I tried to make a catalogue of the various phenomena I experienced today as my students, your children, took their first Social Studies exam. I saw the smudged palms and bases of hands, and I saw many a hand go through “writer’s cramps.” I witnessed students visually drawing triangles in the air and trying to envision a particular thought. Naturally, I beheld the sight of panicked faces with eyes running across the pages, as if there were some magic answer at the bottom of the exam. Providing a vivid contrast to this would be the vision of faces with a high level of confidence within many a student. I saw students calibrating their watches to synchronize their time to the exam setting, and I watched my students, your children, focus with laserlike precision on this, their first exam. Whether students possessed icons of the Lord Ganesh or were actively marking off which identification topic they were going to complete, I sensed a strong level of commitment and focus towards this assessment.
I remember telling the students at both study sessions that while this exam might prove challenging, it will represent a small exertion in comparison to the work that lies ahead. Once exams are returned, we will commence our study of chapter 5, the road to revolution. While the key concept of chapter 4 was the emergence of colonial culture vis a vis the Enlightenment, the analysis of chapter 5 will revolve around one central idea: Midnight. The moment when the clock strikes is also when both hands meet for a instant, but their touch can last for what seems to be an eternity. Indeed, this becomes the metaphor for our analysis of the road to American Revolution. I borrowed this idea of midnight and its inevitability from Salman Rushdie’s work, Midnight’s Children. As the protagonist, Saleem Sinai, is born into a world of mystery and freedom, so to is the nation of India. This notion found much resonance in my mind as I was drawn to the paralell of individual psychology and national history. The pain and joy of love and politics seem to be united in one image: Midnight. When applying this same idea to America, I found much similarity. Midnight: The stroke of time when nations and people awake to freedom and life. Midnight: When our “trysts with destiny” are met with the redemption of a promise and pledge. Midnight: While the world sleeps, a nation and a people awake to life and freedom and the inevitability of both. Prime Minister Nehru’s words serve as the backdrop to Rushdie’s work, but can also be deftly applied to the study of the colonists’ struggle for freedom.
Midnight will become our central image, our metaphor through which we will examine the colonial struggle for freedom. Within this will be the study of inevitability and its role in the American historical dialectic and within the evolution of individuals. We begin our journey with an analysis of the French and Indian war, and then continue with our first presentation, Scholarly Sparknotes. In this project, a group of students are responsible for teaching a section of the text and reporting out to their colleagues. With this task, the belief of dependence meeting interdependence arrives in a more developed form. Naturally, in recognition of such a powerful and meaningful metaphor, it can be understood that our end of the unit assessment will be equally potent in magnitude. I can offer a hint: It is worth 300 points and in three parts. I am confident that while students worked well throughout chapters 3-1 and 4, they will be working much harder to find success in chapter 5, throughout the darkness and light inevitably linked to midnight.
I will be sending out conference confirmations with students/ parents/ guardians with whom I will be meeting soon. I will also be sending out Social Studies progress reports Friday, September 28, 2007. As always, if I can be of any further help or assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me via district email, or at my home, or through posting a response to this blog.
All best and happy hunting.
Mr. Kannan
I remember telling the students at both study sessions that while this exam might prove challenging, it will represent a small exertion in comparison to the work that lies ahead. Once exams are returned, we will commence our study of chapter 5, the road to revolution. While the key concept of chapter 4 was the emergence of colonial culture vis a vis the Enlightenment, the analysis of chapter 5 will revolve around one central idea: Midnight. The moment when the clock strikes is also when both hands meet for a instant, but their touch can last for what seems to be an eternity. Indeed, this becomes the metaphor for our analysis of the road to American Revolution. I borrowed this idea of midnight and its inevitability from Salman Rushdie’s work, Midnight’s Children. As the protagonist, Saleem Sinai, is born into a world of mystery and freedom, so to is the nation of India. This notion found much resonance in my mind as I was drawn to the paralell of individual psychology and national history. The pain and joy of love and politics seem to be united in one image: Midnight. When applying this same idea to America, I found much similarity. Midnight: The stroke of time when nations and people awake to freedom and life. Midnight: When our “trysts with destiny” are met with the redemption of a promise and pledge. Midnight: While the world sleeps, a nation and a people awake to life and freedom and the inevitability of both. Prime Minister Nehru’s words serve as the backdrop to Rushdie’s work, but can also be deftly applied to the study of the colonists’ struggle for freedom.
Midnight will become our central image, our metaphor through which we will examine the colonial struggle for freedom. Within this will be the study of inevitability and its role in the American historical dialectic and within the evolution of individuals. We begin our journey with an analysis of the French and Indian war, and then continue with our first presentation, Scholarly Sparknotes. In this project, a group of students are responsible for teaching a section of the text and reporting out to their colleagues. With this task, the belief of dependence meeting interdependence arrives in a more developed form. Naturally, in recognition of such a powerful and meaningful metaphor, it can be understood that our end of the unit assessment will be equally potent in magnitude. I can offer a hint: It is worth 300 points and in three parts. I am confident that while students worked well throughout chapters 3-1 and 4, they will be working much harder to find success in chapter 5, throughout the darkness and light inevitably linked to midnight.
I will be sending out conference confirmations with students/ parents/ guardians with whom I will be meeting soon. I will also be sending out Social Studies progress reports Friday, September 28, 2007. As always, if I can be of any further help or assistance, please do not hesitate to contact me via district email, or at my home, or through posting a response to this blog.
All best and happy hunting.
Mr. Kannan
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