Friday, January 31st

Greetings, young philosophers! Please use the time today to set yourself up for NO HOMEWORK THIS WEEKEND!

TO-DO LIST

• Finish yesterday’s reading and journal entry (1.30)
• Finish Seminar Reflection/Post-write
• Turn in Seminar Prep if you haven't done so already.
• Catch up any missing starters and journals (Table of Contents)
• Keep reading Into the Wild: Final Lit Circle next Thursday!  Prewrite for ALL the remaining chapters!
• Read ahead to Walden excerpts (for Tuesday!)
• HONORS: If you are done with everything, ask James to sign out a copy of Cat's Cradle!

Thursday, January 30th

Starter 1.30: 

What might human beings find in the wild that they do not find in civilization?  (Relate your answer to the assigned chapters and/or to your own personal outdoor experiences.)

Lit circle meeting #2

Start a fresh document:  Make a copy of the protocol, share with all group members and Jessica.

GROUPS

The Human Connection to Nature:  Spiritual or Scientific?

1. Watch this video

2. Read "Take Two Hours of Pine Forest and Call me in the Morning"

(Printable version)

Journal 1.30

React to the content of the article and relate it to the bigger questions of our project and/or your own personal experience and/or philosophies.  What connections might you see between the scientific worldview and spiritual belief systems?

-OR-

Tell a story about an experience that you had in nature that had healing powers.

Wednesday, January 29th

via GIPHY


TO-DO!

1. Harold and Maude Seminar Reflection/Synthesis
• Please turn in seminar prep if you did not do so already!
2. Get ready for Lit Circle #2 meeting.  Finish assigned chapters and work on the pre-write.  Do we want to change the plans to consolidate the last two lit circles into one? That would mean that you must read 70 pages in one week.
3. On Monday, we will look at transcendentalism.  If you want to get a jump on your weekend homework, read Excerpts from Walden, in your reader on pages 53-55. 
4. Catch up any assignments from comp book
5. HONORS: Are you ready for another book?
6. Conference with Jessica about your work in my class or your life on Earth:)

Tuesday, January 28th

SEMINAR: Harold and Maude

SEMINAR GROUPS

When you are not in seminar, work on your post-write and/or read Into the Wild and work on pre-write for Thursday’s lit circle #2 meeting.

TURN IN YOUR SEMINAR PREP!!!

Seminar Post-write (due Wednesday midnight)

1.  Reflection/Self-Assess

• Reflect on the outcome of the seminar.  Consider your own performance and the seminar overall.  How did you do personally and how did the group do collectively?   Based on the rubric, what grade do you deserve on the seminar?
• React to your peers’ ideas (be specific) and the meaning you all constructed together.  Was there anything that enlightened you? Something you particularly disagree with? How did your thinking about the film change as a result of this seminar?

2.  Synthesis

• Make an interpretive claim about the film and support it with evidence.  Your claim may be something you develop further from your seminar prep, or it may be a new idea that you acquired during the seminar.  Write 2-3 paragraphs in support of your claim.
• RESOURCES ON MAKINGS CLAIMS
• Handout
• Powerpoint

Here is a link to some movie quotes that you may want to integrate into your synthesis.

Monday, January 27th

Seminar document

Harold and Maude Seminar Preview

• Film meets philosophy:  Intertextuality!!!  
• The film is a cult classic from the 1970’s starring Bud Cort and Ruth Gordon with an original soundtrack by Cat Stevens.
• We will watch the film with attention to the philosophical lenses we have been studying: existentialism and Aristotle’s Eudaimonia.
• You will annotate the film and answer seminar prep questions before Wednesday’s seminar.
• After the seminar, you will write a reflection and a synthesis.  The synthesis entails several TEA paragraphs based on a literary claim drawn from the seminar themes.
• SEMINAR PREP: due at the beginning of class tomorrow.

Film Screening:  Harold and Maude

Harold and Maude Seminar Prep 

Think of a film as a text.  Annotate it as you watch, analyze, look for evidence.  Refer to the specifics of the film in seminar!

AFTER THE MOVIE….Prepare answers to some or all of the following questions, using evidence from the film to support your answers.  Print out your seminar prep and bring it with you to the seminar.  

1. Is Harold and Maude an existentialist film?  

2. What are the roots of Harold’s angst and alienation?  How do his ideas about happiness and meaning evolve as a result of his relationship with Maude?  How does his character change?  

3. Has Maude has achieved Eudaimonia at the end of her life (deathbed question)?  Would Aristotle see her as having cultivated virtue and the Golden Mean? Or do you see her as an existentialist?

4. What message is this movie trying to transmit?  What might it be trying to teach us about Happiness and Meaning?  How does it impact you personally? Is it rhetorically effective for you?   

5.  Identify 2-3 impactful quotes from the film and explain their literary significance.

Friday, January 24

Starter 1.24:  
How are Aristotle’s ideas on Happiness and a Meaningful Life resonating with you?  What do you reject? What questions does it raise for you?

VIRTUES: 24 Character Strengths from Positive Psychology

MISSION:  Positive Psychology is the scientific study of the strengths that enable individuals and communities to thrive. The field is founded on the belief that people want to lead meaningful and fulfilling lives, to cultivate what is best within themselves, and to enhance their experiences of love, work, and play. 

(*The scholars who developed Positive Psychology have built upon Aristotle’s work!)

What “virtues” (character strengths) do we see on display from these people?

Journal 1.24: YOUR VIRTUOUS LIFE

Identify some of the ways you are exercising virtue in your life, using the table of Virtues and Vices and/or the 24 Character Strengths from Positive Psychology

• Choose 3 strengths that you feel guide you or are inextricably bound to your personal moral code. How does each add happiness/meaning to your life?
• Choose 3 you wish to improve in, in order to live a more happy and meaningful life. Explain how strengthening these attributes could lead to a more fulfilled sense of being.
• SHARE OUT WITH A PARTNER

WORK TIME: 
TURN IN YOUR COMP BOOK!

Read Into the Wild and work on pre-write for Lit Circle #2 (next Thursday)

OR:  (optional): Do additional research on positive psychology and how it might play a role in helping us lead a happier and more meaningful life

Start Harold and Maude?? Would you guys rather watch it all at once on Monday?

Thursday, January 23rd

Starter 1.23: What is your personal definition of “a life well-lived”?  At the end of your life, what do you hope to be able to look back and say?

Solo or with a partner, answer the following questions on a piece of paper or a Google doc. Share the doc with Jessica and be sure both partners' names are on it.

1. Define "Eudaimonia."  Google it beyond this reading.  Does this Google search add to your definition?  How might Aristotle's definition of happiness differ from the way Stanford researcher Jennifer Aaker defined it in the very first reading we did in this project? (see JOURNAL 1.7  on "The meaningful life is a road worth traveling") 

2. According to Aristotle, what makes humans different than the other forms of nature?  What does this difference have to do with the purpose of our existence and our pursuit of happiness?

3. For Aristotle, how do we live a happy and meaningful life?  What might this involve? Give specifics.

4. Explain the Golden Mean.  Use the table on the last page of your reading to help you understand it.  Look up any words on the table that you don't already know; annotate the meaning and add it to your vocabulary!

5.  What might an existentialist say to Aristotle's theory of a meaningful life?

LECTURE:  Aristotle’s Philosophy of Happiness and Meaning

Wednesday, January 22nd

Starter 1.22 (VERBAL PAIR SHARE): 

What worked well from the literature circle?  What might be improved about the protocol?

Review major take-aways and Jessica’s discussion questions.

• How is Into the Wild an “intertextual” work?  How does its intertextuality aid us in interpreting the meaning?
• Why do you think Chris (Alex) is yearning so strongly for this Alaskan adventure?
• Why does Franz lose his religion (p.60)?  Why might anyone?  

Four Corners

• The highest pursuit in human life is learning and attaining knowledge.
• In order to live a “good life,” we must do good deeds that develop our moral character.

READ "Background on Aristotle's Eudaimonia"

Tuesday, January 21st

Starter 1.21:  Read "A Brave and Startling Truth" by Maya Angelou.   REACT how you will.....
INTERPRET!  Make a claim and support it with evidence and analysis.  How might Angelou be weighing in on the existential questions?
-OR-
INTERTEXTUAL LIFE: pick a line or two you wish to make part of your intertextual being and explain why this is important to you.
-OR-
RESPOND in verse if you are feeling poetically inclined

SHARE OUT!!!
How might Angelou be weighing in on the existential questions?

LIT CIRCLE #1
Groups


For tomorrow:
Read "Background on Aristotle's Eudaimonia" (pg 27-32 in reader)

Friday, January 17th

Starter (verbal): In groups of 3, share your Stranger than Fiction analysis paragraph. Read them out loud to each other! Notice the different interpretations.

Share out! Discuss the philosophical connections as a whole group.

WORK TIME (Get 'er done!)

1. If you did not do so already, Journal 1.14 (Nietzche claim TEA paragraph)
2. Finish Journal 1.16 (Stranger than Fiction claim TEA paragraph).
3. Get ready for Tuesday’s literature circle meeting!  Read through page 60 and do the PREWRITE as outlined in the overview document.  Doing your prewrite electronically will facilitate your participation in the meeting.
4. Honors: Finish your seminar reflection and synthesis for The Stranger if you have not done so already.
5. If you are caught up with everything, you could begin the reading on our next philosophical topic: Background on Aristotle’s Eudaimonia (located on pages 27-31 of your reader).

TURN IN YOUR UPDATED COMP BOOK IF YOU HAVE NOT DONE SO ALREADY!!!

Thursday, January 16th

FINISH Stranger than Fiction

WORK TIME

1. If you did not do so already, Journal 1.14 (Nietzche claim TEA paragraph).
2. Finish Journal 1.16 (Stranger than Fiction claim TEA paragraph).
3. Catch up any starters and journals you are missing. (Table of Contents)
4. Get ready for Tuesday’s literature circle meeting!  Read through page 60 and do the PREWRITE as outlined in the overview document.  Doing your prewrite electronically will facilitate your participation in the meeting.
5. Honors: Finish your seminar reflection and synthesis for The Stranger if you have not done so already.
6. If you are caught up with everything, you could begin the reading on our next philosophical topic: Background on Aristotle’s Eudaimonia (located on pages 20-25 of your reader).

Jessica’s Journal 1.14 paragraph:

In this excerpt, Nietzsche suggests that one of the ways we can move closer to our own authenticity is to examine the passions that have made our soul sing. We must do so outside of the influence of others, looking rather at the ways those passions make us who we truly are.  He asks us to “compare these objects, see how they complement, enlarge, outdo, transfigure one another; how they form a ladder on whose steps you have been climbing up to yourself so far.”  Only when we visualize this ladder can we see ourselves in a clear light because, according to Nietzsche, “your true self does not lie buried deep within you, but rather rises immeasurably above you.”  Looking at ourselves in this way will help us transcend our existential angst.

Wednesday, January 15th

BIZ

ALL: Yes, you have to do the journal from yesterday that makes a claim about the Nietzsche excerpt. We will share these in class tomorrow, so please complete it!

HONORS: Yes, you have to write a seminar reflection. The guidelines can be found on the syllabus. Due Monday, January 20th at midnight.

Film Screening:  Stranger than Fiction

Take notes on philosophical and existential themes you see in this movie.  Try to capture quotes that might fit with those themes. (*Note the terms on the board) 

JOURNAL 1.16: Make an interpretive claim that connects this film to existentialism.  Write a TEA paragraph (or two or three!) that supports the claim with evidence from the film.

Terms/ideas to consider:

• Meaninglessness
• Existential crisis
• Existence precedes essence
• The absurd
• Absurd hero
• Angst
• Alienation
• Freedom/Free will (vs. determinism?)
• Acceptance of one’s own absurd condition
• Authenticity

Questions to consider: 

• Where might this film come down on “Free Will Vs. Determinism” debate?
• Is Harold Crick an absurd hero?
• What does Ms. Eiffel represent?  How might Harold becoming aware of her voice relate to existentialism?
• How does Harold’s angst impact his perspective on his own life?
• What or who might Dustin Hoffman represent? (think about his advice to Harold about pancakes AND to accept his death...)
• What might this film be saying about living an authentic life?
• HONORS:  How does Stranger than Fiction relate to The Stranger? In what ways are Meursault and Harold Crick similar? 

Tuesday, January 14th

Starter 1.14: Journal for 10 minutes in response to the following poem (on page 19 in the reader if you want to annotate!).  Or write a poem back. Or just react. In light of everything we have been studying lately, where does this poem hit you?

Mary Oliver, The Summer Day

  Who made the world?

  Who made the swan, and the black bear?

  Who made the grasshopper?

  This grasshopper, I mean--

  the one who has flung herself out of the grass,

  the one who is eating sugar out of my hand,

  who is moving her jaws back and forth instead of up and down--

  who is gazing around with her enormous and complicated eyes.

  Now she lifts her pale forearms and thoroughly washes her face.

  Now she snaps her wings open, and floats away.

  I don't know exactly what a prayer is.

  I do know how to pay attention, how to fall down

  into the grass, how to kneel down in the grass,

  how to be idle and blessed, how to stroll through the fields,

  which is what I have been doing all day.

  Tell me, what else should I have done?

  Doesn't everything die at last, and too soon?

  Tell me, what is it you plan to do

  with your one wild and precious life?

Mini-workshop on making interpretive claims about literature

HONORS: Let’s talk literature!  The Stranger seminar

TO-DO

1. JOURNAL 1.14:  Make an (interpretive) claim about the Nietzsche excerpt.  Connect it to one (or more) of the principles of existentialism we studied yesterday.  Select a quote from Nietzsche to support the claim. Analyze the quote! ONE TEA PARAGRAPH! 
• Existentialism Review. Review my Existentialism Lecture for reference.
2. Catch up on any other readings or journals that you have fallen behind in.
3. Read ahead to the next philosophy! (located on pages 27-32 of your reader):  Background on Aristotle’s Eudaimonia
4. Read Into the Wild.  Be prepared for next  Tuesday’s first literature circle meeting.

Monday, January 13th

Starter 1.13: DanIsNotonFire

• What do you think existentialism is at this point?
• Did DanIsNotOnFire terrify you?  How are you feeling about studying this topic?  Are you worried you might spill milk all over the counter while making cereal one morning?  If so, there’s no use crying over spilt milk. 

PAIR SHARE: Reactions to Taylor, “The Meaning of Life”

• Can you make any intertextual connections between this reading and the other content from last week?  Draw conclusions about common threads of meaning you might see.  
• What do you think about Taylor’s claim that “The meaning of life is from within us, it is not bestowed from without, and it far exceeds in both its beauty and permanence any heaven of which men have ever dreamed or yearned for.”

Existentialism Lecture

Journal 1.13:  Reflections on Existentialism

• Which pieces of existentialism are you attracted to?  Repulsed by?
• Do any of these tenets have a place in your own personal philosophy? 
• With which quote do you agree more?  Macbeth’s “Tomorrow” speech or Dylan Thomas’ “Do not go gentle into that good night”?

Honors:  We will seminar on The Stranger tomorrow during the second half of class.  If you are doing Honors Book Club for Honors credit, please complete the seminar prep as described in the Honors syllabus.

EXTRA TIME?: Into the Wild! Prepare for next week's Lit Circle meeting!

Friday, January 10th

Starter 1.10: Interpret the song and react.  What might it mean? What intellectual and/or emotional impact do the lyrics and music have on you? (philosophically speaking…) Can you connect it intertextually to Macbeth? To "Shades"?

Pink Floyd “Time” (lyrics)

Ticking away, the moments that make up a dull day

Fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way

Kicking around on a piece of ground in your hometown

Waiting for someone or something to show you the way

Tired of lieing in the sunshine

Staying home to watch the rain

And you are young and life is long

And there is time to kill today

And then one day you find

Ten years have got behind you

No one told you when to run

You missed the starting gun

And you run, and you run to catch up with the sun, but it's sinking

And racing around, to come up behind you again

The sun is the same in a relative way, but you're older

Shorter of breath, and one day closer to death

Every year is getting shorter, never seem to find the time

Plans that either come to naught, or half a page of scribbled lines

Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way

The time has come, the song is over

Thought I'd something more to say

(Breathe Reprise)

Home, home again

I like to be here when I can

When I come home cold and tired

It's good to warm my bones beside the fire

Far away, across the fields

The tolling of the iron bell

Calls the faithful to their knees

to hear the softly spoken magic spell....

TED Talk:  Why does the universe exist?

Key terms

Ontology:  (simply) the philosophical study of the nature of being, becoming, existence, or reality

Deity:  God, goddess or divine being

Transcript, if you want to follow along, review, or translate....

Takes notes on the following in your comp book....

What different explanations does Holt mention that humans use to explain why the universe exists?

Which explanation does he arrive at?

JOURNAL 1.10 Why Does the Universe Exist?

REACT!  Review the transcript if you need to.  Which pieces of his discussion do you agree with?  Which do you reject? What do you personally believe about the universe and its existence?  If you don't really know yet (as many don't), use this journal entry to wonder in words...

TO-DO

Reading Time: Pages 15-24 in your reader: “The Meaning of Life” Richard Taylor

Check out a copy of Into the Wild?

Honors: Read The Stranger! Seminar Tuesday! See Honors Syllabus for the seminar prep assignment.