Writing Webquest

For today's post, follow the link below to a creative writing/creation webquest.

Start by clicking on the "Task" tab at the top of the screen and follow the instructions from there through the 2 processes to the conclusion at the end.

This is a creative writing exercise, so be expressive and use your imagination.
When your Powerpoint presentation is ready at the end of class let me know and I will come to collect it. Feel free to speak to me with any questions or concerns.

Webquest:
http://drb.lifestreamcenter.net/Lessons/ocean/index.htm

-Mr. Lambie

Rights Final Assignment

We've looked at rights very broadly the last few weeks, briefly exploring issues of refugees, child soldiers and poverty in general as seen in other parts of the world. Most recently we compared the Universal Declaration of Human Rights with Canada's Charter of Rights and freedoms to start thinking about rights closer to home. Through our responses we discussed the idea of how people in troubled situations share stories to build hope for a better world.

The idea of Human Rights was created to try and encourage people to actively make the world better than it is for all people.

In the spirit of all of those ideas, our final project in this exploration of rights and freedoms will ask you to look at your own communities.

As we saw early on, there are lots of bad things happening in the world all the time. It also became clear that a lot of people in our classes feel bad about those things, but don't really know what to do to help, and don't really feel all that connected to the issues.

The best problems/issues/ideas to work on are the ones that mean the most to you, and those are usually the ones that you see or are somehow a part of every day.

People in Canada have a lot of freedoms and privileges, but that does not mean that our lives feel magical and perfect, and it is hard to feel like helping someone we don't even know when there are things happening at home that take up more of your attention.

Your Final Assignment:

Inspired by the Aviva Community Fund, I want you to imagine that a charitable organization is offering to give money to community projects in our area. They want to give the money to specific projects, however, projects that support a community and its people. They will not support any projects that are illegal, or that remove rights from certain groups of people to give them to others

Building a better world doesn't just mean working in Africa or Haiti. There are things about our own communities that could be better. This is your chance to share your story and your ideas: start thinking about how a difference could be made.

Step one: Outline

1) What community do you feel most attached to? In this case I'm talking about a group of people, but also a place. Which out of your school, city, town, other, do you feel the strongest attachment to?

2) What do people in that community need to make their lives better? (What are you entitled to? What is your right?)

3) What do the people in that community want? (What privileges do you have? What privileges do you deserve?)

4) What project could help fill these needs and wants? (be specific, where do you think the money could do the most good?)

5) What are the most important details of this project if you want to get other people to support it?

Step Two:

Once this outline is complete, You will be asked to write a very brief (100 word) introduction to what your project plans to do for your chosen community. Try to use as much detail as possible in that 100 words.

Steps 1&2 will be due: Monday November 28, 2011

Step Three:

The Real Aviva Community fund is a competition; once all introductions and outlines have been submitted, they will be put on display in the classroom and the top six ideas will be chosen.

Step Four:

Each of those six top ideas will then create a powerpoint and oral presentation Illustrating why their idea is the one most deserving of winning the top prize.

Clearer instructions on steps three and four will be given at the start of next week

Comparing Rights Documents

For your post-response reading assignment, please consult the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms:

http://laws.justice.gc.ca/eng/Charter/page-1.html
(Note that there are 2 pages)

and the UDHR:
http://www.un.org/cyberschoolbus/humanrights/resources/plain.asp

The instructions on contrasting the two documents are on your handout.

Whereas the UDHR is a set of guidelines put together for the whole world by the UN, the CCRF is a measure of how those freedoms are granted in Canada. The two documents are different, and it is worth taking the time to examine how those difference effect our lives.

Wordplay

People have been playing with words and meaning for almost as long as there have been languages.
In any language you look at, you can find examples of wordplay taking place in various different ways.

At  http://www.fun-with-words.com/index.html all sorts of different kinds of wordplay have been collected together and explained, with examples.

For this blog post, look down the left side of the page and pick two kinds of wordplay you have never heard of, read about them, and write your own explanation of how each one works. Then write two examples for each (write your own, don't just steal an example from the site).

Video link: Invisible Children

The Following is a link to Invisible Children: Rough Cut, one of the video resources we looked at in class, and which you can use for your response.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3166797753930210643

Writer's Toolbox

On the following website is a magazine article full of resources to improve writing skills.

http://www.smashingmagazine.com/2009/06/28/50-free-resources-that-will-improve-your-writing-skills/

The article is broken up into 7 sections 

1. Grammar, Punctuation & co.
2. Common Mistakes and Problems
3. General Writing Skills
4. Practical Guides to Better Writing Skills
5. Copywriting Blogs
6. Tools
7. Further Resources

What I would like you to do is visit three sites/resources and look at what is available. Once you have looked at what the site has to offer, I would like you to post a comment below reviewing the site:

Tell me (and your fellow students)

1) What is the point of the site (what is it trying to help people with)?
2) How well does it do this job?
3) What sort of assignment or project might it be useful for?
4) Would you recommend it to others? (refer to your other points to say why)

PLEASE REMEMBER TO INCLUDE YOUR NAME IN YOUR POST

What to do?

While talking about rights in class, some students have turned to me and said things like "This is so depressing," or, "What is the point of this?"

I understand those perspectives. Sitting in our classroom looking at, reading about, and hearing about terrible things happening in other places can make a person feel sad and upset. Part of the point of this is to look at why you get those feelings from learning about world events.

Once you know something bad is going on, either close to home or far away,  you have two options. You can help, or you can hide.

As we've talked about, there are a lot of different bad things happening all over the world, all the time. It is hard not to want to hide from some of them; to pretend they don't exist. But hiding doesn't make them go away.

At the same time as all of the terrible events we've been hearing about, there are people out there in the world doing great and wonderful things to help every day. Take a look at some of the websites below and post a comment that gives an example of something that organization is doing to help people who are being denied their rights or freedoms. Some of the projects involve money, but many don't. Take the time to explore.

me to we

the love alliance
war child

save the children

postsecret

invisible children

free the children

http://can-you-solve-this.org/

The Free Child Project

http://feliciafollum.blogspot.com/2011/08/inspirational-social-justiceartist.html
**or name one you already know, which is not on this list**

Your comment should say: 

1. Which site you visited (try to pick ones you see others have not gone to yet). Make sure there is a link.
2. What project caught your eye (or what that organization does in general)
3. How you think this group is helping to empower people, and give them back their rights.

Response Assignment Instructions

Why Tyrants fear storytelling

“Stories are one way of sharing the belief that justice is imminent. And for such a belief, children, women and men will fight at a given moment with outstanding ferocity. This is why tyrants fear storytelling; all stories somehow refer to the story of their fall.”

Berger, John. “Hold Everything Dear: Dispatches on Survival and Resistance”. Briar Patch, March/April 2010, page 39.

Using the ideas we've looked at with regard to rights and freedom so far in class, we are going to be practicing our skill at writing responses. Your task is to respond to the quote above by making connections between the quote, the two videos watched in class, and the world.

As a guide, try to answer the question: Which video more clearly shows people telling stories to make the world a better place?

This response will be a work in progress as we continue our study of rights in English class, and you will be expected to show connections you see between class material and the issues discussed in today's videos.

Steps:

1)    Watch the two videos and record what you observe in column one of your "thinking about what I've read" sheet in note form

a.     Remember that an observation is leading you towards a theme, it can be something you hear, as well as something you see (as both videos are mainly men talking, it will be more important to look at what they are saying)

2)    Start to look for meaning in the ideas you observed; what is linking the ideas together? Record your meanings in note form in column two.

a.     Re-watching the videos might help with this step

3)    In the "so what" Column, look at the meanings you see and come up with a theme for your response which links the quote and the two videos

4)    In column four, make connections to the world and to other stories/articles/games/experiences you may see links to

5)    Write a first draft of your response.

An initial Draft of your response will be due at the start of class on November 11, 2011.

Links:

Peter Gabriel fights injustice with video

http://www.ted.com/talks/peter_gabriel_fights_injustice_with_video.html#.Tq_1n9MLKRk.email

Wadah Khanfar: A historic moment in the Arab world

http://www.ted.com/talks/wadah_khanfar_a_historic_moment_in_the_arab_world.html#.Tq__kHaMhl0.email