Scribe Mon 4/30

We have an essay on Wednesday so be ready! We have to bring a pen/pencil and paper and we can bring a thesis statement and outline.
Here is the question:

• Huxley predicted that in order to achieve a Utopian society that one must sacrifice certain ideals to achieve "happiness." Specifically, what is one area Huxley sacrifices in BNW?
• Explain 3 clear examples that support that sacrifice in the BNW
• Explain 3 clear examples of how our society today has also sacrificed the same ideals
• Use formal essay writing strategies to complete your writing

Today we took the quiz over chapters 9-18 in class

For the remainder of the period we played Jeopardy to review. The six main topics were:

1. Character identification (know the importance of characters and their relationships)
2. Multiple choice
3. Quotation identification (Know who said what and when)
4. True or False
5. Slogans (All the stuff we put up on the poster in the back of the room)
6. Matching

Scribe 4/28

The first thing we did today was take an online survey, relating to our class and its use of technology.
You can take this survey by going to Smith's webpage on Arapahoe's website. There you will see a link called "Survey" with a sentence reminding you to enter your class code behind it. There will also be several numbers underneath it, showing each of her classes and their corresponding codes. I believe our code is 242, but you should check just to be sure.

After that, the next and final Brave New World group went, group 9 (chapters 17-18), which, as it so happens, was my group.

• We started off with quote by George Orwell: "The best books... are those that tell you what you know already."
• Then we played the song "Testify" by Rage Against the Machine, which shares another quote with Orwell: "Who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past."
• We then tried to find links between the song and the book, and the "Who controls the past..." line seemed to garner the most reaction. However, there were a few people that saw connections throughout the song. There are a few that seem to mention something like soma.
• Then we showed the class six more quotes by various people, including Orwell, but we also had Huxley himself, and even Adolf Hitler.
• Orwell: "The essence of being human is that one does not seek perfection." "There are some ideas so wrong that only a very intelligent person could believe in them."
• Huxley: "Most ignorance is vincible ignorance. We don't know because we don't want to know." "Consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life. The only completely consistent people are dead."
• Hitler: "The great masses of the people will more easily fall victims to a big lie than to a small one." "How fortunate for leaders that men do not think."
• Once again we asked everyone to try to find connections between these quotes and the book, or if they could, to modern-day life. Most people found several connections, such as Lenina seems to be more willing to believe the big lies she is told, while she may not completely trust the small ones. Also that the BNW society is contrary to humanity if the essence of humanity is not seeking perfection.
• Then we showed the class a saying: "If you have nothing to die for, you have nothing to live for" and asked the class what they would die for, if anything, or what the difference between living for something and dying for something was.
• Immediatly people said they would die for their family, some pointed out that there are some that would die for their religion or their country. A few people said that living for something was more selfish, whereas when you die for something that shows you are willing to give up anything for it.
• Finally, we asked if they saw our modern society heading in the direction of Brave New World, most surprisingly said that it wasn't.
• We ended with a quote by Benjamin Franklin: "Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both." My personal favorite of all the quotes we used.

We were supposed to have our final quiz over the book today, but we ran out of time because of the survey and the presentation, so we will most likely take it first thing on Monday. I'm not 100% sure which chapters its over (I think 9-18) so I'd would review the entire book just in case (unless you know for sure what its over).

HW: Obviously the quiz on Monday, study for it. Also the semester project, which will be due soon, so for those of you who haven't started (you know who you are) I would get goin' on that quickly.

Wednesday 4/25

The fortunate few students who arrived early to class were able to enjoy homemade cupcakes from Smith.

There were shortened classes due to ACT testing.
Group 8 (15-16) presented with a power point

• The group started with a few slides with facts and questions.

Sacrifice

• What would you give up for a piece of gum?

Scott said that he would take a flick in the ear for a piece of gum.

• For a bag of fruit snacks?

Katie was kicked in the shins for this bag of fruit snacks.

• Candy Bar?

Andy got up in front of the class and acted like Chewbaca for the candy bar.

Did You Know?

• There are 14 different species of parasites that live on your pillow.
• Every year you swallow 7 spiders in your sleep.
• Some hot dogs are made of mechanically separated chicken flesh!

Discussion Questions for Sacrifice activity

• Were the sacrifices worth it?

Yes, also in the BNW the people in the society seem to have sacrificed a lot, whether they know it or not.

• In the BNW society they gave up science, religion, art and truth. What have we done in our society that is like this?

We have given up a lot. Like BNW we have somewhat become dependant on technology. Someone said that we have no work ethic, are spoon-fed everything and are very rebellous.

• What has the BNW society gained besides happiness?

They have gained order. They are also a lot less likely to rebel.

Discussion Questions for the Did You Know activity

• Did those facts scare you?

A little, most of the class was just grossed out.

• Did or would you feel more comfortable NOT knowing these facts?

Andy related it to the movie "Super Size Me," and how after people saw that movie they ate the same way they did before.

• Is John unhappy because he is not ignorant?

Yes, when he first came to BNW he did not like the society. He knows what else is out there and he knows that there are much better things.

• Is ignorance bliss?

Not really, you are happier before you find things out that put a bummer on your day or ruin your outlook on something.

HW: READ, finish the book, semester project, QUIZ on FRI 9-18.

scribe 1/23

Jeopardy

• we played a game of jeopardy to start the day- the game consisted of questions outlining/reviewing chapters 13 & 14 of Brave New World, to answer a question you had to be first with your hand raised and you had to make a weird noise. winners got skittles.
• for every 3 general questions there was one deep thought question
• Deep thought question 1: Why does Lenina connect with John (the savage) more than any other character in the book?
• Deep thought question 2: Why do you think fanny cares so much about what Lenina does in her social life?
• Other interesting questions: what do the kids at the hospital, in chapter 14, say about Linda? , What is Lenina's purpose/reason for going to see John in chapter 13?

After jeopardy we fishbowled

• The most interesting topic discussed during the fishbowl was brought up by Levi- Levi asked who is benifiting from this "utopian" society? With all the lengths that have been gone through to reach this society, someone must be benifiting, but who?
• This brought up an interesting discussion to which no one was really able to come up with an answer.
• Along with Levi's quesiton, one key idea that was discussed was how this society has been able to subdue feelings and emotions. It was brought up that when John is called to the hospital because his mother is on the verge of dying, that the nurse seems perplexed at John's attitude/reaction to his mother's cituation. The nurse goes as far as to ask John what ever could be the matter? (this being asked right after he learns of her condition). This complete loss of sympathy had the class full of questions and remarks. These were some of the main questions brought up.
• In general, the class concluded that our society mimics the society of Brave New World, but we still feel compassion and sympathy
• We also discussed how the government and our parents play a role in "conditioning" our own society. Many believe that our parents conditioning is extremely similar to that of Brave New World. Smith pointed out that almost everyone pics up their faith (religion), parenting methods and means of approaching the world from their parents. It was also commented that the government is worse, or more influential than our parents because it is the government who sets the ultimate limits of our society. It is the government who decides what is criminal and what is ok. Through those laws that our government has laid out, we as a society have become increadibly conditioned.
• These were the main topics discussed/ reviewed
• We also wrote down on Smith's grade sheet the grade we recieved for the chapters 1-9 quiz (the 44 question one)

Homework: read chapters 15-16, semester project

Scribe 4/20

Scribe 4/20

We started off today with the class discussion. The questions that were asked during the discussion by both Ms. Smith and the class are:
-What are your impressions so far?
-Why do people still look different even though they are all clones?
-Why is the first line of every chapter italicized?
-How, in the civilized society, can the preach about equality, with thier caste system being so strong?
-Is the savage reservation more of a brainwashing idea or was it just to expensive like the director said?
-What do you think about the paradox of Bernard's opinion of society and his place in it now?
-What are the sacrifices of society to become the utopia tha it is?

Next, Group 6(Amy B, Melissa B, Mark C, and Nathan K) did their presentation over chapters 11 and 12. They first split the class into 6 different groups. Then each group got a sheet of questions that they were supposed to discuss with each other and with the guidance of one of the leaders. The questions were: 1. How has Bernard changed thus far throughout the novel? Give specific examples. 2. How did Dorian change from beginning to end in The Picture of Dorian Gray? Give examples. 3. How does the atmosphere in Hollywood change celebrities? 4. What is the idea that ties all of these questions together? After each group discussed the questions, the whole class discussed the questions.

Homework:
-read 13-14

Scribe 4/16

Today, we:
-Took a quiz for chapters 1-9 (Talk to Smith for make-up)
-Group 5 (ch. 9-10) presented

HW:
-Read 11-12

Wednesday's schedule:
-Song activity

Important Upcoming dates Smith gave us:
5/2: Essay Final (on BNW)
5/4: Multiple Choice Final (on BNW)
5/7-5/9: Work days for semester project
5/11-5/14: Semester Project Presentations
5/16: FINAL Essay


Group 5 (9-10)
-For each caste (including savages), 2 people in the class were selected to represent the caste
-Legends of the Hidden Temple Style (Answer question correctley and step forward)
-Betas think the game was rigged
-Alphas and Savages tied in the end
-Alphas correctly answered factual questions; Savages got the personal questions right
-The activity portrayed that savages have emotion, Alphs have knowledge, and you must have both to survive

Scribe 4/13

Smith was gone today :( so we had Mrs. Ritzdorf.

We have a Quiz on Monday on chapters 1-9, we weren' sure if it was supposed to be 5-9. Group 5 is also supposed to lead warm-ups on Monday.
A preview for next week:
Wed-Song Activity
Fri-Discuss 7-12

Group 4's Warm up:
A "pop quiz" (Very clever kids, by the way... Way to freak everyone out.)
All of even numbers were easy questions, or questions that pertained specifically to you.
All of the odd questions were hard and pertained to things based on society.
These were all connected to the fact of how in the Society of Brave New World, the difficulty of the question would be switched. They would be able to regurgatate factualy information but not information based on
their own lives.
Questions that were asked were, "Why did the civilized world allow the
savages to continue their traditions of society?" and "What is the significance
of Huxley quoting Shakespeare's works Hamlet and The Tempest?" You can
find Hamlet quotes on page 131 and 133.
The Tempest is a play about a daughter and father who arrive on an
island and civilize it.
Shakespeare is supposed to represent the lack of middle ground,
he is a passionate well-known writer. He also represents the
lack of passion and emotion of this society.
Another questions was, "How will John react to the 'other place'?"
Possibly like Bernard? Reject the culture and kind of like a
circus freak? Or he could possibly enjoy it; living wild and be
intrigued by it?
For the rest of the period we workd on our semester projects with our groups and we had to turn in a "Project Time Line" and a brief summary of our accomplishments in that time to Mrs. Ritzdorf.

That was it!

Scribe 4/11

WEDNESDAY APRIL 11, 2007

Today we had to have our podcasts of our montage's turned in.

For the rest of the class period we worked on our slogan poster, which was HUGE! Everyone was helping to cut out magazine pictures and words of slogans that related to Brave New World OR that related to our world today. It went very productively, everyone had their own part, some people were cutters, and some people glued all the slogans onto the poster, and some people wrote out quotes from the book. It looks great, and is hanging in the back of the classroom!! Oh yea and we had donuts today....of course!

For homework we have to have chapters 7 and 8 read.

Amy B

Scribe 4/9

Today in class we started out with Group 3 - Jeff Gunell and Chris Goerke - doing their starting activity, which was a powerpoint comparing some of the ideas in chapters 5-6 of Brave New World to modern songs, although the songs wouldn't play (we forgive you guys). The first of these songs was "Pimper's Paradise" by Bob Marley, which basically talks about a "promiscuos" woman who is very social and "slutty", for lack of a better word. This relates to the idea that "everyone is for everyone else" within the novel, where sex isn't held as something sacred or special, but it is instead very commonplace and people have many sexual partners. The second song the guys used was "We Are All On Drugs" by Weezer, which basically talks about how drugs make people lazy, ill-witted, and content. This song was applied to the book in the fact that pretty much everyone in Brave New World is addicted to Soma, which the government encourages, because it keeps people from feeling individual by having emotions or by just thinking for awhile. Whenever someone feels melancholy or has enough time to actually stop and think, they take Soma and all their troubles disappear. Jeff and Goerke also posed a few questions to us about our society:
- What things would you consider to be like a Soma for society today?
- Do you think Bernard would be considered a rebel today?
- Who do you think are the Bernard's in our society?
After the starting activity, we had a whole-class fishbowl over chapters 1-6. Some ideas we discussed were:
- Why is sex so prevalent in this book?
*Satirical exageration of the trend Huxley saw in his time.
*Gets rid of the emotion in sex by cheapening it, making it commonplace.
- Idea that Bernard is comforming because of Lenina's wishes.
- Some sacrafices society has made to achieve "Utopia":
*Individuality, Love, Family
- Bernard's regret for having slept with Lenina after their first date
* He wishes he could feel true passion and emotion by depriving himself, for a time, of a desire.

The homework for this week is: Do montage podcast by Wednesday, bring magazines for Wednesday, chapters 7-8 due Friday.

Scribe 4/6

Scribe 4/6/07

-Ms. Ritzdorf was the subsititute because Ms. Smith was absent
-We started the class out by having a partner quiz over chapters 1-4
-Then we had a starter activity presented by Group 2 (Katie, Amy, Ashley)
Everyone in the class was split up into five groups
Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons
We were assigned parts that would either fit or frustrate our point of views and personalities and then we were assigned to sit somewhere according to our group
Then Katie, Amy, and Ashley asked questions to the class, expecting at least one person from each group to answer
The first question was what is 2+2?
Next, how do you spell dog?
Then we were asked what the 13th prime number is
What is the capital of Vermont?
How many pages can you print out in the library before having to pay?
What is the mascot of Arapahoe?
The last two questions were quite interesting though
Sonny disagreed with the answer for the library question
Jeff disagreed with the mascot of Arapahoe
Throughout the discussion/quiz, the Alpha’s stopped listening to the Epsilons, Deltas, and Gammas
In the end, whatever answer the Alpha’s gave became the right answer
Jeff and Sonny disagreed with questions though, to represent the individuals
Sonny was Helmholtz Watson and Jeff was Bernard Marx
From this activity, we learned that the Epsilons really are dumb and get no respect
The Alphas on the other hand are highly looked up to and whatever they say stands supreme
-Following the starter activity, we worked on our Montage Activity
We followed up on our groups, selected our pages or script, and planned when to get together to work on the project

Homework
-Read Chapters 5-6
-Group 3 Presents the Starting activity on Monday
-Bring Magazines to class on Monday
-We will have a discussion on Chapters 1-6 on Monday
-Podcasts are due on Wednesday

Scribe from Jeff Gunnell

Scribe 4/4

Scribe 4/4
Introduction
Dave brought doughnuts, some shaped like hearts, because he loves us that much.
Smith passed out three blue papers to help us with the quiz on Friday and with this unit.
Smith will be gone on Friday so we must be on our best behavior for the quiz.
We will get the choice between a partner quiz or “Gates of Heaven”.
Montage Project
In a group you will make a podcast of a couple pages from chapter three with the two scenes.
Copy pages and create a script and assign parts
To create a podcast:
You need to get the microphone from Mrs. Gaffney, tell her that you are in Smith’s class, she knows you are doing this project.
NOTE: Make sure you turn on the microphone ;0)
Go into the scary editing room on the right side as you enter the library
You will need to sign up for a time on the door before doing this
Sign on to the computer and from the start menu click on “Audacity”
Record the audio of your group members reading the dialogue from your scene
NOTE: The record button is the circle, the stop button is the square
Replay your audio before saving to make sure you can hear everyone.
Save into your folder
Export as mp3 by clicking “file” and “export as mp3”
Class
Kurt, Matt, and Scott gave a wonderful presentation of three movie clips and a discussion over chapters 1 and 2 of Brave New World.
The clips were from The Matrix, Star Wars – Attack of the Clones, and The Island
We then discussed conformity, technology, individuality, and a false sense of happiness.
We finished too late to do the group project Smith had planned so we got a chance to start chapter 3 and get into our groups for our Montage project.
Homework
Read chapters 3 and 4 in Brave New World
Study for quiz on chapters 1-4 on Friday
Socratic discussion on Monday in which Smith expects us to participate in like adults. There will be no computers.
Montage Project due Wednesday, April 11

Scribe 4/2

Here’s the summary for what we did today: Monday, April 2nd.
We split into groups of around 3 or 4 people, and signed up for days to lead the class in an “opening activity.” What exactly does this mean? Well, here’s the gist:

While we are reading Brave New World for class, we will be discussing the novel just about every day. But to get us focused and warmed up for discussion, Smith wants to start each class period with an opening activity, led each day by a different group of people. Leading the activity is worth 50 points. Here are the guidelines:
1) The activity should last between 5 and 10 minutes (15 minutes maximum). It should involve the participation of every student.
2) It should tie-in to the chapters being discussed, but also force the class to look at the book from a different and unique perspective.
3) It should be original. Each day’s activity should be fresh, not just a replica of another group’s ideas. It should evoke each student’s own creativity.
4) The group leading the activity is expected to be prepared. This includes meeting with each other to brainstorm and meeting with Smith to verify your plans.
Here is the order that the groups are leading the activities in:

Date of Activity
Chapters
Group Members

April 4th 1 & 2
Matt, Kurt, Scott

April 6th 3 & 4
Ashley G, Amy B, Katie

April 9th 5 & 6
Jeff, Chris

April 13th 7 & 8
Marie, Alex Ma, Sonny, Andy

April 16th 9 & 10
Haley, Caitlin, Ashley M

April 20th 11 & 12
Melissa, Amy K, Mark, Nate

April 23rd 13 & 14
Taylor, Nick, Stacey, Alex Mu

April 25th 15 & 16
David L, Burger, Levi

April 27th 17 & 18
Zach, Kyle, Leanne, Jess

As an example, Smith led us all in an activity in class. People partnered up and one person in each pair was deemed “the experimenter,” the other “the lab rat.” The experimenters were told to shout the name of their lab rat and bang on a desk 4 times. The lab rats were then made to hop on one foot for 30 seconds in order to get their heart rates up (HR was measured after the hopping). We repeated this “shout ‘n’ jump” procedure a total of 4 times. The fifth time, the experimenters shouted and banged the desk, but the lab rats weren’t made to jump. We then measured the heart rates of the lab rats when just given a stimulus (the shout) versus when they got the stimulus and had to do physical activity (the hopping). The results?—Well, it seems most people didn’t respond to this form of “classical conditioning.” There were a few in the class, however, whose heart rate with only the stimulus was about the same as with the stimulus and the hopping. This means that some individuals learned to associate the experimenter’s shouting with exercise. Therefore, the shout caused the lab rats to prepare for exercise; their heart rates went up in anticipation of the increase in physical activity.

The general point Smith wanted to get across with the activity was how easily people can be controlled, whether at a conscious or subconscious level. In fact, every one of us is conditioned to respond to many stimuli, like end-of-the-period bells, hand signals (the finger-over-the-mouth sign for quiet, or “shhh!”), color patterns (red = stop, green = go), etc. Just like the individuals in BNW, we are programmed with certain ideas in order to allow society to run more smoothly.

Okay, those were today’s main points. Homework: Join up with an activity leading group if you were not in class today. Read chapters 1 & 2 in BNW for Wednesday.

Scribe 3/23

HW: Buy a copy of Brave New World.

We started the day by turning in our summary response papers.

Then we all had a cheer for Levi. Congrats to YOU!!!

Because of Levi, we had a plethora of ice cream and cake. How delicious it was. Thank you for bringing that in.

We then split into our groups and spent the rest of class working on our semester projects.
Posted by Taylor