It is the fifth response, right? Thats a little bit hard to believe. It seems like I just wrote one of these responses... because, wait, I totally did. There's been a week (I think?) of school since the last response, but somehow we still managed to get a lot done, as usual.
When we came back from our extended break, our class still hadn't figured out a theme statement for Hamlet. I wasn't particularly surprised, because there was a lot left to cover and it all seemed terribly confusing to me. Personally, I still think we could talk a lot more about the play, but I don't know that many people would want to (myself included) because we've been talking about it for a very long time. However, our discussions as we tried to come up with a theme were really helpful! I really liked the way only having six key scenes to answer our plot question forced us to really get involved in our arguments about choosing said scenes.
Our class decided that the main question of the plot was whether or not Hamlet would choose a path. After a lot of debate, we decided that the six most important scenes that contributed to this question and its answer were:
- The first encounter with the ghost, in which the question is presented and Hamlet realizes two of his paths (killing Claudius or letting him live),
- The play, during which Hamlet decides that Claudius is guilty,
- "To be or not to be," when Hamlet debates suicide as another path to choose,
- Claudius' praying scene, where Hamlet has the opportunity to choose once and for all but fails to do so,
- The meeting with Fortinbras' army, where Hamlet resolves to kill Claudius, and
- "Fall of a sparrow," where Hamlet accepts that in order to kill Claudius he too must die.
Next, we made a list of the motifs in the play, and found that they fell under four main categories (I don't remember all of them but identity and control were two big ones). Those motifs contributed to our theme, which I really like: "In Hamlet, Shakespeare warns that when you don't know who you are you are unable to effectively exercise moral judgement."
I was gone for the last two days, but I assume that, like the day before, they were spent working on the study guide for the test. I'm a little disappointed that we didn't end up doing a project, because I think it would have been a lot of fun, but I think a test will work out just fine. From looking at the collaborative study guide I think that will really help me prepare, so I'm not too worried!
Emma,
ReplyDeleteI also thought that writing out the central conflict and choosing six important scenes was helpful. We have used just motifs the last two times, but the addition was great and added to discussion.
Our two classes came up with completely different scenes and central questions, but we still managed to have similar motifs and theme statements. I think this is a testament to the idea that pieces of literature have one main theme that is backed up by evidence and includes all the aspects of the piece.
Despite my desire to finish Hamlet quicker, I thought the time we spent on it was necessary to understanding the whole play. I think the other pieces were less complicated and did not have an added issue of unfamiliar language.
Remember to make connections to things outside of the class.
Good job!
The only thing you missed in this post is to connect things to your life outside of school but overall its really good. I like how you included the six scenes that your class came up with as well. I would like to know more about your experience with the collaborative review, I personally had a little bit of trouble with it because I have sixth hour so there was so much information on it by the time I looked I had trouble adding. We did it so many days as well that I think it was way more in depth than what we actually needed for the test. I was also disappointed we didn't do a project, I was really looking forward to it and it sounded really open ended and fun. I really liked how we could hear your voice in this post! Great job on another post!
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