LEARNER. TEACHER. WRITER.
English 11: American Literature 2
Josh Matthewson (welder and all around artist), Jackson G., Daniel B., and Zach B./The Great Gatsby
Seth P./The Great Gatsby
Madilyn L./To Kill a Mockingbird
Josh Matthewson (welder and all around artist), Jackson G., Daniel B., and Zach B./The Great Gatsby
These are some of the creative final projects by former juniors.
English 11: American Literature 2 focuses on literature written after the Civil War. We start the year with pop culture and general analysis, and the students study how commercials, ads, music videos, art, locations, etc. form arguments and sell ideas. Students complete a Rhetoric of Place assignment, inspired by assignments I saw in Auburn's English Department, and write an essay analyzing a music video or commercial.
Later in the year, my students study The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller, and The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury.
In addition to these more traditional texts, I try to bring in films for the juniors to analyze. For instance, we have discussed how Zootopia comments on race relations and stereotypes and how The Truman Show comments on truth, religion, turning people and "reality" into commodities. They read scholarly articles about The Truman Show and presented the various arguments to the class. My hope is that they will begin analyzing movies and shows like we analyze books and that they will practice being active consumers.
When we study literature, my students sometimes draw symbols, represent scenes and symbols with play-doh, pretend to be various characters at a dinner party, and create lessons to lead the class based on a passage from a novel. My goal is to facilitate creativity and movement. They still answer in-depth questions about the texts we study, but I try to mix up the way we discuss the answers. Sometimes we even have reading days where students can bring blankets and pillows, and I provide hot chocolate, tea, and the sound of a crackling fire from YouTube. Overall, my hope is that we can create an open, comfortable environment for the students to share their ideas and focus on the text at hand.
At the end of each year, both my English 11 and English 12 students work on creative projects for their final. This means that they must reinterpret any of the texts we've studied throughout the year in a creative way. In addition, they must write a short reflective paper discussing how their project reflects the text and present their project to the class. I based this project on assignments by Dr. Anna Riehl Bertolet, an Associate Professor of English at Auburn University. You can learn more about Dr. Bertolet and her projects on her website and in her essay collection Creating the Pre-Modern in the Post-Modern Classroom, which is co-edited by Dr. Carole Levin. The students and I have loved ending the year with creative projects because it shows what they've learned, because they can utilize and enjoy their talents, and because it feels like a celebration. You can view some of their visual projects in the photo gallery above.