Opportunities for Character Building
Short Stories: "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson
Students analyze the consequences of following traditions blindly through Shirley Jackson's story.
Landscape with the Fall of Icarus by Pieter Bruegel
Where is Icarus?
Landscape with the Fall of Icarus
William Carlos Williams According to Brueghel when Icarus fell it was spring a farmer was ploughing his field the whole pageantry of the year was awake tingling with itself sweating in the sun that melted the wings' wax unsignificantly off the coast there was a splash quite unnoticed this was Icarus drowning |
Musee des Beaux Arts
W. H. Auden About suffering they were never wrong, The old Masters: how well they understood Its human position: how it takes place While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along; How, when the aged are reverently, passionately waiting For the miraculous birth, there always must be Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating On a pond at the edge of the wood: They never forgot That even the dreadful martyrdom must run its course Anyhow in a corner, some untidy spot Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse Scratches its innocent behind on a tree. In Breughel's Icarus, for instance: how everything turns away Quite leisurely from the disaster; the ploughman may Have heard the splash, the forsaken cry, But for him it was not an important failure; the sun shone As it had to on the white legs disappearing into the green Water, and the expensive delicate ship that must have seen Something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky, Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on. |
Instructions:
Part 1: Read the two poems above. How does the authors' viewpoints about "The Fall" differ?
Part 2: Brainstorm with your group. In life does our society sometimes look away from others being hurt or carry on with things because they are tradition?
(Include article on OSU marching band hazing from Columbus Dispatch)
Part 1: Read the two poems above. How does the authors' viewpoints about "The Fall" differ?
Part 2: Brainstorm with your group. In life does our society sometimes look away from others being hurt or carry on with things because they are tradition?
(Include article on OSU marching band hazing from Columbus Dispatch)
Persuasive Essay
Students choose from current controversial issues in society today and write a research-based piece to support their claim on the issue.
Of Mice and Men
Character Analysis of George. Was he a good person? Did he make the right choice in the end?
Rachel's Challenge: Start a Chain Reaction
Rachel's Challenge, a anti-bullying program led by the family members of a student killing in the Columbine shooting.