|
LESSON PLANS:
 Setting the Stage
Perception of the Viewer
Reflections on Leadership
Dangerous Negotiations
Voices of Memory
OTHER EPISODES:
Cold War I Home
Bay of Pigs
Citizen Kurchatov
Berlin Crisis
SITE CREDITS
|
 |
In the dark times, will there also be singing?
Yes, there will be singing
About the dark times.
-- Bertolt Brecht
The aesthetic voices of an historical period follow their experiences, their thoughts, their dreams. Sometimes, this is into shadowed landscapes and other times into realms of light. But always, it is the expression of self and time. The voices do not necessarily articulate a political position, but they can lift the mask of distance from history and reveal the human face of experience, articulated reflection, and authentic perspective.
The ability to penetrate aesthetic expression is a critical one, linked pivotally to documentation and data. Strong thinkers need to hear the human voices of history and place them into both larger and personal landscapes. Historical thinkers need to link the Voices of Memory to discover the patterns of human interaction, conflict, and history. In that way, learners penetrate the truths of time to build their own capabilities to understand and influence others, events, and history. They accept the deep responsibilities of memory.
- Students will analyze poetic works related to historical events and write a personal creative piece related to history, a manuscript reflective of an historical event, person, or process.
- Application of data within an artistic and personal process of creative expression
- Synthesizing critical thinking through exploration of the relationship within the interactions of an historical event, person, or process and the influences upon thought, people, and events within history.
- Utilization of resources from a variety of different mediums.
- Application of materials from different mediums to the analytical and creative thought processes.
- Experience the process of sharing and presenting creative work.
|
LANGUAGE ARTS STANDARDS
from McREL Standards database at www.mcrel.org
View related standards>>
Writing and Reading
- Uses the general skills and strategies of the writing process
- Uses the stylistic and rhetorical aspects of writing
- Uses the grammatical and mechanical conventions in written manuscript
- Gathers and uses information for research purposes
- Uses the general skills and strategies of the writing process
- Uses the general skills and strategies of the reading process
- Uses reading skills and strategies to understand and interpret a variety of texts
|
Viewing, Listening, Speaking, and Media
- Uses listening and speaking strategies for different purposes
- Uses viewing skill and strategies to understand and interpret visual media
- Understands the characteristics and components of the media
|
HISTORY UNDERSTANDING STANDARDS
from McREL Standards database at www.mcrel.org
View related standards>>
Historical Understanding Standards
- Understands and knows how to analyze chronological relationships and patterns
- Understands the historical perspective
|
LIFE SKILLS STANDARDS
from McREL Standards database at www.mcrel.org
View related standards>>
Thinking and Reasoning Standards
- Understands and applies the basic principles of presenting an argument
- Understands and applies basic principles of logic and reasoning
- Effectively uses mental processes that are based on identifying similarities and differences
|
WORKING WITH OTHERS STANDARDS
from McREL Standards database at www.mcrel.org
View related standards>>
Working with Others Standards
- Contributes to the overall effort of a group
- Works well with diverse individuals in diverse situations
- Displays effective interpersonal communication skills
- Understands and demonstrates leadership skills
|
- A copy of the educational version of the Yalta Conference, a television, and a VCR
- A copy or access to work within the poetry collection, Against Forgetting: Twentieth Century Poetry of Witness. Edited and with an Introduction by Carolyn Forche
- A copy or access to Unsettling America: An Anthology of Contemporary Multicultural Poetry. Edited by Maria Mazziotti Gillan and Jennifer Gillan.
- Computers with Internet access
- Computers with word processing program
- Computers with art/image manipulation software such as Adobe PhotoShop or PaintShop Pro.
- Computers with presentation software such as Microsoft PowerPoint
- Pencil and paper
|
|
The time required for completion of this lesson is dependent upon the teacher and students' backgrounds in the craft of reading, analyzing, and writing poetry as well as in presentation software, art software, and Internet protocols.
|
- View in class with your students the two segments associated with Lesson 5 of the educational version of the Yalta Conference
- Allow time for discussion and reflection upon specific, key parts of the Yalta Conference video related to segments that reflect upon the direct effect of historical events upon people, cultures, and individuals. For example, reference portions such as the segment where David Reynolds (segment 1) indicates that "Churchill feels particular responsibility for Poland" and the perspective offered by the commentator that the Poles and Russians were "mortal enemies" where just six months before, Stalin did not act when the Germans annihilated the underground resistance, and the images and data offered concerning Warsaw where 65,000 Poles died."
- Accompany a viewing of the documentary segment, with exploration of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum web site at http://www.ushmm.org/
- In exploring the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's resources, direct students to the web site's segment
www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/szyk/
where there is an on-line collection of the art of Polish-born Jewish artist Arthur Szyk, whose artwork exposed persecution and urged international intervention. Encourage exploration and discussion of the relationships of metaphor, event, and personalized reflection.
- In exploring the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's resources, direct students to the web site's segment, Music of the Holocaust,
www.ushmm.org/museum/exhibit/online/music/
Songs in this segment arose from the ghettos, resistance forces, and concentrations camps of Nazi-controlled Europe. Encourage the exploration of creative expression and historical influence.
- Allow time for personal as well as group exploration of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's site. Encourage analytical linkages and references back to the events and influences documented in the video The Yalta Conference. To assist students in staying oriented to the timeline of events in the Yalta Conference documentary, reference students to the on-line timelines at
- Plan time to allow students to bring together intellectual as well as personal perspectives on the powerful human conflict and human cost underlying and influencing the events of the Yalta Conference. Permit time for individuals and groups to share findings and reflections to the class.
- Nobel prize-winning poet Czeslaw Milosz lived in Warsaw during the German occupation. He speaks of the burden of memory in his poem, "In Warsaw," as he states "five hands/Seize my pen and order me to write/The story of their lives and deaths."
- Read his poem, "Child of Europe," found on pages 439 through 442 in the collection, Against Forgetting: Twentieth Century Poetry of Witness."
- If you do not have the collection, go online to the Academy of American Poets' site where background and three, selected poems of Milosz are available in both Polish and English at
www.poets.org/poets/
poets.cfm?45442B7C000C040409
- Explore on-line, Milosz's work, "A Poem for the End of the Century."
- Osip Mandelstam, the Warsaw-born Russian poet, died in a transit camp near Vladivostok after both exile and time in a labor camp. His work has been translated by the Pultizer prize-winning poet, W.S. Merwin. Read Mandelstam's two, short pieces, "The Stalin Epigram" and "Mounds of human heads" on pages 122 and 13 of Against Forgetting: Twentieth Century Poetry of Witness.
If you do not have the collection, read "On the Pale Blue Enamel" on-line where twenty four of Osip Mandelstam's poems are available at
http://www.poets.org/poets/
poets.cfm?45442B7C000C01040C
- Irene Kepfitz is a living poet, who was an infant in Poland during the Warsaw Uprising. She and her mother were hidden and saved by peasants. Her poem, "These words are dedicated to those who died" is placed in sharp and revealing contrast to her piece, "These words are dedicated to those who survived" in Against Forgetting: Twentieth Century Poetry of Witness. Her short prose poem, "Poland: My mother is walking down a road," is a piece with powerful, reflective imagery and statement. Read her materials to gain another powerful, personal perspective on the rippling effects documented in the video of The Yalta Conference.
- An additional powerfully personal reflection of event and influence is found in Gregg Shapiro's "Tattoo," with its powerful, opening lines, "My father won't talk about the numbers/3-7-8-2-5 between the wrist and elbow/blue as blood on his left forearm." Gregg Shapiro, born and raised in Illinois, is of Russian, Hungarian, and Polish descent. His poem, "Tattoo," is on pages 34 and 35 of the collection Unsettling America: An Anthology of Contemporary Multicultural Poetry.
- Learners should plan peer discussion and poetry reading groups to build their understanding and exploration of creative voices responding to powerful, historical events and influences. During discussion, the group should identify influential events, responses, emotions, and intellectual concepts as reflected in their reading.
- Reflecting on the video, student groups should discuss the events surrounding the Yalta Conference agreement, identifying the historical influences affecting specific elements and compromises. The text of the agreements reached at the Crimea (Yalta) Conference between President Roosevelt, Prime Minister Churchill and Generalissimo Stalin can be obtained on the Internet at the Yale Law School link
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/wwii/yalta.htm
- To bring personal meaning to concept, students should select an historical (it should be acceptable to utilize any element from the documentary or the assigned readings or to select outside of the documentary and assigned readings) event of historical or personal significance to respond to in a creative piece of poetry or prose poem.
- Students should brainstorm and write a personal, creative work through both individual and collaborative writing process with time permitted for personal writing, peer workshop, review, editing, and final polishing of the manuscript.
- Final manuscripts should be submitted to the instructor.
- Additionally, students should plan to present their creative piece to the class. This can be in the form of multimedia presentations, poetry readings, or performance art presentations.
- Collaborative process should be utilized in the creative sharing of resources and ideas during the writing process as well as the presentation preparation process.
- Collaborative process should be utilized in the technology-skills development needed for the creation of an effective multimedia presentation.
- Emphasize that media skills to evoke, instruct, and persuade should be reflected in an effective poetry reading, performance art presentation, or multimedia presentation.
|
|
- Students might wish to have a poetry reading as well as lead discussions on the historical and personal perspectives of their creative manuscripts to an English or history class in school
- Students can be encouraged to polish their creative manuscripts to a quality that can be published on-line or in the school or local newspaper.
- Student poetry and prose poems can be collected together and published on a class CD-ROM.
- Student poetry and prose poems as well as any PowerPoint interpretations and presentation work can be printed out and made into a class notebook.
|
Writing is a struggle against silence.
-- Carlos Fuentes
|
|
