Overview of last week (03/24/14 - 03/28/14)

Hey english bunnies,

For the last time to give an overview of the past week is it my turn to do so.

On Monday we had two discussions, one about the worst fate of all the tributes and one political question.

The first discussion was not that good actually but the task was as said before who has got the worst fate of all the tributes. We came to the conclusion that Johanna has the worst fate because she acts strong but is actually that much damaged in a mental way.

The second discussion was about the question if the novel "The Hunger Games" were an appropriate way to show the reader - here mostly young people - how war effects the society and individuals.

Since some or most of the course misunderstood the task the discussion was a bit mixed up.

Nevertheless we can say that the novel shows the effect on the society and the individuals especially for the young people.

That's it for Monday.

Now an overview about the last topic: Happy End or Sad End?

Coincindentally it was also my week.

We started with the definition of a happy end:

A happy end is an ending of the plot of a work of fiction in which almost everything turns out for the best for the protagonist, their sidekicks and almost everyone except the villains.

Then you should decide who has a happy end and who not.

happy end:

• districts (rebels)
• Plutarch Heavensbee

sad end:

• Capitol/Snow
• Coin

happy and sad end:

• Gale
• Peeta
• Haymitch
• Katniss

After that you should do several tasks on Haymitch and Peeta (happy end).
Then you should work on Snow/Capitol and Alma Coin (sad end).


On Thursday we worked on Katniss' ending and happy endings in dystopian novels. We can say that in dystopian novels there is no real happy end for the protagonist only for the other people. The protagonists risk their life so other people in the society can live in peace and in freedom. This automatically does not mean that the system changes from dystopia to utopia.


I hope that this overview helps you a bit for the upcoming abitur-exams and the overviews of all the Semester which will follow.
Have a nice day everyone!

Overview of last week (03/17/2014 - 03/21/2013)

Hey bunnies, Kreachers-Week! ;)

This is the last time for me to do the blog and i have the pleasure to give an overview of the week in which Tante Schütt had his birthday. :D

But first of all to our topics in this week:

On monday we started the week with the new group which had to present something about the tributes' stories in the Hunger Games (coincidentally it was my own week :D).

We started with Peeniss (for Weih-oh: Katniss & Peeta) and the first task was to complete the profile of the tributes and after that we prepared three questions about each of the tributes.

Katniss:

We focused on her mental condition. We found out that most of the time she is not to 100% aware of the effect she has. But still there are moments where she is aware of her effect, examples for that would be:

1. When she puts the flowers arrount Rue in the arena
2. When she saves Peeta with the berries
3. When she visited the hospital in district 8

We found out that Katniss' mental condition changed after the Hunger Games again. Before the HG she had to grow up really fast because of her fathers death. After the HG she got traumatized, because she had to kill other tributes.

Peeta:

We focused on Peetas' mental condition and his torture through the Capitol. The Capitol uses him for their propaganda to influence the rebellion and especially Katniss. They don´t use Johanna, because she doesn't have the same influence on Katniss.

Back in the rebellion Peeta was send into the "star squad", because Coin wanted to show the Capitol that Peeta is actually fighting for the rebellion and not for the Capitol. Another aspect was that Coin did not like Katniss at all and she didn't care about the dangers for Katniss.

Peeta is probably not completely rehabilitated, because the trauma is to intense. In the end he still somtimes asks "True or False?".

On tuesday we had time to talk about Haymitch, Johanna, Finnick and Beetee.

Haymitch:

We found out that Hamitch is on the one side caring for the people he likes and for his tributes. On the other side he is very repellent, because he doesn't want to lose someone he loves through the Capitol again.

The way he deals with this trauma is that he drinks a lot of alcohol and has to sleep with the light on and a knife under his pillow.

Johanna:

Her mental condition is on one side very strong but on the other side it is very weak. She lost all her loved ones, because she didn't cooperate with the Capitols plans after she won the 71st Hunger Games. You can notice her weak side when she is talking about her loved ones or when she is confronted with water after her torture in the Capitol. Still she is very strong because she is trying to act normal and wants to fight against the Capitol no matter what. Because of her trauma she becomes a morfix addict.

The healing process of Johanna is diffrent to Peetas because she is not supposed to act in front of an cameras so the Capitol does't care about her appearance. That is the reason why her hair was cut off.

Finnick:

In the second lesson we focused on Finnick and Annies wedding and their mental conditions.
The wedding was for both something special and they were able to live together until Finnick was send into the "star squad" and had to fight in the Capitol. Unfortunately Finnick died in this fight. After Finnicks death Annie had to take care of their son and her whole life alone.

Finnick was an important character in the novel, because he told the secrets such as Snows way of dealing with rivals.

Beetee:

Last but not least we talked about Beetees relationship with Wiress and if he was a slave of the Caopitol or if he is a slave of president Coin.
We compared the relationship between Beetee and Wiress with the relationship of Sheldon and Amy. Similar would be that Beetee and Wiress as well as Sheldon and Amy share the same interests. Also it seems like Beetee and Wiress have a strong bond between them, because Beetee is able to finish Wiress' sentences.

He has to cope Wiress' loss, but since Coin has tasks for Beetee in mind he is able to focus on something else.

Unfortunately we had no englishlessons on thursday, because Tante Schütt celebrated his birthday on wednesday (he got very old and is now the oldest male-tante i've ever seen :D). No hornestly he looks like he got 16 *cough* :P.

That's it for now! ;) I hope you had a wonderful weekend and don't forget to do your part of the overview for all our semesters.

Summary of the week 03-10-14 - 03-14-14 !!!!!

Hey bunnies..

I`m really sorry that I needed again so much time for the blog, but now it`s finally online and so you can check all important facts about the "politics week" Alex prepared.

The first task on Monday was to define the word "Dictatorship".

Therefore we created a mind map and came to this results:

 

Important facts in a dictatorship are:

- political system

- strict rules

- opposite of democracy

- it`s unfair

- society has no rights

- opression

- one leader (whole power in one hand)

- no freedom

After we came up to the knowledge that there is also a dictatorship in The Hunger Games we had to give examples for these facts from the books.

----> (god, why isn't this arrow working?)

So here the results without the arrow:

no rights / no freedom - society is not allowed to leave their districts

violence - Peacekeepers, who act violent in every situation (Gales Punishment) , starvation, diseases

political system / strict rules - every district has it's tasks (12 = coal mines) , all children at the age of 12                                                     can take part in the Hunger Games

After talking about that the political system is really unfair, our second task was to work on the differences and similatries between district 13 and the Capitol.

So I just took a picture of the table we created on the blackboard:

After these tasks we also thought about different revolutions, which you can see in the next picture:

The next day (Tuesday) we worked on the topic Snow vs Coin.

Our first task was to differentiate between the goals of the rebels and the goal of president Coin.

Therefore we also created a wonderful table, which you can see here:

After that we created another table ( god, why all those tables? ) on the question "Would the rebellion have succeeded without Coin and Disctrict 13?"

pro                                                                           con

- no, because Coin brought a structure                      - had some different goals than the rebels

  into it

- before 13 was brought into being, there                  - Coin did not want to stop the system

  where just some people, who did not dare                 --> just wants to become the leader

  to go against the Capitol --> because of 13

  and Coin exists a big group of rebels (Unit)

- people in 12 for example would not have the

  material to create Propos for TV

- gives hope

In the second lesson on Tuesday we were totally creative again (I guess Plüschi pissed off ;) )

We should create profiles for Coin and Snow. 

Therefore we split into two groups and designed the profiles, which you can see here:

Coins profile:

Snows profil (which is so totally creative, because my group designed it) :

So, these are all important things we worked on in the week, where we talked about the politics in the Hunger Games.

As you maybe remember, we did not make a discussion, which makes all of us really sad!!

All in all I hope this post helps you to summarize the politics in the Hunger Games! :)

Love, Whei-oh-lättah ♥

 

02.03-07.03 - Internal Conflicts

Hello English Bunnies,
last week AJ and Vio organized some great lessons about Katniss' internal conflicts.
Before we talked about the conflicts, we did something about personal relations again.

What is a personal relation?

-> When two or more people feel something for each other no matter if positive or negative they have a connection.

What is an internal conflict?

-> Mental struggle arising from opposing demands or traumatic experiences

There are positive and negative Aspects about internal conflicts. You can fight for a goal and gain more self-esteem but a conflict like this can also change your behavior and can be dangerous for your mental health.

 

 Which internal conflicts does Katniss have?

• The situation in the other districts
• Her trauma from the Hungergames
• Peeta or Gale?
• Rue
• Her role in the family
• Being the Mockingjay - rebel or not?
• The other tributes
• Coin vs Snow

Was is a good idea to make Katniss the Mockingjay?

PRO

• She is the latest victor and victors are signs of hope
• Evereyone knows her because she was present in the media for the past two years
• She already did rebellious acts (berries/escaped from the arena)

CON

• She can't act
• She is too subborn
• She has kind of a mental illness

WHY PEETA WOULD HAVE BEEN BETTER

• He can play with words very well
• He cares for everybody
• His charme can convince people very easily

All in all it has been an interesting week and I'm looking forwad to Alex's lessons about the politics and the war in Panem.

Overview of last week 

(17.02-21.02.2014)

Our topic on Monday was "The Topics in Mockingjay"

We have summarized our topics of last week and have come to the following results:

The topics in Mockinjay

1. Katniss' internal conflict
(Gale or Peeta, Prim's development, friend or enemy)

2. Politics
(new vs. old leader, construction of District 13, bombardment on District 12)

3. The story of the tributes
(Finnick's story, Haymitch's live, tributes - the Capitol slaves)

4. Happy End?


We continue with the worksheet "The Use of Propaganda".

Use of Propaganda 
( http://hungergamespropaganda.blogspot.de/ )






The use of "propos" or propaganda is used by both the rebels and the Capitol. Even though the technology for the people to receive information is basically on a television, it seems to be effective.
The use of video propaganda is used throughout the trilogy. Katniss finds herself on television more than she would like. Students could discuss the following:

• How does President Snow of the Capitol use propaganda? Give examples and tell how it is effective.

• How does President Alma Coin of District 13 and the rebels use propaganda? Give examples and tell how it is effective.

• Who uses it best? Why?

We start working on the worksheet and wanted finish working on Thursday because...

...we have written our exam on Tuesday and I hope all of you passed because then you will stand the ABITUR.

On Thursday we compared our results:

President Snow's use of Propaganda:

 

http://ww1.prweb.com/prfiles/2012/03/27/9338101/peace%2520keeper%2520posters_press.jpg

• Caesar Flickerman interviews Peeta on the television à the Capitol know about the plans of District 13

• President Snow himself talk about the consequence the rebellious act of District 13

• show the bombardments their arranged to Panem

President Coin's and the rebels’ use of propaganda:

http://images5.fanpop.com/image/photos/30200000/The-Hunger-Games-Propaganda-Posters-the-hunger-games-30259012-550-670.jpg

• show Katniss as the symbol of rebellion --> Katniss as the leader the districts can follow

• Peeta together with Katniss --> the Capitol couldn’t change Peeta

• the bombardments of the Capitol against the Districts --> use the brutality of the Capitol against it

Who uses it best?

Capitol: brutality, intimidation

• Snow wants to stop the conflict: don't want to lose his position

Coin/ rebels: hack the Capitol's system, one society without the Hunger Games

Why?

In my opinion President Coin and the rebels used the best propaganda because they want to over throw the Capitol and stop the Hunger Games as a community.
Katniss is the symbol and a good leader of the rebellion, the revolution behind the system of District 13.

For next week devided up in four goups for the "Topics of Mockingjay".

Overview of the last week (10.02. - 14.02.)

This week its my (Plüschi) turn again to do the overview of the past week in our english lk.

Last week we gave our breathtaking presentations on Couchsurfing, Facebook and Modern language, but we also discussed "Mockingjay" we had to read over the holidays.
But lets start with the presentations.

The first presentation was from my group and had the title: "The-oh-my-god-I-think-I-have-to-cry-because-this-is-going-to-be-the-absolute-best-most-breathtaking-presentation-about-facebook-that-I-will-ever-see-in-my-entire-life-and-this-title-is-so-awesome-that-the-group-has-to-get-a-great-grade-for-their-presentation-project-week". As you know our main topic was facebook and we subdevided it in Media literacy on facebook, Cyber-bullying and Shitstorms. The most important points to remember from our presentation are:

1. if you join a social network (no matter which one!) you should be clear on the consequences that it can have so use it wisely - do not post everything!
2. to avoid becoming a victim of cyber-bullying you shoul keep your privacy settings on your profile up-to-date and only connect with your real friends.
3. shitstorms can happen to everyone - no matter if celebrity or "normal" person.

The second presentation was on the topic of "Couchsurfing". The most important facts to remember from this presentation are:

1. it is free to create an account, but you need to give a lot of private information 
2. sometimes people use it as a dating site

And last but certainly not least was the presentation on the topic of "Modern language". You should remember that:

1. expanding the language
2. it uses a ot of emoticons and abbreviations/acronyms
3. its informal

On Monday we started to discuss the novel "Mockingjay". Since some of you couldn't come to class because you had to write your geography exams (that hopefully went well :) ) i'll repeat our results. We started off by discussing the four aspects of "Mockingjay" and which ones we didn't like. This obviously was everyones own opinion so you have to think about that for yourself ;) . After that we continued to talk about the term Mockingjay and created a mind map for that. 

In the end we seperated in two groups and were supposed to devide the novel into substories and give those titles. Since we wern't able to compare those we all got it as a homework for next monday.

On Thursday we Continued again with the novel. Our first task was to analyze the development of the Mockingjay from the first to the last part of the series. 

1. We found out that there was something like a "Pre-Mockingjay-Phase" since they are only a crossbreed between Mockingbirds and the Jabberjays. This was the Phase in which the Jabberjays were sent into the wilderness to die off because they didn't do their "job" to spy on the rebels in the districts. The only Porblem was that "they hadn't anticipated its will to live" which is why the new species was created.
2. In the first novel the Mockingjay was a symbol for Katniss dead father. For her the Mockingjays was something devine since for her "[i]t's like having a piece of [her] father with [her], protecting [her]."
3. In the end of the first and beginning of the second novel, the mockingjay grew into a symbol of failure and weakness (for the Capitols point of view!!!), because a) it's "a creature the Capitol never intended to exist" and b) since Katniss wore a pin with it in the arena and tricked the Capitol to save hers and Peetas lives. Now in the second novel, in Katniss point of view it grew into a symbol for Rue (WOW she seems to have a thing with dead people.... :P ). But for all the Districts it became a symbol for rebellion (Katniss in the arena, Cinnas dress...). 
4. In the third novel it obviously gew into a symbol for the revolution in Panem. What is more interesting is that it becomes clear that Katniss doesn't see them as something devine anymore. Since she had to "become the Mockingjay" she outgrew her role. When she started to sing herself she described that they fell silent for her as well.  Now she has the bigger role than the Mockingjays had for her in the first part.

Last but not least we talked about propaganda in the novel. A propaganda is the systematic dissemination of  political opinions done to influence the public opinion on certain topics. In the novel we have to remember to seperate the Capitols Propaganda (Peetas interview...) from the rebels propaganda (all propos)!

As you all know - on tuesday we have to write our exam. One of the possible tasks could be to write an article. Since some of us didn't get their articles back already I'm going to post mine for now to give you an example until you get yours back!! I hope it helps you to study! :) 

Also remember that we have a 99.9999 chance to have to write an analysis of a cartoon so have a look at how to write those again as well! Other than that maybe have a look at the other possible creative tasks for the exam (speech, comment, discussion, letter to the editor....) :).

So this is all for now (finally!). I wish you all a nice relaxing weekend. See you on Monday
-Plüschi :)

Overview from the last week (20.1. - 24.1.)

Hi fellow english-LK students. Here is the summary of the last week (by Alex).

We covered the topic "Media Manipulation". We got an excerpt from a -text- written by the famous linguist Noam Chomsky. The text focuses on 10 strategies of media manipulation.

We were supposed to explain the strategies and to find examples for them. 

Here is a summarized list of the 10 strategies:

1. The strategy of distraction

 -> draw the attention to unimportant things

 -> leave out important information

2. Create problems, then offer solutions

 -> inform the viewer about a problem and immediately about the solution for it

3. The gradual strategy

 -> big changes happen step by step (mostly socioeconomic changes)

4. The strategy of deferring

 -> call something "painful and necessary" to gain acceptance

5. Got to the public as a little child

 -> address viewers like they were little children or mentally deficient

6. Use the emotional side more than the reflection

 -> cause feelings to weaken the critical sense of the individual

7. Keep the public in ignorance and mediocrity

 -> ensure that people do not get to know how they become influenced

8. To encourage the public to be complacent with mediocrity

 -> convey the message, that it is good to be dumb

 -> show, that being stupid uneducated and vulgar is modern

9. Self-blame Strengthen

 -> let individuals blame themselves for their misfortune

 -> devaluate and guilt the individual

10. Getting to know the individuals better than they know themselves (aka "k-t-i-b")

 -> get personal information

 -> scientific analysis of society

We were also supposed to make posters to explain the strategies shortly and find examples:

For the next week we got the task to prepare ourselves for the abitur-exam. 

Have a nice day and keep on reading the hunger games!