Single text English (LC)

Bobtheman

I am disinclined to do King Lear - never a fan of the play and I have done it three times. I'm thinking of doing wurthering heights . Am I mad ? Am I heathcliff?!

chases0102

Have an incredibly mixed, but more OL, 5th English. Am gone mad (no Lear pun intended!) trying to figure out the best Single Text to do that will adequately appeal to both HL and OL.

cupcake queen

Bobtheman wrote: »

I am disinclined to do King Lear - never a fan of the play and I have done it three times. I'm thinking of doing wurthering heights . Am I mad ? Am I heathcliff?!

Are you teaching Higher Level? Will you do Lear then for the comparative or is there another Shakespeare option?

Wuthering Heights is of course great but personally I would only do it with a strong class.

Bobtheman

cupcake queen wrote: »

Are you teaching Higher Level? Will you do Lear then for the comparative or is there another Shakespeare option?

Wuthering Heights is of course great but personally I would only do it with a strong class.

I'm teaching honours. They are a mixed bunch in terms of ability. I'm about half way through it with them

AJG

cupcake queen wrote: »

I would only do it with a strong class.

Amen to that... great book but the narrative is long and winding over a couple of generations of characters... the class need to be good just to get the intricacies of the plot.

Benicetomonty

Have to do Shakespeare one way or another of course. What comparative texts would you see Lear working with? Or The Tempest? Suppose it could possibly be worth doing for one year to see how it goes!

Bobtheman

Have done a few weeks. I have handed them summaries of each chapters plus a family chart. Taking it slow. So far so good.

Ready4Boarding

I think more teachers should do this. Shakespeare is difficult and liable to turn off students. And because it's possible to do well in the Comparative section with little more than a good understanding of the plot of each text, you can go along way towards covering a Shakespearean text with only scene summaries. But why Wuthering Heights?? Substituting one text that students will find difficult to read for another seems senseless. I would have thought Handmaid's Tale - shorter and one of the most talked about books of late - would be the obvious choice. The first priority should be making sure students enjoy reading the text. And that's more likely of a contemporary text.

Bobtheman

Ready4Boarding wrote: »

I think more teachers should do this. Shakespeare is difficult and liable to turn off students. And because it's possible to do well in the Comparative section with little more than a good understanding of the plot of each text, you can go along way towards covering a Shakespearean text with only scene summaries. But why Wuthering Heights?? Substituting one text that students will find difficult to read for another seems senseless. I would have thought Handmaid's Tale - shorter and one of the most talked about books of late - would be the obvious choice. The first priority should be making sure students enjoy reading the text. And that's more likely of a contemporary text.

Its a boys school so not sure how Handmaid's tale would go down, plus Im personally sick of being lectured to about feminism and no Im not against your run of the mill Feminism. Just the constant pontificating from the media.
However,I do take your point but besides WH-there was 1984 but it's a difficult text too. The rest were just unappealing-especially Room.
A lot of the time, despite my best efforts -kids regurgitate notes-no matter what you do. Im sure some 'brilliant' teacher will point out the error of my ways on the last point.Thus, for this reason I think it important that a teacher does what he or she enjoys too. Doing KL again-would have been death to me- as a single text.

Ready4Boarding

Jeepers.

RealJohn

Bobtheman wrote: »

Its a boys school so not sure how Handmaid's tale would go down, plus Im personally sick of being lectured to about feminism and no Im not against your run of the mill Feminism. Just the constant pontificating from the media.

You could use it to point out that the comparisons made by the pontificating media are utter nonsense, and that it bears no resemblance to anything modern feminism has to contend with. Frankly, students need more teachers who will point out reality to them. The last few years have shown that people in this country are desperately ill-equipped to see it for themselves, and would rather believe what they read on Facebook than analyse easily accessible information for themselves (and I am absolutely not only referring to teenagers there).

Bobtheman

RealJohn wrote: »

You could use it to point out that the comparisons made by the pontificating media are utter nonsense, and that it bears no resemblance to anything modern feminism has to contend with. Frankly, students need more teachers who will point out reality to them. The last few years have shown that people in this country are desperately ill-equipped to see it for themselves, and would rather believe what they read on Facebook than analyse easily accessible information for themselves (and I am absolutely not only referring to teenagers there).

Good point. Can I ask you what you think modern feminism has to contend with ? Genuine question. Just curious.

chases0102

Hmmm....really stuck here. Have a class that will definitely be mixed in terms of uptake of HL and OL...so my problem is trying to pick a Single Text that will work for both, but the choices are not great.

Has anyone any advice?

Has anyone ever chosen a OL Single Text, that the HL in their class could then use as part of their comparative, and then vice versa as well?

Bobtheman

Philadelphia here I come is a relatively easy text I think. If students drop down-do they go to another class? I just didnt want to do Philadelphia again. Its theme of Exile and parental loss can work with Out of shadows (book) Out of shadows is a great little book that boys would like. Based in a boarding school in zimbabwe 1980s.

chases0102

No, there's no going to another class.

English classes are mixed, and set for the cycle. If Macbeth, or even Hamlet was an option for the Single Text I would absolutely go ahead with those - but KL is just too long, too cumbersome for the class I feel.

Has anyone looked at 'Days Without End' by Sebastian Barry?

RealJohn

Bobtheman wrote: »

Good point. Can I ask you what you think modern feminism has to contend with ? Genuine question. Just curious.

You can ask, but I probably can't tell you without risking an 'infraction', or at least accusations of 'trolling' these days.

Bobtheman

RealJohn wrote: »

You can ask, but I probably can't tell you without risking an 'infraction', or at least accusations of 'trolling' these days.

Pm so

Bobtheman

chases0102 wrote: »

No, there's no going to another class.

English classes are mixed, and set for the cycle. If Macbeth, or even Hamlet was an option for the Single Text I would absolutely go ahead with those - but KL is just too long, too cumbersome for the class I feel.

Has anyone looked at 'Days Without End' by Sebastian Barry?

I personally hate his books. They are like reading the book of Job (Bible) . But given your predicament it's really either him or Atwood. Atwood might be a better bet with the new tv version out there. To be fair to Atwood she was writing five years after the Iranian revolution (1984)and Iranian women saw their rights reversed quickly and forced to wear a black robe. I just didn't like the way the pro choice lobby used her imagery in their last campaign. Given the access to abortion in the UK I thought it was OTT. Also in modern era contraceptives are widely available and women are not treated as simply breeders as those protests seemed to indicate.
And I'm not necessarily against abortion before I am lectured to .

chases0102

Thanks a million for that perspective above

It's a real bind I'm in!

Bobtheman

chases0102 wrote: »

Thanks a million for that perspective above

It's a real bind I'm in!

You can sweat a lot over choices but in the end it's usually the teachers who work out how to compare not the students. You do the donkey work -not them. Thus ,do what works for YOU.

Ready4Boarding

chases0102 wrote: »

Thanks a million for that perspective above

It's a real bind I'm in!

That poster is clearly allowing his politics to influence his teaching. I pity his students. Stay clear.

cupcake queen

chases0102 wrote: »

No, there's no going to another class.

English classes are mixed, and set for the cycle. If Macbeth, or even Hamlet was an option for the Single Text I would absolutely go ahead with those - but KL is just too long, too cumbersome for the class I feel.

Has anyone looked at 'Days Without End' by Sebastian Barry?

Your higher level students will still have to do Lear at some point...what will the ordinary level students do then?

I have taught Lear as an OL Single text before. It's actually quite accessible, especially compared to Hamlet, and the students had no issues. Don't forget, the Shakespeare questions at OL are always very straight forward too.

Bobtheman

Ready4Boarding wrote: »

That poster is clearly allowing his politics to influence his teaching. I pity his students. Stay clear.

Jesus wept. Yeah hand maids tale would go down a treat in a boys school ?! That's my main reason. I pity students everywhere being taught by po- faced feminists.( Tongue firmly in cheek)

Ready4Boarding

Bobtheman wrote: »

Jesus wept. Yeah hand maids tale would go down a treat in a boys school ?! That's my main reason. I pity students everywhere being taught by po- faced feminists.( Tongue firmly in cheek)

Still haven't quite learnt how to spell it, have you? And I struggle to see why (in your infinite wisdom) you think a group of ordinary-level boys will take to Wuthering Heights but not Handmaid's Tale. It's first and foremost a futuristic dystopia that allows for various interpretations. It reveals much about your abilities that you don't know that.

Bobtheman

Ready4Boarding wrote: »

Still haven't quite learnt how to spell it, have you? And I struggle to see why (in your infinite wisdom) you think a group of ordinary-level boys will take to Wuthering Heights but not Handmaid's Tale. It's first and foremost a futuristic dystopia that allows for various interpretations. It reveals much about your abilities that you don't know that.

I have read the book and watched the series. Let's leave it there. My group are honours not ordinary (btw).

Ready4Boarding

Bobtheman wrote: »

I have read the book and watched the series. Let's leave it there.

That's even worse, then!

My group are honours not ordinary (btw).

"there was 1984 but it's a difficult text too. The rest were just unappealing-especially Room."

Both are ordinary-level texts.

Bobtheman

Ready4Boarding wrote: »

That's even worse, then!




"there was 1984 but it's a difficult text too. The rest were just unappealing-especially Room."

Both are ordinary-level texts.

You are right. I just got mixed up with the various questions here. It

I made my decision in August so awhile since I looked. At the time I wasn't certain what level I was getting.
I didn't like Barry's book.It's just too depressing. I wanted to avoid king Lear for reasons noted and while I was open to the Tempest I could not locate much on it. Now I must flee the liberal/feminist mob. ( Tongue in cheek)