So, we’ll start with a little writing to get us thinking.

Period 1:  Do you agree/disagree with the following quote.  Explain with examples from your own life or from examples in history, literature, pop culture, etc. 200 words or so.

If it keeps up, man will atrophy all his limbs but the push-button finger.  ~Frank Lloyd Wright

Period 5: Read the following poem and comment on the degree to which you think society causes people to be all the same.  Do you feel that pressure?  If so, describe a time when that happened. If not, describe a time when you were able to resist pressure to conform.  Quote at least once from the poem in your writing. 200 words or so.

Then, we’ll take the quiz. Good luck.

Finally, we’ll have groups work together to create their own dystopias and present them to the rest of the class.

Image Credit: glinkster.com Godzilla vs King Kong

HW: Read F451 pages 71-91 or Anthem 68-80.

Period 1:

Let’s try and get up and move around or at least stand. We’ll push the desks back and play Fortunately, Unfortunately and also Fractured Fairy Tales.  In FFT, you take a well known tale and change the ending.  The trick is to change it to something that is surprising, but plausible. Here are the fairy tales:

1. Cinderella
2. The Boy Who Cried Wolf
3. Snow White
4. The Emperor’s New Clothes
5. Jack and the Beanstalk
6. Goldilocks and the 3 bears
7. Rumpelstiltskin
8. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice

Next, we’ll get to F451. We just read pages 14-40 and I’ll give you five excepts to paraphrase and connect to larger ideas.

• Page 20 “She’s didn’t look up…” (1 paragraph)
• Page 26-27 “It doesn’t like me” to “…Reacted toward me.”
• Page 29 “Oh, they don’t miss me.” (1 paragraph).
• Page 34 “That’s rich!…” to “Benjamin Franklin.”
• Page 39-40 “You can stop counting…” to “People ran out of houses all down the street.”

Then, I want us to have a larger discussion about technology and society. Please take the following survey and we’ll discuss the results. If we have time, I’d like us to write a bit in reaction to the following quote:

If it keeps up, man will atrophy all his limbs but the push-button finger.  ~Frank Lloyd Wright

Finally, we’ll get a head start on the reading.  Read pages 41-68 by next Tuesday and we’ll have a quiz over section 1.

Period 5:

Let’s try and get up and move around or at least stand. We’ll push the desks back and play Fortunately, Unfortunately and also Fractured Fairy Tales.  In FFT, you take a well known tale and change the ending.  The trick is to change it to something that is surprising, but plausible. Here are the fairy tales:

1. Cinderella
2. The Boy Who Cried Wolf
3. Snow White
4. The Emperor’s New Clothes
5. Jack and the Beanstalk
6. Goldilocks and the 3 bears
7. Rumpelstiltskin
8. The Sorcerer’s Apprentice

Then, I’ll read you a poem by W.H. Auden called The Unknown Citizen and ask you–individually–to write a first response to the poem.  Describe “The Unknown Citizen.”  What was he like? How does the text of the poem differ from the attitude of the poet?  What is the poem trying to get at concerning the life of The Unknown Citizen? Then, we’ll do a little work with Anthem. In small groups, paraphrase the following excerpts and connect it to larger issues and themes you think the author is trying to talk about.

• Page 31 From “International 4-8818 stepped…” to “We shall go, none the less.”
• Page 36 From “We have stolen manuscripts…” to “…clearer than rock crystal.”
• Page 41 From “We do not think…” to “…we do not like to think.”
• Page 47-48 “We do not wish to look” (one paragraph)
• Pages 50-51 From “As the chains…” to the end of the section.

If we have time, we’ll get a head start with the reading.  Pages 52-67. Quiz on Tuesday. Image Credit: Mike Lockett.com The Three Bears

We’re ready to get started with our first books.

Period 1

Let’s start with some class policy debates. In small groups, I’ll give you a short list of policies that I’d like your input on.  You’ll talk, write a bit, and then, we’ll discuss.

Next, we’ll get blogs set up (crossing fingers).  I’ll explain how.

Then, questions from F451.  Do them in groups, one copy per 4 desk group.

1. What is Montag doing at the beginning of the novel? How does he feel about it?
2. Why does the girl Montag meet upset him? What does she ask him and how does that challenge him?
3. How is life in Montag’s house very different from that of Clarisse’s house?
4. What do we learn about what a fireman is and why they have the job they do?
5. Re-read the paragraph on page 9 starting “I sometimes think…” What is she describing about how people live in that time?  What do you think the author is saying about the danger that technology holds over people?
6. What’s wrong with Montag’s wife and what happens just as he finds out?  Why did the author choose to have that happen?
7. What do we know so far about the world of F451?  How does it differ from our own?

After we get a chance to hash through those questions, we’ll talk about what’s going on in the novel and what Bradbury is trying to accomplish early in the novel.

Then, I want to talk a bit about the 6 word story. Here are some examples from Wired Magazine. I’ll give you 10 minutes to come up with 3 of your own. Then, individually, I want you to take one 6 word story and expand it into 3 paragraphs in a blog post.

Finally, we’ll read a bit in class and talk a bit about what’s going on.

HW: Read pages 14-40 (…People ran out of houses all down the street.”)

Period 5

Let’s start with some class policy debates. In small groups, I’ll give you a short list of policies that I’d like your input on.  You’ll talk, write a bit, and then, we’ll discuss.

Now, questions from Anthem:

1. Why does Equality 7-25 say that “It is a sin to write this.” What is wrong with writing?
2. How are people raised in this society? Where do they spend childhood?
3. Why wasn’t Equality happy in school? Why do you think the schools are made this way?
4. How do people choose their jobs in this society?
5. What does Equality want to be, but what does he have to be instead?
6. What does it mean to be guilty of the Transgression of Preference?
7. Re-read the paragraph on page 23 “All the great modern inventions…” and explain what it literally means and then what you think the author is trying to say to the reader about the society she is describing.

After we get a chance to hash through those questions, we’ll talk about what’s going on in the novel and what Bradbury is trying to accomplish early in the novel.

Then, I want to talk a bit about the 6 word story. Here are some examples from Wired Magazine. I’ll give you 10 minutes to come up with 3 of your own. Then, individually, I want you to take one 6 word story and expand it into 3 paragraphs.

Finally, we’ll read a bit in class and talk a bit about what’s going on.

HW: Read pages 26-51 (finish I and read all of II)

We’ll try and give blogs a chance (like the song)…and then…

We’ll talk about how to tell a story. We’ll talk about what makes a good story and what was good–structurally–about the Sedaris story.  Then, I’ll ask you to edit your story to make it stronger and post it. Think set up, crisis point, complications, resolution.

Next, we’ll get books.  Period 2 will get Fahrenheit 451 and Period 6 will get Anthem.

We’ll read a bit in class and then for homework…

Period 2:  Read pages 3-14 in F451 (ending in “lips go moving and moving.”

Period 6: Read pages 17-26 in Anthem (ending in “cold blue glass buttons.”)