Response

You have good insight about the biguns and the litttlusns and the literal level and the mental level. I am glad that you were enjoyuing your group. Now in your writing can you also bring in quotes to back up what you are saying to support your points and you also want to try adn make connections to help develop and add insight. You are on teh right path.

Mind-maping Lord of the Flies (Summative Choice)

On the last class of this past week we had a lesson based on the concept of creating mind maps: a visual aid to organize your idea. The class was planned in a way that all the groups had the chance to contribute with what they knew about the theme. One of the groups went a little further and their members were asked to complete the gaps that were left, including one example of a well done mind map by Jenessa, who showed us how the use of different colors and shapes can go a long way on getting your attention to what's important and keep you focused on the main idea. After our usual 15 minutes for silent reading the discussion in our 'Lit Circle' tried to follow the organization of a mind map: we decided that the topics were Darkness & Evil and kept going deeper in them and how they relate to the beast on the island of Lord of the Flies. We ended up deciding that the night period had a lot to do with the kids fears, as in the dark it's hard to tell what is real and what is imagination. We also came up with the conclusion that although the "littluns" started the stories about the beast, the "biguns" had fears of their own, the main difference is that out of pride and shame they kept it to themselves ("But that's littlun's talk. We'll get that straight. So the last part, the bit we can all talk about, is kind of deciding on the fear." - P. 88), while the "littluns" weren't old enough to understand the deceiving game that was going on in the fight for power and therefore could speak sincerely of what bothered them: "He wants to know what you're going to do about the snake-thing" - P. 34. In our quest to understand how the beast might actually be the darkness in all of us ("You knew, didn't you? I'm part of you? Close, close, close! I'm the reason why it's no go? Why things are what they are?" said by the Lord of the Flies on p. 158) , we started having fun with our discussion, but we were interrupted and told that we were "having too much fun" with our assignment and that kind of killed the whole moment, I hope that won't happen in the future, because I believe that our conversation was much richer when every member of the group was actually having a good time and willing to give their opinions and speak without being recriminated. If our discussions can ever go back to being as lively as they were seconds before this unfortunate event I think we will all get new ideas to reflect on and add to our own opinions of the book so far. Furthermore we can already see connections between this book and the television series 'Lost', where a group of people also survived a plane crash in a desert island, where soon enough the fear of an unknown beast and the rivalry between two leaders (one of which is called Jack in the series) starts to be motive for aggression and division inside the group. Although this two creations are material for interesting comparisons, the most important comparison is between the book and the darkness in ourselves. Because who among us can answer without a doubt that we would never hurt someone or do immoral things if our own lives or the ones that we love were at stake? None; at least not without being big fat hypocrites.

response

You have come to truly understand teh difference of denotation adn connotation. Now how do you think this is going to help you understand your text as you work through your novel. Have you encountered blood in you novel so far? what for m was it in? try and bring in more examples to go deeper into the layers of the novel as you look into the layers of the word and why the author chose to use that word.

Also as you write your response tell me about you and your group and yoru participation in it. I am looking to see how involved you are and your growth as well. Are you contributing to the discussion, how so etc. Overall a good explanation of your coming to terms aboout the terms.

Denotation & Connotation

This past week we spent some time working in our Lit Circles, reading our books and finding connections with evil and darkness, which is what we've been working with for a couple of months now. That, however, was not all we've learned. We have also worked with denotation and connotation, seeing not only the meanings of these words but also comparing examples and coming to our own conclusions. In order to remember what denotation means, you can observe that it starts with a "d", same letter that starts the word dictionary. So the denotation of a word is its actual meaning, the description we could find for the word in an official dictionary. The connotation leaves part of the reason behind and is the meaning for the word that you can find in between the lines, it's what the word brings to us when we read it in a context, based in our culture and emotions. One example could be the word "Blood". Its denotation is: "the red liquid that is sent around the body by the heart, and carries oxygen and important substances to organs and tissue, and removes waste products" (By Cambridge Dictionary: http://dictionary.cambridge.org/dictionary/british/blood_1). But when we look at this same word, it may also bring us a sense of danger, pain, and violence that is not contained in the "official" description, but we were taught to know because of our experiences and reflections.

please add

HI,
Could you please add to your write up what you presented in class. You needed to include that piece as well.
thanks,
Mrs. C

Response

How true that we do need a balance. Unfortunatley that is what are society since the beginning of time has created the need for. That is all we know. We have never known a society that is all pure. It is something sometimes that one would like as an ideal do you not think.
You have raised many good points in your reflection. Can you think of any specific examples to further develop your writing next time?

Why is there darkness in humanity?

If you really think about this question you will see that it is open to many interpretations, we could simply say that it doesn't have a reason to exist, it just does and it's impossible to imagine humanity without it, but that would be way to easy and not such a satisfactory answer. So we can go deeper in the many concepts that can be represented by the word darkness and come up with something a little more creative. Darkness can be found in humanity to make everything that is good, actually feel good. If life was a series of endless happy events, people would never appreciate when something great happened, because they just wouldn't have anything else to compare the feeling with, making it less intense and not as interesting. So you could say that humanity needs a balance, in order for us to understand the state of happiness there must be something that we can experience and see as the complete opposite of it, in order for us to understand what we want, we need to understand the alternatives and decide that we don't want them. To sum up, darkness is present in humanity, because not only the positive things, but also the negative are necessary for us to become who we are and feel alive.