http://prezi.com/x3qyct1v0eoo/present/?auth_key=i2o3cav&follow=svulwpvn9a3v
Lyrics:
Me and my classmates
We're finished high school
Off into the real world we're not sure what to do
Going to college
Or to the mountains,
These lessons we've learned must show us what to do
And now we're
Out here on our own
We've got a long way to go
We'll use our English class as guidance
And now we're
Starting to feel free
Adults with curiosity
We won't regret our education I guarantee
Frodo Baggins taught me
Stay close with your friends
Through fear and fame they'll be there in the end
Truth and Bright Water
Gave me a lesson in parenthood
What to do, how to love and to be there when I should.
And now we're
Out here on our own
We've got a long way to go
We'll use our English class as guidance
And now we're
Starting to feel free
Adults with curiosity
We won't regret our education I guarantee
Tuesday 4 June 2013
Final Reflection: Applying my English Experience to REAL Life
Final Reflection for ELA 30-1
By Marcus Ramsay
Throughout the course of my high school years, English has always been one of my favorite subjects. English is the only course I have taken that has truly given me the ability to express my self through school projects, and has directly applied to my life outside of school. My learning in ELA 30-1 was significantly more influential on myself as a human than what was taught in ELA 10 and 20. Learning about the paradoxes of the human condition gave a little bit more insight into the adult I would like to grow up to be, and the material covered gave excellent examples of how certain individuals will react in situations of parenting, murder, suicide, substance abuse, heroism and many other topics I may or may not encounter in my life. English class has taught me to use literature and other forms of media as lessons or examples for how I may or may not want to live my life.
The first unit completed in ELA 30-1 was Hamlet by William Shakespeare. This play is a Shakespearean tragedy about a young man struggling to take revenge for the murder of his father. The constant frustration at the back of his mind sends him into a state of madness, to which the other characters respond to with a plan to murder Hamlet leaving them all doomed for failure. Although Hamlet was written during the Elizabethan era, it still contains many valuable life lessons that can still be applied to society today, such as the consequences of treating people unkindly. Hamlet somewhat "bullied" both Ophelia and his mother, making them both highly susceptible to emotional pain, resulting in both of them taking situations as what would be considered to far. Hamlet's constant put downs towards woman, telling Ophelia to go to "a nunnery" and comparing his mother to whore, puts a lot of stress on the two female characters, and it is apparent throughout the novel that neither of them are happy. This example shows the harm that verbal abuse can put on an individual, and one must be kind to others in order to truly be happy themselves.
The second unit we went through in English 30 was Truth and Bright Water. Truth and Bright Water tells the story of two First Nations communities separated by the Canadian and United States border, how ever the two towns have much more in common than the majority of onlookers would think. The biggest impact Truth and Bright Water had on me was the ideas about parenting, letting go and growing up. Most young adults can relate to Tecumsuh because he feels the constant pressure of acting mature and being forced to get a job if he wants his own things. This pressure is what causes a lot of stress in teenagers, along with the fear of having to go off by oneself. The questionable antics of Tecumsuh and Lum's parents is also a little bit of a model of what I do not want to be as a parent. The alcoholism that the characters have to deal with at a young age is a terrible example for children as it makes them think that it is alright. Tecumsuh's dad Elvin constantly deals with the guilt of falling short and giving up on what he has lost. Although he seems like a somewhat happy man, these little things constantly plague him, and I would like to put full effort into everything I do rather than only do the bare minimum like Elvin does.
The third and final unit we did was Lord of the Rings. Peter Jackson's interpretation of Tolkien's novel The Return of the King is a cinematic and literary masterpiece that has become one of my favorite films. There are many heroic characters in the film, some quite typical while some are visually surprising to classify as a hero. The hobbits best fit the classification of "visually surprising" because of their size. Jackson shows the viewer that anyone can have the potential to be a hero, no matter their shape or size. Although the hobbits were usually physically unable kill every villain that crossed their path, their wit and determination enabled them to complete the task of getting to Mordor and destroying the ring. Jackson's film has taught me that with courage and help from friends, a seemingly impossible task can seem a little more within reach.
And so it begins. The end of high school, the beginning of real life. This journey has not always been an easy one, but each struggle or challenge has simply been another step to shaping the individual I am today, and the individual I will be in the future. It is finished with now, all I can do is study and practice my writing in hope I achieve a satisfactory mark on the diploma. The material covered in the course has benefited me greatly and enhanced my knowledge, now it is up to me to continue reading, watching, studying and listening in order to keep learning.
The first unit completed in ELA 30-1 was Hamlet by William Shakespeare. This play is a Shakespearean tragedy about a young man struggling to take revenge for the murder of his father. The constant frustration at the back of his mind sends him into a state of madness, to which the other characters respond to with a plan to murder Hamlet leaving them all doomed for failure. Although Hamlet was written during the Elizabethan era, it still contains many valuable life lessons that can still be applied to society today, such as the consequences of treating people unkindly. Hamlet somewhat "bullied" both Ophelia and his mother, making them both highly susceptible to emotional pain, resulting in both of them taking situations as what would be considered to far. Hamlet's constant put downs towards woman, telling Ophelia to go to "a nunnery" and comparing his mother to whore, puts a lot of stress on the two female characters, and it is apparent throughout the novel that neither of them are happy. This example shows the harm that verbal abuse can put on an individual, and one must be kind to others in order to truly be happy themselves.
The second unit we went through in English 30 was Truth and Bright Water. Truth and Bright Water tells the story of two First Nations communities separated by the Canadian and United States border, how ever the two towns have much more in common than the majority of onlookers would think. The biggest impact Truth and Bright Water had on me was the ideas about parenting, letting go and growing up. Most young adults can relate to Tecumsuh because he feels the constant pressure of acting mature and being forced to get a job if he wants his own things. This pressure is what causes a lot of stress in teenagers, along with the fear of having to go off by oneself. The questionable antics of Tecumsuh and Lum's parents is also a little bit of a model of what I do not want to be as a parent. The alcoholism that the characters have to deal with at a young age is a terrible example for children as it makes them think that it is alright. Tecumsuh's dad Elvin constantly deals with the guilt of falling short and giving up on what he has lost. Although he seems like a somewhat happy man, these little things constantly plague him, and I would like to put full effort into everything I do rather than only do the bare minimum like Elvin does.
The third and final unit we did was Lord of the Rings. Peter Jackson's interpretation of Tolkien's novel The Return of the King is a cinematic and literary masterpiece that has become one of my favorite films. There are many heroic characters in the film, some quite typical while some are visually surprising to classify as a hero. The hobbits best fit the classification of "visually surprising" because of their size. Jackson shows the viewer that anyone can have the potential to be a hero, no matter their shape or size. Although the hobbits were usually physically unable kill every villain that crossed their path, their wit and determination enabled them to complete the task of getting to Mordor and destroying the ring. Jackson's film has taught me that with courage and help from friends, a seemingly impossible task can seem a little more within reach.
And so it begins. The end of high school, the beginning of real life. This journey has not always been an easy one, but each struggle or challenge has simply been another step to shaping the individual I am today, and the individual I will be in the future. It is finished with now, all I can do is study and practice my writing in hope I achieve a satisfactory mark on the diploma. The material covered in the course has benefited me greatly and enhanced my knowledge, now it is up to me to continue reading, watching, studying and listening in order to keep learning.
Monday 3 June 2013
Truth and Bright Water Visual
Of all the projects completed this year, I was most proud of the Truth and Bright Water Visual project. My teaching statement was "Teaching people to let go," and I was able to come up with many characters from the novels that were struggling to let go, but may or may not have in the end of the novel. This project was a real turning point for me, as it was the first time I had done well on something involving art of any kind, making this match the outcome of extending awareness. It also assisted me in respecting others and strengthening community, because of the interaction I had with others during the presentation. I am proud of my ability to construct meaning from text and context via art and be able to communicate efficiently to explain this project.
Truth and Bright Water: Poetry Question 9
This question asked us to find four poems we thought related to Truth and Bright Water and explain why. This assignment took alot of work, as we had to not only explain the relation of characters but also pull examples and quotations from sometimes multi-page poems. This assignment demonstrates my ability to respond to a variety of print and nonprint texts, this time in poem and novel form. It shows I am able to follow a plan of inquiry, through my forming generalizations and conclusions about the similarities between characters. This assignment also helped me improve my thoughtfulness, effectiveness and correctness of communication.
This assignment also began the development of a new-found love of poetry for me.
Truth and Bright Water Poetry Question 9
Marcus Ramsay
The poem Icarus by Don McKay has many connections to Truth and Bright Water’s character Lum. Icarus is a character in
Greek mythology who builds a set of wings to give him the ability to fly.
Despite constant warnings from his father, Icarus flies to high and too close
to the sun, sending him “tumbling into freefall,” (line 23, Icarus)and he plummets into the sea to
his death. The character of Icarus “isn’t sorry,” (line 1, Icarus) meaning he has no regrets, similar to Lum. Some of Lum’s
final words in Truth and Bright Water
are him singing “Bye-bye, baby, bye- bye.” (Page 271, T&BW) Lum tells
Tecumsuh it was his “mother’s favourite song” (Page 271, T&BW). Although it
is not yet known Lum is about to fall from the bridge to his immediate death,
the words of the song are foreshadowing, similar to Icarus’s fathers warnings
of not flying to close to the sun. The way Icarus “rehearses flight and fall,”
(line 5, Icarus) can also be compared
to Lum’s running and his constant battle against himself to “go faster” (page
4, T&BW). Both Icarus and Lum’s deaths cause a great deal of pain to family
and friends around them, but their stubborn and selfish attitudes leave them
with no remorse and neither of them are “sorry”(line 35, Icarus).
The speaker in William Wordsworth’s The World is to Much With Us has an
outlook on life very similar to that of Monroe Swimmer’s in Truth and Bright Water. The speaker in
the poem claims “we lay waste our powers” (line 2, The World is to Much With Us), accusing people of wasting the
technology and potential we have in the modern age and not doing everything
possible with it. Monroe is attempting to bring back First Nations culture and
have modern day people respect their ancestors and what they believed in. Both
Monroe and the speaker in the poem are not well understood by others, shown in
the novel when Miles says Monroe is “probably queer” (page 177, T&BW), or
when the speaker says he wishes to be “standing on this pleasant lea”(line 11, The World is to Much With Us), because
he would rather be interacting with the gods than with simple civilians that do
not understand him. Monroe briefly discusses about his ambitions “to be a hero”
(page 209, T&BW) when he was younger. Him and the speaker in the poem are
both attempting to discuss that dream all children have to be a hero when they
are younger, but as they get older they “are out of tune; It moves [them] not.”
(line 8, The World is to Much With Us)
and they begin to grow out of touch with their previous dreams and accept the
harsh reality of adulthood. Those individuals who are lucky enough to continue
dreaming as they age have the ability to continue making the most of their
talents and doing something with it to make the world a better place.
One
Perfect Rose by Dorothy Parker can be connected to the battle for love
between Elvin and Helen. That “One perfect rose” (line 7, One Perfect Rose), describes the love that Elvin is constantly
battling for but Helen has given up long ago. Elvin’s many attempts to impress
Helen with the chair and the restoration of the Karmahhn Ghia are always foiled
by his unfortunate unreliability, leaving Helen with many false hopes that her
ex-husband could one day change his foolish ways. The speaker in One Perfect Rose is still searching for
the “one perfect limousine,” (line 9, One
Perfect Rose) to pick her up and take her away to the place of happiness she
feels she deserves. Helen is also feeling this way, but unfortunately may not
find a man to be that limousine that Elvin cannot be.
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