Wickstone’s Weekly Work – #1

Aside from the posts I normally write on here to cap off a project, over the next few weeks I will be posting what I learned throughout each week in a summative post on the weekend. I will be doing this in an effort to open up a bit more, and to see how I’m learning in the moment as oppose to just once a project has been wrapped up. With that being said, here’s what this past week has looked like!

Now 5 weeks in to this crazy 10 week format of classes, it was time to switch things up a bit. We finished up our Marking History unit with Ms. Maxwell early in the week, and as Thursday rolled around, Ms. Willemse took the reins as we switched to being in class every day for English. Before we move on, if you haven’t already, I’d love for you to check out my post on our Marking History unit, its a good one!

Pics, Pamphlets, and Perspectives

Heading in to class Thursday afternoon, we got right down to business. There was already a literature assignment due that would help us hit the ground running. However not everyone had it completed, so some of us hit the ground, just not running…

Going in to class everyone knew we had some sort of English project in store for us, fuelled by Ms. Willemse’s fervent love for the subject. Before we got in to anything to literature-y though, we discussed something we weren’t all anticipating: the role and treatment of women throughout history. To propel our discussions, we were presented with a few videos. These videos ranged from SNL skits to Sex and the City clips, all tied together by some uncomfortably outdated words and phrases. The SNL skit we watched was the infamous “Jane, you ignorant s—t” clip, where Dan Aykroyd is engaged in a satirical debate with Jane Curtin and drops the s word on her…rather harshly. This clip demonstrates how times have changed, and it ignited quite the discussion between our class.

For the most part, I sat back and listened, as quite frankly, I didn’t want to say something that had the chance of offending someone. Now whether that is a healthy thought to have in a classroom or not, it’s something I have found myself thinking a lot about in regards to this project. By no means do I think I am someone who is always on the controversial side of an argument, but I do certainly tend to analyze both sides and perhaps play devils advocate more than could make people comfortable. I think this unit has a lot of potential for our class to engage in civil discussion, and maybe even discourse, which I would find to be helpful and informative for everyone involved. I’m looking forward to watching this unit unfold, as after all thats happened in just a couple days, I’m sure there is much more in store!