Did you know the word conflict comes from the Latin words "struck together?" This image of being struck together reminds of a person trying to build a campfire in a wilderness with flint and steel. Like this guy: Basically, without friction, there is no fire. And without conflict, there is no story. Now that we are in the third fifth of your free choice novels, there should be multiple strands of conflict revealed. You will be analyzing one of them. You will locate a place in the text where the author is developing conflict. You will also need to identify what kind of conflict you've found. Probably, your conflict will be one of these four most common types:
Let's look at examples of these four types of conflict using music videos from the 90's. (Either the 90's were a particularly conflicted decade, or I just remember it like that because those were the years I was in middle school.) In our Curriculum TEAMS meeting of next week, we'll analyze one of these videos together. 1. Character versus CharacterBrandy versus Monica. 2. Character versus SocietyGwen Stephani versus the Patriarchy. 3. Character versus SelfJohn Michael Stipe versus his own Faith. 4. Character versus NatureFran Healy versus the Rain (and the Scottish Highlands). And there you have it, the 4 most common types of conflict. Less common (and not from the 90's) are the following two types of conflict: Character versus Supernatural (perhaps relevant for those of you reading vampire or fantasy stories) and Character versus Technology. Character versus SupernaturalMichael Jackson versus the Undead. Further back to 80's. Have you guys ever seen this before? The TikTok aficionados out there have something to learn from Michael's dance moves, as do we all. Watching this video is a cultural education in itself. Character versus TechnologyJanelle Monae versus the Androids. And now we're back in the 2000's. Janelle Monae: ALSO A GREAT DANCER, RIGHT? So much cultural commentary in this video, too. Hello again, students! I hope that you've been able to hit a kind of daily rhythm with your school week. Now that our lives aren't governed by the bells of Bellaire, we all have more freedom, which I hope you are enjoying, but a general routine during the day can be comforting and helpful. I like a lot of what this blog post has to say about school at home: create a routine, not a schedule; don't try to do every subject every day; and most of all follow your own inclinations. For me, a kind of routine has been shaping up during the school week, and even the weekends. Thanks to the mischief canine twins, Birdie and Bracken, I'm up at 7:00 every morning. That's 7 AM for those of you out there who seem to have turned into spontaneous night creatures now that you don't have physical school to tether you to daylight. In the time between making coffee and teaching, I work on my own schoolwork. Then teaching time, and in the afternoons I do my second round of homework: yoga homework for the yoga teacher training I started after I took a Character Strength Survey. Turns out my number one character strength is "Love of Learning." So, might as well learn some more stuff with my extra time. So why think so much about time? And space? Because next up, we're analyzing setting in your free choice novels. Thinking about how time and space affects us is a bridge to thinking about how time and space affects the character development or plot of your free choice novels. No story takes place in a vacuum, and the setting is vital for all stories. For example, in We Were Liars, the majority of the action takes place on a small island off the coast of Massachusetts in the summer. An island is a very particular world with very real boundaries. That means there's nowhere to run, and the setting becomes instrumental in bringing the main character to face a buried truth of her past. As you look for quotes to use for setting dialectical journals, keep the following tip from this website in mind: Examine the details. Pay close attention to detailed descriptions of the setting, such as weather, the natural surroundings or the inside of a house or room. These details provide clues as to the emotional condition of the characters. I'll end this post with a video of a beautiful setting, one we would have visited together through Othello had school not been cancelled. During the first "essential" TEAMS meeting of next week, April 26th or 27th, we'll look at this video together and brainstorm some ways that this particular setting could affect plot and character. Hello, class! I have said this several times already in TEAMS meetings, but just in case you haven't heard it yet: I am REALLY enjoying reading your structured journals! We should have done this a long time ago. I'm learning about all kinds of different things through your interests: different musicians and types of anime. It's great stuff! Keep it up. I thought about your journals when I saw this article in the New York Times: "Why You Should Start a Coronavirus Diary." We're one step ahead of course, but I still found the article to be really interesting, especially the section "Know Your Story Has Value." Just in case you need to hear this: it's true. Your story and your thoughts have value. So do your images. They help illustrate your point-of-view. Check out this other story in the New York Times to see what I mean. On Wednesday April 22, your first Round Two Free Choice Dialectical Journal (DJ for short) is due. You'll be analyzing characterization. Just as a review, remember that authors use a variety of ways to craft believable characters. Sometimes, authors directly tell us who the characters are by using descriptive adjectives. For example, in We Were Liars, a book by E. Lockhard that I just finished reading with my book club, the main character Cady says, "I used to be strong, but now I'm weak." These descriptions are examples of direct characterization. Authors also use indirect characterization by revealing a character to the reader through that character's words, thoughts, dialogue, actions, and physical description. For this assignment, please focus on an example of indirect characterization. We'll be talking some more about characterization during our first TEAMS meeting of next week. About the TEAMS meeting: I HAVE AN ANNOUNCEMENT. Which will also be explained on your agenda for next week. The first TEAMS meeting will be "required:" I'll have essential information (like characterization info) to help you succeed on your free choice DJs. The second TEAMS meeting of the week (Thursday or Friday depending on your class) will be an optional question and answer session, only necessary for students who need some extra guidance. Thank you for reading to the end of the post. Your reward for sticking with me is the following very strange and joyous hand-drawn animation of a Japanese lady dancing all over town. Hello, students! As promised, this blog post is an example text of what I expect from your structured journals. Remember, the two requirements are 1) 250 words and 2) an image that relates to your words in some way. You have freedom when it comes to the format: you can handwrite, type, or create blog posts. You also have freedom when it comes to subject matter: you can write about anything at all on your mind, as long as you remember that this particular journal is public, not private. You will have at least one reader (me). I will post my word counts after each section of text so that you can mark my progress. And now, let the structured journaling begin! I’ve been paying a lot of attention to plants these days, especially blooming ones. Since my husband and I have started planning our meals (more or less) weeks in advance, the only time I leave my apartment these days is to take the pups on walks. Bracken prefers short walks: go outside, get done what needs to get done, and he’s ready for a snuggle and a nap again. And maybe an afternoon snack. Birdie is an adventuress. She loves going further afield, smelling new smells, giving the squirrels a run for their money. Between you and me, I don’t think she’ll ever catch one, at least not unless she figures out a way to seriously improve her technique. She hunts squirrels and I hunt flowers. I don’t know the name of this purple flower, but it is familiar to me. It grew in the wild area beside the gray house I grew up in Mississippi. In the spring, I would pick handfuls of these. I only found one or two blossoms on my walk, but in my memory of my childhood home, we had fields. I remember them as blooming after the dogwood. First the dogwood tree bloomed, then the grape hyacinths, then these flowers. As a kid I always called them bluebells. But surely they are purple. Maybe lavender. (221 words) Today I noticed the lantana blooming. There is an order here, but I don't know how to calculate and quantify it. Maybe some mathematical equation of growing beauty, like the golden ratio. The tiny blossoms seem to reveal themselves in a pattern: first a ring of yellow and white blossoms pop out one by one, then an outer band of pink blossoms. Eventually all the middle buds will pop out into flowers. (72 words) And...that's it. I wrote a total 293 words. If you like, you can also write over the word limit. I hope I showed you that you can literally write about anything at all. If the idea of writing about ANYTHING gives you anxiety instead of a sense of freedom, here is a list of simple journal prompts you can use to jump start your writing,
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AuthorI'm a Houston high school teacher in the Spring of 2020. Welcome to my adapted, socially-distanced, quarantined English II classroom. Archives
May 2020
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