11.05 - Theme in Harrison Bergeron, Lisbon Bond Orders

We started today's class with the class working in three small groups. Each group was tasked with identifying and discussing a theme related to a specific concept (equality, government, the individual) in "Harrison Bergeron." These themes were then shared out and discussed with the class. The themes that were identified were as follows:

(click image to enlarge)

We then transitioned to looking at where careful reading and critical thinking skills are really important in life beyond high school: voting. Specifically, we were taking a look at the bond questions on this year's ballot in Lisbon.

In looking at these bonds, we read the bonds and then everyone received a typed copy of each bond, an article about bond question 1 (re: the Worumbo mill), and questions that analyze these bond questions.

Documents:
Article on the Worumbo Mill bond (link)
Typed bond questions (document)
Response Sheet (document)

For bond order question 1, everyone is to read the article and determine some of the arguments for and against the town buying the mill and then explain what they think is best to do based on arguments presented in the article and culled from their own experiences.

For bond order questions 2 OR 3, everyone is identifying significant language in the question to help figure out exactly what the question is asking and then explaining how this fits within the context of the question. The idea here is that understanding the question is half the battle and decoding language is key.

In class, partner groups looked at bond order 1 and then were assigned either bond order 2 or 3. If you are making this assignment up, just look at bond order 2.

Note: The questions on the response sheet do ask what people think the best choice is for the options listed. The questions were intended to be phrased in a manner which was not specifically asking how anyone particularly would vote though we acknowledged in class that this is a very slight difference. I was available to construct different questions for anyone who felt uncomfortable giving their perspective on the matter. I did talk about viewing discussion around voting and what the right choice is as a way to have dialogue and learn more about a topic, not a way to convince someone that your own view is correct. For the assignment there is no right or wrong answer, responses are assessed based on evidence and discussion of language (see rubrics on the response sheet).

Everyone had until the end of the period to work on this assignment. At the end we talked a little bit about the bond order questions. We will recap this reading tomorrow in class.

Homework:

Continue to study the unit one roots and prefixes for the review quiz on Friday.

If you did not do so today in class, finish responding to the questions on the response sheet for the bond order questions.