, Sirius Black or James Potter (James, obviously ^_~). I need more fights like that in my life.
In the meantime, at least there's the internet, where I can find random strangers who also care about the things I care about.