Yet another month has passed in AP Lit, even though we weren't there for most of it. Yet in that little bit of time we were in class in the past month we've done some good work.
The first thing we did upon returning to class is finish up discussing Hamlet. Though our discussions were slow right after break, the did pick up and become more involved as we got back to the play. With second hour, I know a big part of our debate was what the central question of Hamlet was and what the turning point was. This was new to me, in past English classes I've always been told what the turning point was and we rarely talked about the central question of a piece of literature. Having to think about these things without much guidance from Ms. Holmes really got me thinking about Hamlet and what was really going on in the play.
There were a ton of motifs in this play, so many that we ended up grouping the motifs into three main categories: Duality, Control, and Religion. When grouping together our motifs we saw that some fit into more than one category, which was also something new to me. I never really thought about how motifs could relate to each other and to overarching categories. To me it always seemed that a motif was meant to represent one thing and one thing only so this really opened my eyes on how motifs work. Grouping the motifs together also helped with writing a theme statement.
I was pleasantly surprised with writing our Hamlet theme statement. It was nowhere near as hard as I thought it was going to be and I think a big part of that was being able to look at our three motif categories and our central question and say, "Okay, what do these have to do with what is happening in the play?" In the end I was very pleased with our theme statement, especially when we worked out the wording so that it wasn't a black and white statement without any shades of gray.
Since finishing Hamlet, we've moved on to preparing for the final. Can I just say that I love the idea of the collaborative final review? In Brit Lit last year, Mrs. Patnoude just told us everything that was going to be on the review and two years ago in English 10, Mr. Crocker just said "review everything we've covered". I like the idea of everyone contributing to make this one big review because there were things that people had put up that I'd forgotten. Also, some parts of existentialism and theatre or the absurd were cleared up for me (things that I probably wouldn't have understood on my own). Creating practice questions at the end also helped me get in the mindset of taking the final.
Caitlin,
ReplyDeleteYour class was not alone in their slow discussions (at first.) 6th hour had the same problem. I think your whole paragraph about Motifs is super intriguing. I think it's so cool that your class was able to group the motifs into three categories and work from there. In my class, it seemed we kind of just free balled a "big idea" and went from there. Nonetheless, I was happy with our final theme statement as well. I thought it was very helpful that Ms.Holmes explained the central conflict as something that is "sticky." Like you, I've never actually had to discover what the central conflict is; it's usually quite obvious. This is one reason I enjoyed Hamlet is because it was challenging! Overall, your response seems to encompass everything. Good work!
Caitlin,
ReplyDeleteI certainly wish my class had our act together enough to group motifs into 3 categories; we tend to be a bit all-over-the-place with our thinking, and thus had a difficult time consolidating all of our ideas. My experience in discussing Hamlet in class was similar to yours. I feel that without Ms. Holmes' guidance, it would have taken ages to decide on anything, let alone a theme statement. Admittedly though, one of my favorite parts about this class is indeed the slight amount of direction we are given—having to come to our own conclusions with minimal information from the person who has all the answers really helps improve our critical thinking skills, I think. You included all of the important information in this post, good job!
Hi Caitlin,
ReplyDeleteIn sixth hour we discussed the turning point and the main conflict of Hamlet too and in the past I’ve simply been told that this is the main conflict and turning point. I think being able to discuss this helps us in more ways than one. It’s interesting that your class grouped the motifs together, I hadn’t really thought about how motifs relate to each other either. I liked the collaborative review too, even though I would have preferred to have had a project based final. You covered all things we’ve done in class and that’s good. In my response to course material I discussed the open prompt we had to write too. I’m not sure if we had to include it, but you might want to. Good job!