Orange: Prompts/quotations to generate discussion
Yellow: Students? verbal responses to prompt in seminar
Dark Blue: Students? individual written responses to seminar
Green: Students? individual reflections on the seminar process
Light Blue: Teacher reflections of the seminar
The following are four quotes and documentation of some of the student responses to these quotes:
?Bigotry tries to keep truth in its hand with a grip that kills it.? ? Rabindranath Tagore
Whites keep the truth how they want it. Tom?s innocence in the trial is the truth, but the writes manipulated it the way they wanted it to be.
A mockingbird is the truth, and you can say bigotry tries to keep the bird in its hand with a grip that kills it.
In the trial when Tom says he feels sorry for Mayella, that is the only reason why he got killed. Racism kills the truth.
Boo?s parents keep him inside the house because they don?t want him to see the outside world. Theya re not ashamed of him, but rather they don?t want him to see the cruelties of Maycomb.
Bob Ewell is just trapped in the cycle of racism.
?There are two ways of spreading light: to be the candle of the mirror that reflects it.? - Edith Warton
Tom is the candle ? the townspeople are the mirror.
Tom is the match tat lights the candle, and Atticus is the candle.
The light from the candle does not always have to be good.
?When the power of love overcomes the love of power the world will know peace? ? Jimi Handrix
If reminds me of The Outsiders ? having the ability to love and care for things is gold. But then once you get hard, like Dally, you are incapable of loving things because you almost forget how.
The jury loves the power so much that it overcomes their reason.
?A man who won?t die for something isn?t fit to live.? ? Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Tom is like the blacks fighting for freedom in the civil rights movement ? he sacrifices his life for freedom.
Tom just ran because he was human (didn?t sacrifice himself)
Tom is like the panther ? caught in a cage and tortured.
Does this quote mean that Mr. Ewell isn't fit to live?
It isn?t Bob Ewell?s fault, he was brought up that way.
I agree with what Asha said. She thought the truth was Tom?s innocence in the trial. She thought the jury turned it around. This all makes sense to me.
Many people talked about how people are often stuck in their ways and are unwilling or even scared to change their ways. I can connect this to the cycle of racism ? people are unwilling to change their way of life. Even if they start to doubt what they?re doing, they won?t change? Atticus used every tool available to free men to save Tom Robinson. But in the secret court of men?s hearts Atticus had no case.
I learned from what Dylan said that maybe Boo Radley is a child at heart, and his father was protecting him from the outside.
I agree that the injustice tries to take control of the gold/truth/mockingbird. In denying them freedom, it slowly kills it. It is not the injustice itself that kills it, but the pain of the barrier between it and the world ? the jail, the panther?s cage, etc.
?She said you can?t judge people until you see them and know them for yourself? When you are presented with the truth, the plain facts about someone, you can see them without assuming things about them? This is the gold that Scout has that forces Mr. Cunningham to see himself in the mob.
I wonder what Bob Ewell was like as a kid.
Alison furthered my thinking on how Mr. Ewell could have changed the way he lived, but didn?t choose to.
I disagree that it isn?t bob Ewell?s fault for the bad things he?s doing. He is responsible for his actions. He is the one who drinks and beats Mayella.
I agree, Choice is hard to do. Mr. Ewell couldn?t pull himself away because he wasn?t strong enough. It?s like with women, they had the choice to keep being under men, they fought, they were strong.
If dying for something you believe in makes you fit to live, are terrorists fit to live?
I DISAGREE that Tom Robinson is sacrificing himself by running out of the jail. I think that the fact that he ran away doesn?t have anything to do with the quote by MLK. When MLK says that, he is referring to a cause, something he wants to make change in annd is passionate about? When Tom ran he ran from himself, because he wanted to escape himself?
I agree that Tom Robinson is like the panther. I disagree that Tom Robinson?s death didn?t make a difference. I think it did.
I agree with Dylan and Nick about how Tom is the match tht starts the candle, which is Atticus. Then I started thinking if they are that, then I think Scout and Jem reflect it.
I disagree with (I forget who said it) the reflection of the candle can be bad?
I disagree with Jad when he said that the candle and the mirror represent a crowd? Tom Robinson was more of a match to help light Atticus? flame against racism.
The town was not the mirror! When you reflect light, you make more of it, not put it out.
Norah and Jacob have made me think that there is not only the candle and the mirror, but the wick and the flame?
Something that really opened my eyes? Someone said that ?a dream deferred? was connected to ?I have a dream?? I never thought about them being the same dream.
There was an eagerness to participate that made the seminar work. People were looking out for each other.
I could have done better because I contributed to the stalling of the whole group. I had some trouble saying what I wanted to say a couple of times (trying to get the right words).
I did well because I shared out a lot this time.
The only thing our group didn?t do well was taking turns in sharing. A lot of people were really waiting and it was hard trying to make sure everyone got equal air-time.
There were good thoughts and were connections to oter things like music, poetry, book texts, civil rights history.
We did not do well time-wise. You think you have enough time so you talk thinking others will too, but you run out and some people don?t get a chance to talk. I need to work on not talking as much as I did. I tended to be really chatty toward the end.
In the beginning of the year I was proud of myself if I spoke once in a text seminar. This seminar I said so much that I was disappointed that I didn?t get time to say everything. Next time I want to get everything out. I want to say things that will really change or further the conversation, or make people really think.
We all had deep ideas and tried hard to build off of one another.
We did well by asking a lot of questions. Some were meant to move us away from a topic when we got stuck. Some of them helped us to go deeper into an area. We also used many pieces of evidence.
The first group started real well, but then they lost it and decided to have a facilitator.
The group really dove deep into issues like Bob Ewell Vs. Martin Luther King. However, we repeated a lot of comments.
The second seminar group built off of our seminar thoughts. But they started by getting stuck on one idea, like us.
I think I really learned from other people. I am thinking about humanity and how there are so many perspectives. Also, how much power we can have and how fragile a person can be.
Kids give each other credit for insights ? they quote each other as authorities I am struck with how enthusiastic they are to participate. They really come alive when they are asked to be ?in charge? of their learning.
I notice that ideas first expressed in the discussion are often extended of elaborated when listeners reflect in writing.
I notice lots of productive, interesting disagreements. I think that students (especially middle-schoolers) feel more comfortable disagreeing with each other than with teachers.
It really is amazing to see how far they have come in this process through the year. In the beginning, students would get stuck on a topic or run out of things to say. At these points they would always look to me to ?save? them. Now, they are reliant on one another. My presence in the room is less valuable to them than their comments to one another.
When students disagree, they argue rather than contradict one another. For example, ?When you reflect light? ? backs up a position and explains why. When another student says, ?Tom Robinson was more of? ? he/she is using the first idea and sharpening it.
Every once in a while we have a ?bad? seminar. Students argue without listening, they do not use direct textual evidence, some dominate, others are silent. It is vital to ask students to reflect on the group process and their individual contributions. Later, we may read from some of these reflections to improve our next seminar. Kids are often the ones who come up with new ideas to improve the next discussion.
It?s great to see the conversation about Bob Ewell leading in different directions, particularly when it leads kids to wonder, ?What was he like as a kid??
I notice kids helping one another to extend the metaphor of candle/mirror (even to the point of absurdity!). This is a good example of kids scaffolding critical thinking for each other. It?s not so important to nail down ?what it means,? but it?s fun to speculate on what it might mean.
In the very beginning of the seminar one student asked, do we want a facilitator? They all looked around the circle and listened and decided as a group. This small moment confronts the stereotype that middle school students are not respectful, mature, or appropriately responsive to each other. I don?t care if they have a facilitator or not. I do care that they can function as a group without my management.
