Class continued with reading and discussing Night.
The class read the story "The Things They Carried" and did a variety of activities tying this story to
Night.
For class on Friday students should have a rough draft of a poem following this model:
Carrying Poem
Name
_________________________________ Date ___________Period_______
List
some specific moments in time try to focus on transitions:
Going to college
Moving out of the first house I owned
Fishing at the town dock when I was five
Coming to Grant
List
items that you brought; you should focus on tangible things, but strong poems will use the
physical objects to help show the intangible emotional things as well:
A bucket light blue bucket with a metal handle and white
plastic grip
Fishing rod my grandfather gave it to me, it was push
button
Kastmaster silver and silver and blue
Life jacket big, orange, it pushed my ears up
Pride; excitement; adventure; success
Go back and add details
(sensory details, remember?) to the items above make the specific; the more
vivid the better
Now, using the images you’ve
listed above, assemble the memory into a poem.
From the big white house
facing the bay
I could walk my five year
old walk – BY MYSELF
to the town dock. Clear green water
clam-shells, white moons
on the sandy bottom
Silvery shadows, torpedo
shaped below me
Mackerel backs are
black tiger stripes, on
velvet green
red-white bobbing tugs,
bends rod, child yelps
“Fish!”
Slippery, and salt slick,
fish in air, over dock
small hands press the
fish to the splintered gray wood
sharp hooks, released,
back to the sea
drying, in a light blue
hole, the tiger-prize
“Fish!”
and the dance repeats
“Fish!”
always magic
Little boy skipping home,
Orange life jacket lifts
his ears as he sings
“Got three mackerel what
do I do,”
“Got three mackerel what
do I do!”
He is heavy-bucket proud!
STUDENTS are also reminded of their 6-8 page journal due at the end of the unit. On Friday students will be working both on their poem and on the following quotes:
Close
Reading of Night Chapters 1-3
Night is a
disturbing story of human atrocities; it is also a hopeful story of triumph.
The subject matter that we will be dealing with during this unit is difficult.
I know that you can be sensitive to the needs of others; and I hope that you
will be sensitive to your own needs and personal safety, as well. After every
night is a new dawn.
There are many different issues to address when reading Night. The passages I have selected
below are ones that address some of the most significant and recurring issues.
First review the entire set of references. Choose five of the passages to write
very detailed responses to; as you read through the chapters also create a
journal entry or note on each of the passages.
Page 5: “What
question and answer is one?”
Page 10: “The Eight
Days of Passover. The weather was sublime.”
Irony is when what happens is the opposite of what is
expected; are there other examples of irony in the text?
Page 12: “Most
people thought that we would remain in the ghetto until the end of the war,
until the arrival of the Red Army. Afterward everything would be as before. The
ghetto was ruled by neither German nor Jew; it was ruled by delusion.”
Could Ellie have had this point of view from the Ghetto? Is
being ruled by delusion always bad?
Page 20: “Oh
God, Master of the Universe, in your infinite compassion, have mercy on us…”
Will this prayer be answered?
Page 24: Mrs.
Schachter cries out, “Look! Look at this fire! This terrible fire! Have mercy
on me!” Ellie relates, “Some pressed against the bars to see. There was
nothing. Only the darkness of night.”
How do you explain this episode?
Page 29: “The
beloved objects that we had carried with us from place to place were now left
behind in the wagon, and with them, finally our illusions.”
What objects in your life create illusions? Would
delusions be a better word in the text of Night? What about for objects in your
life? Objects that you see in other peoples’ lives?
Page 30: “’Shut up,
you moron, or I’ll tear you to pieces! You should have hanged yourselves rather
than come here. Didn’t you know what was in store for you here in Auschwitz?
You didn’t know? In 1944?’”
Should they have known?
Page 31: In the
cattle car, young men and fathers have an argument: To revolt, or not. The
argument is won by saying, “We mustn’t give up hope, even now as the sword
hangs over our heads, So taught our sages…..”
Do you agree that this was the argument to have? Is it
better to die in a hopeless battle, or to maintain hope?
Page 32: A truck
load of babies is dumped in a flames.
Ellie writes, “I did see this, with my own eyes …
children thrown into the flames. (is it any wonder that ever since then, sleep
tends to elude me?)
There are those today who deny that The Holocaust of WWII
happened. Do you think the monstrosity of the events makes it easier, or harder
to deny the truth?
Page 33: “I don’t know whether, during the history of the
Jewish people, men have ever before recited Kaddish
for themselves.
Ellie writes, “For the first time, I felt anger rising
within me. Why should I sanctify His name? The Almighty, the eternal and
terrible Master of the Universe, chose to be silent. What was there to thank
Him for?
What would you say to Ellie? Is what you would say were
you standing next to him in 1943 be different from what you would say to him
were you to meet him today?
Page 34: “Never
shall I forget.”
Consider this passage in the center of the page.
Page 42: “I became A-7713.”
What is the importance of a name? What is the
significance of making a person a number?
Page 45: “Akiba
Drumer said: ‘God is testing us. He wants to see whether we are capable of
overcoming our base instincts, of killing the Satan within ourselves. We have
no right to despair. And if HE punishes us mercilessly, it is a sign that He
loves us that much more…”
Page 46: “How we
would have liked to believe that. We pretended, for what if one of us still did believe?”
Is this kind of belief a delusion, or a source of power?
Page 46: “On the
way, we saw some young German girls. The guards began to tease them. The girls
giggled. They allowed themselves to be kissed and tickled, bursting with
laughter. They all were laughing, joking, and passing love notes to one
another. At least, during all that time, we endured neither shouting nor
blows.”
Are bystanders evil? Guilty? Can the girls be held libel
for being girls?
Consider
the passages that I have asked you to pay special attention to above. Now read,
or review Chapter 4 (pages 47-65). Which passages seem most important to you in
this section. Copy the passage down; write a question or prompt that you think
is important to consider in conjunction with the passage. You should have at
least two passages.
