| Outcomes |
Teaching
strategies |
Student
activities |
| 11. A student
analyses and synthesises information and ideas into sustained and
logical argument for a range of purposes and audiences. |
Questions
- Who came
as migrants?
- Where did
they come from?
- Why did they
come?
- Where did
they settle?
Resources
Department
of Immigration & Multicultural & Indigenous Affairs web
site www.immi.gov.au
- Research
Migration on the Internet
- Check
resources in the school library.
|
Brainstorm
For
each question, each student lists information found on butcher’s
paper
Research in
groups
- Australian
post-WWII migration
- White Australia
policy.
Each group shares
their information from the research visually and verbally. |
| 9. A student engages
with the details of text in order to develop a considered and informed
personal response.
4. A student uses
language relevant to the study of English. |
Feliks
Skrzynecki
Read the poem aloud to the students a few times.
Focus
on language
Focus on particular features and model how to explain to students,
for example:
The first line
begins with the personal pronoun “my” that illustrates a particular
relationship between the composer and the subject.
The adjective “gentle”
helps to define the way the composer feels about his father.
|
Brainstorm
in groups
- How does
the speaker feel about the man he is describing?
For example: admiration, love, understanding,
sympathy; optimism, nostalgia,
- Underline
the words in the text that influence your decision.
For example: -“gentle”; “my”; “loved his garden as an only child”;
“but I’m alive”;
-“Always shook hands too violently”
-“like a dumb prophet,/ Watched me pegging my tents/ Further and
further south of Hadrian’s Wall.
Group work
questions
- What evidence
can you find in the poem to tell you that this attitude is maintained
throughout the poem?
- What does
the simile describing the garden as “an only child” tell us about
the garden and the man?
|
6. A student
interprets texts using key language patterns and structural features.
11. A student analyses
and synthesises information and ideas into sustained and logical argument
for a range of purposes and audiences.
9. A student engages
with the details of text in order to develop a considered and informed
personal response.
|
Crossing
the Red Sea
Introduce the concept of displacement. Divide the word into
three syllables:
dis/place/ment and
encourage student responses about how to go about working out its
meaning.
When we think of
displacement we often think of the negative sense of the word. It
conjures up images of whole races of people being dispersed and dispossessed.
Such stories abound in the Bible and throughout history.
Introduce the Biblical
story of Moses crossing the Red Sea and the significance this had
for the Jewish people. It was a symbol of liberation and divine intervention. Explain
the chaos presented in the first section. Highlight the images of
confusion from the poem. |
Pair work
What can you tell about the word when divided into three syllables?
Without using your dictionary, write down a meaning.
Example answer: When the
prefix ‘dis’ is placed in front of a word, it negates that word. “Dis”
is a Latin prefix that means ‘apart, away, removed from, expulsion,
not’
Research displacement in history
- Research
the history of the Israelites in Egypt at the library and on the
Internet. Present the information to the rest of the class focussing
on aspects of displacement that the situation touches on.
- refugees
in the modern world.
Presentation of findings to whole class
In your presentation,
answer the question: What are some of the effects of displacement?
Consider that a lot of ESL students have experienced being cut off
from their own culture, and should easily draw on their own situation
to provide a list. For
example, exile; dispossessed of culture; family broken up; assimilation
of new culture; language acquisition; fragmentation of social groups;
search for new identity: who am I?
|
5. A student demonstrates
understanding of how audience and purpose affect the language and
structure of texts.
1. A student demonstrates
understanding of how relationships between composer, responder, text
and context shape meaning.
|
10
Mary Street
Read Sydney Morning Herald article, “Mary Street and Me”(Jan
8,1997).
Consider:
- structure/language
elements
- tone/purpose
- audience/responder.
Read the poem aloud
to the class.
Focus
questions
Explain the poem by inviting class discussion through the following:
- How is the
rhythm of the daily routine suggested?
- As in Feliks,
there is a strong sense of the warmth and affection that the composer
has for his parents. How are these emotions captured in the language?
|
Group work
question
- How is the
information presented?
- Is Skrzynecki’s
perspective clear?
- What is his
perspective?
Task
Write a short “instant reaction” of about six lines.
Note
taking on focus questions
Question 1, for example:
All of the following suggest routine:
- repetition
of “For nineteen years”
- use of “hum-drum”
- simile “like
a well oiled lock
Question 2, for
example: There’s
a sense of safety/security in:
- simile “Like
adopted children” reveals nurturing nature of parents
- warm imagery
of home in “heated discussions and embracing gestures”;
- juxtaposition
of him “ravaging” the garden whilst his parents nurtured it.
|
11. A student
analyses and synthesises information and ideas into sustained and
logical argument for a range of purposes and audiences.
4. A student uses
language relevant to the study of English.
5. A student demonstrates
understanding of how audience and purpose affect the language and
structure of texts.
|
Migrant
hostel
Read short story, “The day that lasted forever”, by Peter Skrzynecki
in DUTTON, G, (Ed.) (1992) Country childhoods, University of
Queensland Press; 1992, pp106-116.
Read a report on
refugee resettlement:
HEALY, J. (Ed.) Issues in society: refugees and illegal immigrants, 2000, The
Spinney Press.
Read the
poem aloud to the class.
Divide the class
into 4 groups and allocate one stanza to each group.
Focus questions
- How does
the poet give the responder a sense of the migrants’ anonymity?
- How is security
suggested?
- What is the
poet’s perspective of the migrant hostel? What aspects of language
reveal this?
Model how to make
notes on poems before getting students to do so. Use the following
areas of:
- subject/
theme
- content
- atmosphere/
mood
- language
features
- purpose
- tone
- outstanding
features
- perspective.
|
Group work questions
- What is the
story about?
- Where is
it set?
- What is the
perspective of the composer?
- How do you
know this from the language?
Task
What are some of the issues relating to migrant
resettlement in this country?
Collect articles
from newspapers and magazines on: refugees and resettlement; the
plight of illegal migrants.
Groups retell
main points to the class.
Group work on stanzas
Each group is to mime the events of their stanza to the class.
Note-taking
on focus questions
Question 1, for example:
- through
the imagery of the opening of the poem: “No one kept count/ Of
all the comings and goings”.
Question 2, for
example:
- through the
sustained imagery of birds; “like a homing pigeon…always sensing
a change” reveals insecurity and uncertainty of the future.
Question 3, for
example:
- Through the
use of a simile to describe the barrier gate to the hostel area,
“As it rose and fell like a finger”, the responder feels that
the hostel is cut off from real life, separate and therefore preventing
interaction.
Group
work
On butcher’s paper write down the significant features of the poem
by using the areas modelled by the teacher. Use class notes and
handouts, as well as your own ideas. |
6. A student interprets
texts using key language patterns and structural features.
12. A student draws
upon the imagination to transform experience and ideas into text.
1. A student demonstrates
understanding of how relationships between composer, responder, text
and context shape meaning.
|
Kornelia
Woloszczuk
Dictogloss activity
Brainstorm some ideas. Read the poem aloud to the class three times,
at normal pace. In pairs or groups students take notes and then
reconstruct what they have heard in a paragraph that is meaningful.
Discuss the ideas
in the poem. For example:
- water imagery
- violent images
- feelings
of inadequacy expressed by the person.
Focus
questions
1. What has caused the division between mother and son?
2. What perspective
does the poet have on his role as son?
3. What techniques
does the poet use to suggest Kornelia’s loneliness and isolation? |
Dictogloss
Students:
- listen
to the first reading.
- take notes
on the second and third readings
- work together
to write sentences and a paragraph, combining their notes
- write
their paragraph on OHT to show to class
- take part
in discussing positives and weaknesses in student texts.
Representation
Design a collage that represents the perspective that the poet presents
through his images and feelings. Use photos and words from magazines,
your own illustrations, graphics, quotations, symbols, etc.
Note-taking
on focus questions
Question 1, for
example:
- cultural
displacement seen through the use of rhetorical questioning, as
in, “Where did I go wrong?”
- guilt, can’t
live up to expectations, as in “children who forget you”.
Question 2, for
example:
- “Walking/
Behind her”
- disturbed
natural imagery of “darkness of storms”
Question 3, for
example:
- negativity,
alienation of “dragging ...swamp”.
|
| 2. A student describes
and explains different relationships among texts.
|
Chronic
ward
Access online the Sydney Morning Herald www.smh.com.au and read the newspaper article
“Crib fight goes from bad to worse”.
Read the poem aloud
to the class a few times.
Divide the class
into three groups and give each group a stanza from the poem.
|
Group work
- How can you predict that this poem will be different from the
others set for study?
- What
similarities are there between the movie and the poem?
- How can the
migrant experience of alienation be applied to this poem?
Dictionary
work
Find meanings for the word “chronic”.
Underline
or highlight
The images that suggest this poem is in a hospital and is
about mentally disturbed people.
Brainstorm and what is occurring in each stanza and report to the class.
What perspectives
are presented?
What techniques are used to convey these perspectives? |
8. A student
adapts a variety of textual forms to different purposes, audiences
and contexts in all modes.
1. A student demonstrates
understanding of how relationships between composer, responder, text
and context shape meaning .
|
Post
card
Discuss the type of idealised images that appear on postcards:
always glossy, colourful.
Short questions
for student pairs:
- What does
a postcard mean to you?
- Why do people
send them instead of letters?
- What is the
purpose and the nature of their content?
- What type
of language is used?
- Read the
poem aloud to the class a few times.
Cloze activity:
Redistribute a copy of the poem with every 12th word deleted. Provide a gloss in a box at the top.
Focus
questions
- What does
the description reveal about Skrzynecki’s perspective?
- What is the
effect of the composer addressing Warsaw as if it were a person?
- Why has he
chosen the word “Haunts”? What connotations does it have?
- How
would you describe the feeling at the end of the poem- is it one
of hope or despair? Find a quote to support you opinion.
|
Using
realia and personal accounts
Students bring in examples of postcards to demonstrate the type
of glossy pictures and use of language typical in such texts.
Mindmap
Students in pairs quickly share answers to questions, for example:
- language:
colloquial, descriptive
- purpose:
personal, brief.
Choose three words
from the poem that best illustrate the composer’s perspective.
Make a list of
the physical features of Warsaw as depicted in the postcard.
eg. “Red buses….high
rise flats, park borders, river, sky”.
Cloze
activity
Note taking on focus questions
Question
2, for example:
Warsaw is personified, talked about as an old friend, someone he should
know very well, but doesn’t. Skrzynecki knows this place only from
a picture and from what he has heard; he is removed from it personally.
Question 4, for
example:
“We will meet before you die”.
The tree signals
the end of insularity-a connection, however slim, is made. |
| |
Final
wrap up lesson
Look at the endings of all of his poems.
|
Class
discussion
The endings of the poems are all paradoxical, suggesting an ambiguity
he feels about the two cultures. |
