Short Texts and Collection of Lesson Ideas
Online Resources
Classic Short Stories
Poets.Org with poetry lessons and selections
NPR This I Believe collection of Personal Essays
REFDESK Features page of all the news media sources for current informational texts (Share this one with
students when they are looking for top interest stories/articles)
Texts in this document (with lessons that follow)
Simplicity by William Zinsser—an essay on simplicity in writing (instructional reference)
The Grieving Never Ends by Roxanne Roberts (personal essay) about the long term effects of suicide
Why American Kids Are (not) Brats – two opposing views about American children. Persuasive rhetoric
Finding Out What’s Under Second Base by Lex Urban Main ideas and messages
From The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins – narrative opening scene, inferences
From The Red Pony by John Steinbeck – characterization and inference
Salvation by Langston Hughes (short memoir) use of language devices and creating tension
Three Innocent Teenagers Were Killed When A Drunk Driver Made a Deadly Decision by Mitch Albom – use of exposition and
dramatic action in a text
The Lottery by Shirley Jackson –(short story) great connection to Hunger Games – how an author builds tension / author tone
Shame by Dick Gregory (short story) Connections to students’ lives—everyone has been embarrassed. Use this as a model to look at
the retrospective narrator. (To Kill A Mockingbird)
Use of Force by William Carlos Williams – power struggles
I Have a Dream by Martin Luther King- look at figurative language, repetition and rhetoric in speech
General lessons / materials for other short texts (use these with any of the above mentioned texts)
Somebody Wanted But So –use as a framework for finding the main idea/details.
Point of View Defined—handout for definitions
Interpret and Connect to Topics by generating strong verb questions
Text-To-World-To-Self connections
Key questions to ask when analyzing media
Nonfiction analysis – Use this when students bring in their own material
Simplicity
by William Zinsser
Clutter is the disease of American writing. We are a society strangling in unnecessary words,
circular constructions, pompous frills and meaningless jargon.
Who can understand the viscous language of everyday American commerce and enterprise: the
business letter, the interoffice memo, the corporation report, the notice from the t bank
explaining its latest "simplified" statement? What member of an insurance or medical l plan can
decipher the brochure that tells him what his costs and benefits are? What father or i mother can
put together a child's toy-on Christmas Eve or any other eve-from the instructions on the box?
Our national tendency is to inflate and thereby sound important. The airline pilot who wakes us
to announce that he is presently anticipating experiencing considerable weather wouldn't dream
of saying that there's a storm ahead and it may get bumpy. The sentence is too simple-there must
be something wrong with it.
But the secret of good writing is to strip every sentence to its cleanest components Every word
that serves no function, every long word that could be a short word, every adverb which carries
the same meaning that is already in the verb, every passive construction that leaves she reader
unsure of who is doing what-these are the thousand and one adulterants that weaken the strength
of a sentence. And they usually occur, ironically, in proportion to education and rank.
During the late 1960s the president of a major university wrote a letter to mollify the alumni after
a spell of campus unrest. "You are probably aware," he began, "that we have been experiencing
very considerable potentially explosive expressions of dissatisfaction on issues only partially
related." He meant that the students had been hassling them about different things. I was far
more upset by the president's English than by the students' potentially explosive expressions of
dissatisfaction. I would have preferred the presidential approach oaken by Franklin D. Roosevelt
when he tried to convert into English his own government' memos, such as this blackout order of
1942:
"Such preparations shall be made as will completely obscure all Federal buildings and nonFederal buildings occupied by the Federal government during an air raid for any period of time
from visibility by reason of internal or external illumination."
"Tell them," Roosevelt said, "that in buildings where they have to keep the work going to put
something across the windows."
Simplify, simplify. Thoreau said it, as we are so often reminded, and no American writer more
consistently practiced what he preached. Open Walden to any page and you will find a man
saying in a plain and orderly way what is on his mind:
"I love to be alone. I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude. We are
for the most part more lonely when we go abroad among men than when we stay in our
chambers. A man thinking or working always alone, let him be where he will. Solitude is not
measured by the miles of space that intervene between a man and his fellows. The really diligent
student in of the crowded hives of Cambridge College is as solitary as a dervish in the desert."
How can the rest of us achieve such enviable freedom from clutter? The answer is to clear our
heads of clutter. Clear thinking becomes clear writing: one can't exist without the other. It is
impossible for a muddy thinker to write good English. He may get away with it for a paragraph
or two, but soon the reader will be lost, and there is no sin so grave, for he will not easily be
lured back.
Who is this elusive creature the reader? He is a person with an attention span of about twenty
seconds. He is assailed on every side by forces competing for his time: by newspapers and
magazines, by television and radio and stereo, by his wife and children and pets, by his house
and his yard and all the gadgets that he has bought to keep them spruce, and by that most potent
of competitors, sleep. The man snoozing in his chair with an unfinished magazine open on his
lap is a man who was being given too much unnecessary trouble by the writer.
It won't do to say that the snoozing reader is too dumb or too lazy to keep pace with the train of
thought. My sympathies are with him. If the reader is lost, it is generally because the writer has
not been careful enough to keep him on the path.
This carelessness can take any number of forms. Perhaps a sentence is so excessively cluttered
that the reader, hacking his way through the verbiage, simply doesn't know what it means.
Perhaps a sentence has been so shoddily constructed that the reader could read it in any of
several ways. Perhaps the writer has switched pronouns in mid-sentence, or has switched tenses,
so the reader loses track of who is talking or when the action took place. Perhaps Sentence B is
not a logical sequel to Sentence A-the writer, in whose head the connection is clear, has not
bothered to provide the missing link. Perhaps the writer has used an important word incorrectly
by not taking the trouble to look it up. He may think that "sanguine" and "sanguinary" mean the
same thing, but the difference is a bloody big one. The reader can only infer (speaking of big
differences) what the writer is trying to imply.
Faced with these obstacles, the reader is at first a remarkably tenacious bird. He blames himselfhe obviously missed something, and he goes back over the mystifying sentence, or over the
whole paragraph, piecing it out like an ancient rule, making guesses and moving on. But he won't
do this for long. The writer is making him work too hard, and the reader will look for one who is
better at his craft.
The writer must therefore constantly ask himself: What am I trying to say? Surprisingly often, he
doesn't know. Then he must look at what he has written and ask: Have I said it? Is it clear to
someone encountering the subject for the first time? If it's not, it is because some fuzz has
worked its way into the machinery. The clear writer is a person clear-headed enough to see this
stuff for what it is: fuzz.
I don't mean that some people are born clear-headed and are therefore natural writers, whereas
others are naturally fuzzy and will never write well. Thinking clearly is a conscious act that the
writer must force upon himself, just as if he were embarking on any other project that requires
logic: adding up a laundry list or doing an algebra problem. Good writing doesn't come naturally,
though most people obviously think it does. The professional writer is forever being bearded by
strangers who say that they'd like to "try a little writing sometime" when they retire from their
real profession. Good writing takes self-discipline and, very often, self-knowledge.
Many writers, for instance, can't stand to throw anything away. Their sentences are littered with
words that mean essentially the same thing and with phrases which make a point that is implicit
in what they have already said. When students give me these littered sentences I beg them to
select from the surfeit of words the few that most precisely fit what they want to say. Choose
one, I plead, from among the three almost identical adjectives. Get rid of the unnecessary
adverbs. Eliminate "in a funny sort of way" and other such qualifiers they do no useful work.
The students look stricken-I am taking all their wonderful words away. I am only taking their
superfluous words away, leaving what is organic and strong
"But," one of my worst offenders confessed, "I never can get rid of anything-you should see my
room." (I didn't take him up on the offer.) "I have two lamps where I only need one, hut I can't
decide which one I like better, so l keep them both." He went on to enumerate his duplicated or
unnecessary objects, and over the weeks ahead I went on throwing away his duplicated and
unnecessary words. By the end of the term-a term that he found acutely painful -- his sentences
were clean.
"I've had to change my whole approach to writing," he told me. "Now I have to think before I
start every sentence and I have to think about every word." The very idea amazed him. Whether
his room also looked better I never found out.
Writing is hard work. A clear sentence is no accident. Very few sentences come out right the first
time. Or the third. Keep thinking and rewriting until you say what you want to say.
From: Zinsser, W. 1980. Simplicity. In On writing well: An informal guide to writing nonfiction. New York: Harper
& Row. Copyright 1980 by William K. Zinsser. Reprinted by permission of the author.
In: Miles, Thomas H. Critical Thinking and Writing for Science and Technology. Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1990,
290-294. Taken from: http://www.as.wvu.edu/~tmiles/zinsser.html
The Grieving Never Ends
Suicide is the last word in an argument, maybe an argument you never knew you were having. It is meant to be the
last scene of the last act of life. Curtain down. End of story. Except it isn't.
June 12, 1996|ROXANNE ROBERTS | THE WASHINGTON POST http://articles.latimes.com/print/1996-06-12/news/ls-14031_1_suicide
The blood was like Jell-O. That is what blood gets like, after you die, before they tidy up.
Somehow, I had expected it would be gone. The police and coroner spent more than an hour behind the closed door;
surely it was someone's job to clean it up. But when they left, it still covered the kitchen floor like the glazing on a candy
apple.
You couldn't mop it. You needed a dustpan and a bucket.
I got on my knees, slid the pan against the linoleum and lifted chunks to the bucket. It took hours to clean it all up.
It wasn't until I finally stood up that I noticed the pictures from his wallet. The wooden breadboard had been pulled out
slightly, and four photographs were spilled across it. "Now what?" I thought with annoyance. "What were the police
looking for?"
But then it hit me. The police hadn't done it. These snapshots--one of my mother, one of our dog and two of my brother
and me--had been carefully set out in a row by my father.
It was his penultimate act, just before he knelt on the floor, put the barrel of a .22 rifle in his mouth, and squeezed the
trigger.
He was 46 years old. I was 21. It has been 20 years since his death and I am still cleaning up.
By the time you finish this article, another person in the United States will have killed himself. More than 30,000 people
do it every year, one every 15 minutes. My father's was a textbook case: Depressed white male with gun offs himself in
May. December may be the loneliest month, April the cruelest, but May is the peak time for suicide. No one knows why,
but I can guess: You've made it through another winter, but your world is no warmer.
This year, thousands of families will begin the process that ours began that night 20 years ago. Studies show that their
grief will be more complicated, more intense and longer lasting than for any other form of death in the family. They will
receive less support and more blame from others. Some will never really get over it: children of suicides become a
higher risk for suicide themselves.
These are the legacies of suicide: guilt, anger, doubt, blame, fear, rejection, abandonment and profound grieving.
Shortly after he died, I remember thinking, "I wonder how I'll feel about this in 20 years?"
Twenty years later, my father's suicide is, simply, a part of me. Think of your life as a can of white paint. Each significant
experience adds a tiny drop of color: pink for a birthday, yellow for a good report card. Worries are brown; setbacks,
gray. Lavender--my favorite color when I was a little girl--is for a pretty new dress. Over time, a color begins to emerge.
Your personality.
When a suicide happens, someone hurls in a huge glob of red. You can't get it out. You can't start over. The red will
always be there, no matter how many drops of yellow you add.
----------The call came about 9 p.m. It was a Friday night in suburban Minneapolis; the restaurant was packed. I was racing from
the bar with a tray of drinks for my customers when the manager gestured me to the phone. It's your mother, she said.
"Roxanne, he's got a gun. He's in the garage with a gun. You have to come."
There had been many, many threats. This was different. There had never been a weapon before.
I made many choices that night; some were smart, some stupid, some crazy. I believed my father would indeed kill
himself, sooner or later. Looking back, I feel lucky to have survived the night.
I drove past the house. He was standing in the shadows of the frontyard; I couldn't see if he had the gun. I sped to a
phone booth two blocks away and dialed.
She answered. "He's in the front yard," I said. "Can you get out?"
Five minutes later, she walked up to the car. He was quiet now, she said. She told him she was going to talk to me but
would be back. Then she dropped the bombshell: He had held her at gunpoint for two hours before she called me.
We attempted rational conversation. We came to what seemed, at the time, a rational decision. We pulled up to the
house, and my father came out the front door without the gun. He wanted to talk.
Give me the gun, I said. He refused. We can't talk until the gun is gone, we said. He shook his head. Come inside, he
asked my mother. She shook her head.
He went back in, we drove to a coffee shop nearby. Frantic, we debated what to do next. To this day, I am still
astonished that it never occurred to us to get help.
It was almost midnight; exhausted, my mother wanted to go home. She would stay the night if he let me take the gun
away.
The house was silent; the door to the kitchen was shut. Ominous. My mother reached it first. Opened it.
"He did it," she whispered and slumped against the wall.
---------There was a time when suicide was considered a noble act of noble men. There was a time when corpses of suicides
were dragged through the streets, refused Christian burial, and all the family's worldly goods were seized by the state.
There was a time when romantics embraced suicide as a sign of their sensitivity.
Now we have long, impassioned debates about "assisted suicide," which pales beside the much larger issue: How do we
feel about suicides when there isn't a terminal disease and a supportive family on hand? How do we feel about suicide if
a 46-year-old guy just doesn't want to live anymore?
How do we feel about someone who's depressed but won't get help? Who blames all his problems on someone else?
Who emotionally terrorizes and blackmails the people he loves? Is that OK too?
This is what I will tell you: Suicide is the last word in an argument, maybe an argument you never knew you were having.
It is meant to be the last scene of the last act of life. Curtain down. End of story.
Except it isn't.
Tosca jumps off the parapet and I wonder who finds the shattered body. Romeo and Juliet die with a kiss, and I grieve
for their parents.
----------
The calls began: first to my father's only brother, who lived three blocks away, then to the police. Officers arrived, then
detectives and someone from the coroner's office. Someone came into the living room to ask questions. I answered. Yes,
he was depressed. Yes, he had threatened suicide. No, there wasn't a note.
This was the night of my brother Mike's high school senior prom. The dance was on a boat--we didn't know where--then
there was an all-night party and a picnic the next day.
The detectives were still in the kitchen when Mike's car turned slowly onto the street and found a sea of police cars,
lights flashing.
I watched from the front step as my mother ran to him. "Your father shot himself and he's dead," she said, guiding him
to the neighbor's house. I watched as the police took the body out, dripping thick drops of blood. I watched my uncle
stare blankly when I asked him to help clean up the kitchen.
White-lipped, he watched as I scooped up buckets of blood and flushed them down the toilet. I threw him an old sheet
and told him to start wiping.
Years later, I learned how angry I made him, how he never forgave me for making him do that.
I was alone in the kitchen again when I noticed the pictures from my father's wallet. There were two portraits of his
children. He loved both pictures. Everybody knew Mike Roberts loved his kids. So why ruin his son's prom night?
"You selfish bastard," I thought. "You couldn't have waited one more night?"
--------My mother was never well liked by my father's sisters, and so they concluded that what had happened was my mother's
fault. She was having an affair. That's what my father had told them before he died. The fact that she wore an aqua suit
to the funeral was proof, wasn't it? (My mother swears there was no affair.)
And I? I was on her side. So it was my fault too.
After the funeral, we were simply abandoned by my father's family. My mother was still numb, but I was confused and
angry. No calls, no help, no kindness. There were no invitations to dinner, not even Thanksgiving or Christmas.
Two years later, I found out why: They thought my mother and I killed him.
At one of those little get-togethers just after he died, my father's family decided that perhaps my mother and I had
cleverly managed to murder my father and make it look like a suicide.
A cousin was so skeptical he went to the coroner and asked to see police photos. It was a suicide, the coroner assured
him.
I vowed never, ever to speak to any of them again. When a distant member of the family--a devoted wife and mother-found her husband dead, sucking the end of an exhaust pipe, I was almost glad.
"Good," I thought fiercely. "Now they'll understand that suicide happens in nice families too."
------------Second-guessing is the devil's game, for there are no answers and infinite questions. But it is an inevitable, inescapable
refrain, like a bad song you can't get out of your mind. What if, what if, what if. What if we had forced him to get help?
Had him committed? What if we had called the police that night? Why didn't we?
Part of it was the natural tendency toward privacy. Part of it was arrogance, believing that we knew father best, or at
least we could handle whatever he threw at us. I think I knew my father would have charmed the police, sent them
away, leaving him furious with me, furious with my mother, dangerous, armed.
Maybe that's why. Maybe it was fear. Maybe not. Maybe I wanted him to die.
------------The police were puzzled by a wand of black mascara they found in my father's pocket. Another woman? Proof of an
affair? The answer was simple: He used it to touch up the gray on his temples.
I don't think he ever really expected to get old. He was the baby, the youngest of five children. He was a very happy
child; it was adulthood that he could never quite grasp.
He was charming enough to talk his way into job after job. There was the real estate phase, the radio phase, the political
hanger-on phase. (In one photo, he is shaking hands with Hubert Humphrey.) No job lasted long; it never occurred to
him to do heavy lifting.
Things started out well enough: a beautiful teenage bride, two kids and--after his mother died--his childhood home, a
little bungalow, to raise his family in.
When did things start falling apart? Or were they ever really together?
I remember a night when I was 11. One of our cats streaked across the living room. In his mouth was a hamster that had
somehow escaped from its cage. We all jumped to the rescue; my father caught the cat at the top of the basement
stairs. He was suddenly, unaccountably livid. He shook the cat, and the hamster fell to the floor and scampered free.
I will never forget what came next: With all his might, he threw the cat down the stairs.
There was a moment of stunned silence, then tears and regret and an emergency trip to the vet. The cat lived. But I
think I never fully trusted my father again.
The 10 years that followed were filled with sudden rages, explosions. I found out later that he first hit my mother when
she was pregnant with me, and continued on and off for two decades.
We begged him to get help. We asked his brother and sisters to talk to him. And when, ultimately, I told my mother I
thought she needed to leave for her own safety, my father saw that as a betrayal. He didn't speak to me for two months,
until the night he died.
-----------I lied to the police.
I told them there was no suicide note. In fact, there were three. Two were waiting in the living room as we walked into
the house.
The note to my mother begged for forgiveness but said he simply could not go on the way things were. She has, to this
day, no memory of reading it.
The note addressed to me opened with a rapprochement. "All is forgiven," read the first line. My eyes filled. No, I said
silently, all is not forgiven.
The rest of the note instructed me to take care of things.
When I went to call the police, I found the third note, addressed to my brother. I cannot recall the specific words, but
the short message to an 18-year-old boy was this: Son, you can't trust women.
My father had asked me to take care of things. And I was going to take care of things.
I stuffed all three notes in my purse and went back out to the living room. A week later, I ripped them to pieces and
flushed them down the toilet.
When I recently told my brother about this, he was angry and hurt. He asked, quietly, "What made you think you could
take something Dad left for me?" Fair question.
Here is the answer, Mike. It is simple. I hope you can live with it: I had to. The wishes of the dead do not take
precedence over the needs of the living.
-------About a year after my father died, I left Minneapolis. I stumbled though my 20s, met a terrific man and got married, and
spent a lot of time thinking about what I wanted to be when I grew up.
Nine months after the funeral, my brother moved to California. He was reckless, strong, adrift and almost died three
times--once in a motorcycle accident, once in a stabbing and once in a heedless dive into a pool that split open his skull.
He returned to Minnesota, subdued and gentle, and went on to a successful computer career. He was, surprisingly,
never angry at my father or his family.
But he cannot bring himself to marry his girlfriend of 16 years. They live together, in a home they bought together, but
he simply does not trust marriage.
Two years after the suicide, my mother remarried, changing her friends, her religion, even her first name. She was
widowed again--a heart attack--and announced a year later that she was getting married again. Her fiance was my
cousin--her nephew by marriage. He was the son of the aunt who had accused us of murder.
"I expect you to be civil to her," my mother told me.
We had an ugly fight, and my mother didn't speak to me for months. I went to her wedding but fled to the other side of
the room when my aunt approached me.
My mother tells me my aunt is very hurt by all this. The cycle continues, in ways I will never fully understand.
-----Four years ago, when my son was a month old, I took him to Minnesota to meet my family.
"Take me to Father's grave," I told my brother.
It was the first time I'd been there since the funeral. I introduced my beautiful new baby to his grandfather, and my
father to his only grandchild.
Today, when I stare at the boy who takes my breath away, I think about how much my father missed over the past 20
years, and how much more he will miss. I've more sorrow than anger now.
A lot of wonderful things have happened in those years, hundreds of shimmering droplets added to the mix. When I stir
the paint now, it is a soft dusky rose. A grown-up's color, with a touch of sweetness and a touch of melancholy.
Lesson Suggestions
Draw student attention to the paragraphing and ask why it is broken up this way. Online text presentation and
paragraphing is a different than writing text. This is a skill they need to transfer between online and in print text.
Ask students to generate questions about this piece. Anything they can think of. Use as a starting place to talk about the
piece.
Discuss the imagery.
Author’s tone and point of view.
Why American Kids Are Brats
By Judith Warner, February 10, 2012
Amidst all the talk this past week about Pamela Druckerman’s new book, Bringing Up Bébé:
One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French Parenting, there was one phrase that
immediately lodged itself in my mind. It was in a sidebar that ran with the Wall Street Journal
adaptation of her book, “Why French Parents Are Superior,” and it said this: “Children should
say hello, goodbye, thank you and please. It helps them to learn that they aren’t the only ones
with feelings and needs.”
That statement points directly to what I see as one of the most meaningful differences between
the French and (contemporary) American style of parenting. I don’t happen to believe, as the
Journal pushed Druckerman’s argument to say, that French parenting is necessarily superior,
overall, to what we do in America. I don’t think French children are, overall, better or happier
people — such generalizations are silly. But it is true that French kids can be a whole lot more
pleasant to be around than our own. They’re more polite. They’re better socialized. They
generally get with the program; they help out when called upon to do so, and they don’t demand
special treatment. And that comes directly from being taught, from the earliest age, that they’re
not the only ones with feelings and needs.
I say all this based on many years of extended hanging out time with French families, both
before and after my own girls — who, like Druckerman’s children, were born in France — came
along. In fact, that experience — and the contrast with the American way of parenting I
discovered when I moved back to the States — inspired my book Perfect Madness: Motherhood
in the Age of Anxiety, the main argument of which Druckerman recapitulates at the very
beginning of Bringing Up Bébé. (Fuller disclosure: she interviewed me for the book as well.)
Like Druckerman, I’ve often noted wistfully how French children know how to handle
themselves in restaurants. I’ve envied how French children eat what’s put in front of them, put
themselves to bed when instructed to, and, generally, tend to help keep the wheels of family life
moving pretty smoothly. But the difference that struck me the most deeply, when my family
moved to Washington, D.C., from Paris and my older daughter began preschool, was how much
more basically respectful French children were of other people. Indeed, how much emphasis
French parents put on demanding they behave respectfully toward other people. And how that
respect helped make life more enjoyable.
In the years when I was gathering wool for, and then formally researching and writing Perfect
Madness, I was disheartened time and again by the ways parents in the U.S. often did just the
opposite. American parents assiduously strove to make sure that their children’s wants and needs
came first, no matter what. This sometimes had a name — “advocating for your child” — and
was clearly predicated on the belief that if you didn’t yourself do it, didn’t teach your child to
“self-advocate,” no one would, and in the great stampede for resources and rewards your child
would get left behind in the dust. In my preschool-mom world back then, this took the form of
letting kids step all over the feelings of other children if their own feelings so compelled them, as
http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/10/why-american-kids-are-brats/?iid=op-main-mostpop1
when a mother in suburban Maryland explained to me that she let her little girl cancel playdates
right up to the last minute because she “couldn’t force her” to engage in social commitments that
now bored her. It never seemed to dawn upon the mother that her child’s passing boredom was
less important than the other child’s potentially hurt feelings; and that teaching her daughter to
think of the other child’s feelings would, in the long term, be better for them both.
This lack of parental empathy was brought home to me much more recently, when a mom in my
then eighth grader’s class complained to me about an incident in which another girl in the class
had had a panic attack — a full-blown panic attack — just as the doors closed on the bus that
was to take the class on a camping trip. Without a word of sympathy, the mom vented to me,
“Like [my daughter] really needed to see that.”
This lack of compassion and empathy, I’ve found, is rampant in today’s hypercompetitive
parenting culture in which almost every child is eternally being groomed to look out for No. 1,
cheered on by parents who view other children more as potential impediments to his or her full
flowering than as comrades-in-arms — or friends — united in the difficult task of gracefully
growing up. As American parents, we parrot a certain amount of knee-jerk politeness, urging our
kids to say “please” and “thank you,” but I don’t necessarily have the sense that all this is aimed
at doing anything more profound than making our kids (and ourselves, by extension) look good.
A more deeper understanding of courtesy — that we do things like make eye contact and say
hello and goodbye because such behaviors convey to other people that they matter and are
worthy of respect — is all but entirely absent from our parenting culture today. It’s far more
important to us that our children be in touch with their feelings and true to themselves than that
they create good feeling around them through “superficial” good manners.
An old-fashioned French online guide to proper comportment shoots down that very modern way
of thinking, which many view as an encroaching threat in France as well: “Philosophers may say
that politeness is the greatest form of hypocrisy,” it states. “But if saying hello, apologizing,
thanking, helping those in need, being attentive to others, are signs of hypocrisy, then we accept
that epithet, and can offer no defense.”
http://ideas.time.com/2012/02/10/why-american-kids-are-brats/?iid=op-main-mostpop1
Why American Kids are NOT Brats
By Megan Pankiewicz
As it tends to go in cultural movement, the pendulum in the American-Franco relationship has taken
another swing. During the Iraq war, which the majority of French opposed, Americans held a tepid regard
for the country’s lack of cowboy resolve. Sure, we’ve always been allies – even dating back to the
Revolutionary War and the extra funding we received to throw off Old King George – but let’s be honest,
ever since we stepped in and saved the French from Adolf Hitler, there’s been a bit of perceived
“wussyness” attached to the fashion of our French friends.
And yet, Americans, while at times staring down our noses at the French, have done so with eyes a little
green with envy. We often stand in admiration of the French glamour, their chic culture, their je ne sais
quoi.
Recently, Francophiles have put our cultural love affair with France back in the spotlight. There’s Paula
McLain’s incredibly popular novel The Paris Wife, Woody Allen’s movie Midnight in Paris, and now
Paula Druckerman’s novel Bringing Up Bébé: One American Mother Discovers the Wisdom of French
Parenting.
In a recent editorial in Time magazine, Judith Warner references Druckerman’s book in order to support a
claim that she has made in her own novel that “French kids can be a whole lot more pleasant to be around
than our own.”
Warner states that she makes this claim based on “many years of hanging out time with French families,”
a level of experience I fully recognize I don’t possess. I can only lay claim to eight years of teaching
English in a public high school and 12 months of raising my own baby girl. Still, I feel compelled to
speak out against Warner’s argument – perhaps engaging in what Warner mocked as “advocating for your
child.”
Yes, American children can be selfish, rude, and ego-centric. But I would like to see quantitative evidence
that French children are less so. Psychiatrics and sociologists have long identified the existence of the id,
that primal impulse with which we are born and which governs our actions as children until we develop
our ego and superego, those self-regulatory aspects of our personality that tell us we can’t always get
what we want when we want it. It stands to reason that our maturity can only marginally differ from
human to human, and so I wonder if Warner has been comparing apples to oranges, as in American 5 year
olds to French 10 year olds?
As to Warner’s examples of overly-involved parents, I’m not surprised by their existence. I ran into my
fair share of helicopter parents while I was teaching; adults who came running into the principal’s office
at the slightest discomfort their children felt in class. But more often than not, schools would actually like
parents to become more involved in their students’ academic lives, not less so.
Warner also states that “American parents assiduously strove to make sure that their children’s wants and
needs came first, no matter what.” She argues that such practices lead to a lack of compassion and
empathy. Interesting, since according to the Corporation for National and Community Service, an
estimated 15.5 million American kids 12 to 18 years old – that’s 55% of all kids – volunteer, which
amounts to an average of 1.3 billion hours of community service each year. Yep, our kids are clearly a
bunch of callous jerks.
And how can our kids be so lacking in empathy when more of our youth is accepting of differences than
ever before? Yes, racism, sexism, and every other –ism still exists (and will for all of human history, I
would wager), but kids today are growing up in a society where people who are biracial, multi-racial, gay,
straight, transgender, and disabled all ride the same metaphorical bus together, and it’s all good, as they
might put it.
I’m glad that America has fallen in love with French culture again. It’s a beautiful country filled with
wonderful people, and their children are lovely, no doubt. But I refuse to believe that our kids, those same
ones who hold fundraisers to send money to earthquake victims, pack into buses to help rebuild homes in
New Orleans and Missouri, and volunteer at nursing homes, are any less selfless than other children
around the world.
I, for one, am glad that American parents teach our children, as Polonius did, “to thine own self be true.”
After all, America exists because our forefathers remained true to themselves and their radical idea of –
politely – declaring our independence. And for that, I am thankful every day.
NPR This I Believe Essay
Finding Out What’s Under Second Base
by Lex Urban - Silver Spring, Maryland
My belief was formed eighteen years ago as a five-year-old kid during my first of many seasons of Little
League baseball. My friend Patrick was on second base when I came up to bat. I sent a line drive out to
left field and after admiring my hit for a while (that momentary pause that drives coaches and parents
nuts), I took off running in the direction of first base. Patrick, however, had yet to start running. In fact,
he hadn’t even left second base. Instead of running for third, Patrick had picked up the base to explore
what was underneath. Apparently the mystery that had plagued kids for centuries—what could possibly
be hiding underneath second base—needed to be solved immediately. The fact that it was the second
inning of our first tee ball game was of no consequence.
What followed were howls of laughter from many kids and even a few adults. Of course, there were a
few dads who pulled on their belt, spit to the side, and commented about kids needing to keep their
head in the game and focus, but for the most part it was the funniest thing anyone had seen in a while. I
don’t remember if we won the game, if I made it to second base, or if Patrick took it with him as he
advanced to third. What I do remember, and what has become a core philosophy of mine, is that I
should always take the time to find out what’s underneath second base.
Looking underneath second base is about living for the moment. It’s not caring if others think what I’m
doing is stupid or foolish. It is about being honest with myself and doing what makes me happy and not
bowing to outside pressures. It is a reminder that I should look beneath the surface of things, and more
importantly, people. Everyone has a story—a series of significant and insignificant life experiences that
precede each moment of their lives. I am more patient and understanding because I realize that the
story may be a painful and stressful one.
After college graduation I did not get a high paying job on Wall Street like many of my classmates did. I
decided to dedicate a year to full-time community service as an AmeriCorps volunteer at City Year—
Washington, DC. I tutored kids of all ages in math and reading. I saw first-hand the impact of painful and
stressful experiences. A hardened exterior usually hid a much softer individual on the inside. A kid who
told me off on the first day later expressed sadness that he didn’t get to see me over the Thanksgiving
break. I saw the power of giving my time to help others. It has truly been the most memorable
experience of my life thus far.
No longer a five-year-old without a care in the world, I have been introduced to the adult concepts of
planning, responsibility and maturity. No one can deny the importance of the future, but no one can
guarantee its presence, either. I try not to get so wrapped up in planning for the future that I forget to
enjoy what’s right in front of me. Taking time to look underneath second base reminds me that it’s the
journey and not the destination that counts.
Looking under second base reminds me to take the time to appreciate things. It reminds me that the
daily grind and the hustle and bustle of a fast-paced world is a voluntary activity. I can choose how I live
my life. I choose to always take the time to find out what’s under second base.
From The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
When I wake up, the other side of the bed is cold. My fingers stretch out, seeking Prim’s warmth but finding
only the rough canvas cover of the mattress. She must have had bad dreams and climbed in with our mother. Of
course, she did. This is the day of the reaping.
I prop myself up on one elbow. There’s enough light in the bedroom to see them. My little sister, Prim, curled
up on her side, cocooned in my mother’s body, their cheeks pressed together. In sleep, my mother looks
younger, still worn but not so beaten-down. Prim’s face is as fresh as a raindrop, as lovely as the primrose for
which she was named. My mother was very beautiful once, too. Or so they tell me.
Sitting at Prim’s knees, guarding her, is the world’s ugliest cat. Mashed-in nose, half of one ear missing, eyes
the color of rotting squash. Prim named him Buttercup, insisting that his muddy yellow coat matched the bright
flower. He hates me. Or at least distrusts me. Even though it was years ago, I think he still remembers how I
tried to drown him in a bucket when Prim brought him home. Scrawny kitten, belly swollen with worms,
crawling with fleas. The last thing I needed was another mouth to feed. But Prim begged so hard, cried even, I
had to let him stay. It turned out okay. My mother got rid of the vermin and he’s a born mouser. Even catches
the occasional rat. Sometimes, when I clean a kill, I feed Buttercup the entrails. He has stopped hissing at me.
Entrails. No hissing. This is the closest we will ever come to love.
I swing my legs off the bed and slide into my hunting boots. Supple leather that has molded to my feet. I pull on
trousers, a shirt, tuck my long dark braid up into a cap, and grab my forage bag. On the table, under a wooden
bowl to protect it from hungry rats and cats alike, sits a perfect little goat cheese wrapped in basil leaves. Prim’s
gift to me on reaping day. I put the cheese carefully in my pocket as I slip outside.
Our part of District 12, nicknamed the Seam, is usually crawling with coal miners heading out to the morning
shift at this hour. Men and women with hunched shoulders, swollen knuckles, many who have long since
stopped trying to scrub the coal dust out of their broken nails, the lines of their sunken faces. But today the
black cinder streets are empty. Shutters on the squat gray houses are closed. The reaping isn’t until two. May as
well sleep in. If you can.
Excerpted from The Hunger Games. Copyright ©2008 by Suzanne Collins.
Lesson suggestions
Inferences
Complete the chart with everything you can infer from this one section.
I think…
They are poor
Because…(evidence from the text)
The last thing I needed was another mouth to feed. But Prim begged so hard, cried
even, I had to let him stay.
Write an opening scene by imitating this one.
Shift focus in each paragraph to describe something new. Look at the first line in each paragraph –action
happening chronologically. The descriptions must be written so that we learn something about the narrator.
Sentence Fluency
Look at the sentence structure and come to some conclusions about the author’s choice of sentence structure.
(Note the last lines in each paragraph—why are they written in this fashion?)
Imitating Author’s Style for Characterization
Passage from The Red Pony by John Steinbeck
At daybreak Billy Buck emerged from the bunkhouse and stood for a moment on the porch looking up at
the sky. He was a broad, bandy-legged little man with a walrus mustache, with square hands, puffed and
muscled on the palms. His eyes were a contemplative, watery grey and the hair which protruded from under his
Stetson hat was spiky and weathered. Billy was still stuffing his shirts into his blue jeans as he stood on the
porch. He unbuckled his belt and tightened it again. The belt showed, by the worn shiny places opposite each
hole, the gradual increase in Billy’s middle over a period of years. When he had seen to the weather, Billy
cleared each nostril by holding its mate closed with his forefinger and blowing fiercely. Then he walked down
to the barn, rubbing his hands together. He curried and brushed two saddle horses in the stalls, talking quietly to
them all the time; and he had hardly finished when the iron triangle started ringing at the ranch house. Billy
struck the brush and currycomb together and laid them on the rail, went up to breakfast. His action had been so
deliberate and yet so wasteless of time that he came to the house while Mrs. Tiflin was still ringing the triangle.
She nodded her grey head to him and withdrew into the kitchen. Billy Buck sat down on the steps, because he
was a cow-hand, and it wouldn’t be fitting that he should go first into the dining room. He heard Mr. Tiflin in
the house, stamping his feet into his boots.
Your assignment:
Examine every word of this description. Steinbeck’s 270 words are filled with not only Billy’s physical
description but also his personality, philosophy, occupation, rank in society, attitudes to life and work,
competence at his job, among other things. Note how you must infer these characteristics through the details
that Steinbeck shows.
In as many words, write a description of a person, real or fictional. You will ideally have the person either
finishing or beginning something. Be sure to use a short time frame to enclose your description and give it a
beginning and ending. Use vivid words and specific details to let the reader understand the insights to this
character. Use concrete nouns in place of abstract nouns. First try line by line imitating, then draft again to
make it your own.
Ex. Original first line
At daybreak Billy Buck emerged from the bunkhouse and stood for a moment on the porch looking up at the sky.
Ex. New character first line
At exactly 12:00, Carol turned off the monitor, pushed in her rolling chair, and straightened the files and pencils on her
desk.
Salvation
by Langston Hughes
I was saved from sin when I was going on thirteen. But not really saved. It happened like this.
There was a big revival at my Auntie Reed's church. Every night for weeks there had been much
preaching, singing, praying, and shouting, and some very hardened sinners had been brought to
Christ, and the membership of the church had grown by leaps and bounds. Then just before the
revival ended, they held a special meeting for children, "to bring the young lambs to the fold."
My aunt spoke of it for days ahead. That night I was escorted to the front row and placed on the
mourners' bench with all the other young sinners, who had not yet been brought to Jesus.
My aunt told me that when you were saved you saw a light, and something happened to you
inside! And Jesus came into your life! And God was with you from then on! She said you could
see and hear and feel Jesus in your soul. I believed her. I had heard a great many old people say
the same thing and it seemed to me they ought to know. So I sat there calmly in the hot, crowded
church, waiting for Jesus to come to me.
The preacher preached a wonderful rhythmical sermon, all moans and shouts and lonely cries
and dire pictures of hell, and then he sang a song about the ninety and nine safe in the fold, but
one little lamb was left out in the cold. Then he said: "Won't you come? Won't you come to
Jesus? Young lambs, won't you come?" And he held out his arms to all us young sinners there on
the mourners' bench. And the little girls cried. And some of them jumped up and went to Jesus
right away. But most of us just sat there.
A great many old people came and knelt around us and prayed, old women with jet-black faces
and braided hair, old men with work-gnarled hands. And the church sang a song about the lower
lights are burning, some poor sinners to be saved. And the whole building rocked with prayer
and song.
Still I kept waiting to see Jesus.
Finally all the young people had gone to the altar and were saved, but one boy and me. He was a
rounder's son named Westley. Westley and I were surrounded by sisters and deacons praying. It
was very hot in the church, and getting late now. Finally Westley said to me in a whisper: "God
damn! I'm tired o' sitting here. Let's get up and be saved." So he got up and was saved.
Then I was left all alone on the mourners' bench. My aunt came and knelt at my knees and cried,
while prayers and song swirled all around me in the little church. The whole congregation prayed
for me alone, in a mighty wail of moans and voices. And I kept waiting serenely for Jesus,
waiting, waiting - but he didn't come. I wanted to see him, but nothing happened to me. Nothing!
I wanted something to happen to me, but nothing happened.
I heard the songs and the minister saying: "Why don't you come? My dear child, why don't you
come to Jesus? Jesus is waiting for you. He wants you. Why don't you come? Sister Reed, what
is this child's name?"
"Langston," my aunt sobbed.
"Langston, why don't you come? Why don't you come and be saved? Oh, Lamb of God! Why
don't you come?"
Now it was really getting late. I began to be ashamed of myself, holding everything up so long. I
began to wonder what God thought about Westley, who certainly hadn't seen Jesus either, but
who was now sitting proudly on the platform, swinging his knickerbockered legs and grinning
down at me, surrounded by deacons and old women on their knees praying. God had not struck
Westley dead for taking his name in vain or for lying in the temple. So I decided that maybe to
save further trouble, I'd better lie, too, and say that Jesus had come, and get up and be saved.
So I got up.
Suddenly the whole room broke into a sea of shouting, as they saw me rise. Waves of rejoicing
swept the place. Women leaped in the air. My aunt threw her arms around me. The minister took
me by the hand and led me to the platform.
When things quieted down, in a hushed silence, punctuated by a few ecstatic "Amens," all the
new young lambs were blessed in the name of God. Then joyous singing filled the room.
That night, for the first time in my life but one for I was a big boy twelve years old - I cried. I
cried, in bed alone, and couldn't stop. I buried my head under the quilts, but my aunt heard me.
She woke up and told my uncle I was crying because the Holy Ghost had come into my life, and
because I had seen Jesus. But I was really crying because I couldn't bear to tell her that I had lied,
that I had deceived everybody in the church, that I hadn't seen Jesus, and that now I didn't
believe there was a Jesus anymore, since he didn't come to help me.
Lesson Suggestions
Use this lesson to model a retrospective narrator. What difference does it make writing this in a past
tense, versus present. Why would the author choose that method?
Practice writing a piece that uses a retrospective narrator.
What is the main idea of the story? Use the Somebody Wanted But So model to create a one sentence
summary.
Three Innocent Teenagers Were Killed When a Drunken Driver Made…a Deadly Decision
By Mitch Albom
Published: 12/31/1997 from: http://mitchalbom.com/d/journalism/1969/three-innocent-teenagers-were-killedwhen-drunken-drivermadea-deadly-decision
Last in a series on the heartbreaks and hopes of unsung Detroit area athletes.
A thin drizzle fell that night, giving the streets an oily sheen under the lights. It was just past midnight, Monday
turning to Tuesday, and a teenager named Tim Doil was driving through Troy with two friends, coming home from a high
school graduation party. It was warm. Early June. They had Puff Daddy on the radio, singing "I'll Be Missing You." They
were heading east.
In the intersection up ahead, Crooks and Long Lake, Doil noticed a black Grand Prix coming west. And from the
corner of his eye, to his right, he saw a white Trans Am moving fast from the south. Doil instinctively stepped on his
brakes, even though the Trans Am had a red light. Something funny about the speed.
One second later, with the disbelief of seeing someone fall out a window, Doil watched the Trans Am run that
red light and plow broadside into the Grand Prix, splitting it in two. There was a loud boom, smashing glass, sparks and
smoke and pieces of metal flying.
And then, there was silence.
"God, did you see that!" Doil yelled to his pals. He pulled his blue Oldsmobile to a safe spot, shut off the engine
and jumped out. Near the median curb he saw the first body, a young man with blond hair. He was face down in a
bloody mess. Doil had never seen a dead person before, but he was pretty sure he was looking at one now.
Just a few feet away, there was another young man, dark-haired. He was facing up, barely breathing. Doil
kneeled down and squeezed his hand.
"Hey . . ." Doil said.
The young man gurgled. There was blood everywhere. Doil saw the eyes close and felt the life slip out of the
young man's fingers. He let them go.
From the middle of the street, he heard the wounded howl of a woman in pain. He ran to join his buddies, who
were already around her. It was so eerie, all these bodies in the rain.
"What's your name?" he asked the woman.
"Lori," she moaned. She had been driving the white Trans Am, but had been hurled out by the impact. She was
bruised and bleeding, in her dying hour. But out of shock, she tried to lift herself, as if to get up to go.
"Stay down," Doil and his friends kept saying. "You hear the sirens? ...Help is coming.... Everything will be all
right."
By now, a few other motorists had stopped, and someone shined a flashlight in the woman's eyes, which kept
rolling back in their sockets. Then Doil heard a voice yell, "There's another one, over here!"
He ran to an area by some small trees, where the back half of the Grand Prix had landed. He swallowed hard.
What he saw was the worst of all. It was a girl, or it had been a girl, in a plaid shirt and jeans. She lay against the
wreckage in a pool of bloody water. A few minutes earlier, Doil guessed, she had been the same as him, alive, laughing,
maybe 17 or 18, on her way home for the night.
And now look.
Drink, drink, drive, die. This is the story of a killer, only the killer is a decision to get behind a wheel. This time it
killed in Troy, a place where children still shine, where they leave their parents dazzled by their achievements. Three of
the brightest lights you could ever imagine were in that black Grand Prix that night, sober and happy. And now their
fathers cry in the middle of the afternoon, and their mothers wait longingly for them to somehow burst through the
door, still young, still laughing.
Drink, drink, drive, die. This is the story of everyone that killer decision destroyed. And what really kills you is
that it didn't have to happen.
The baseball player
"Hey, Mom, we got some garlic bread . . ."
Say good-bye to the first innocent victim. Nineteen-year-old Michael Jamieson, with the rangy frame of a
baseball pitcher, his blond hair still parted in the middle, the way he wore it in high school, flashed his gleaming smile
and held out a fresh-baked loaf.
He had been home a month since finishing freshman year at Western Michigan. His mother, Penny, was glad to
have him back, glad to have the commotion her youngest child brought with him. There were always friends coming by
when Michael was around. They flopped in her living room couch the way teenagers do, watching TV, making jokes,
sometimes falling asleep and spending the night facedown in the pillows.
Penny liked Michael's friends. She liked Andy Stindt, the former high school lacrosse star, who was here with
Michael now. It was the night of June 2, 1997. The two had just come from getting their new uniforms at Kruse and
Muer, a restaurant where they were due to start work the next day.
"I don't know," Michael said, studying the outfits and grinning. "I think our jeans need to be tighter. Show off our
butts. Haha."
Michael Jamieson was mischievous and he was witty. He liked the Beatles. He liked Mountain Dew. And he loved
baseball. He kept sports sections boxed up under his bed, with trading cards of his hero, Nolan Ryan.
When Michael was a kid, his stepfather, Randy Mapes, took him to a baseball camp run by former Tigers star Bill
Freehan. Michael wanted desperately to meet the famous man, so Randy walked him over.
"Don't be nervous when you talk to him, OK, Mike?" he said.
"OK."
"He's just a guy, like you and me."
"OK."
Then, when Freehan looked up, Randy froze.
"Uh . . ." he mumbled. "I, uh . . ."
Michael never missed a beat.
"Hi, Mr. Freehan. My name is Michael. This is my father. He's a little nervous. . ."
Like a lot of kids in Troy, Michael Jamieson blossomed through a bevy of school activities. He pitched for the
Troy Athens team. He played soccer. He played the viola. He won an $8,000 scholarship to attend Western, and his plan
was to become a history teacher.
For now, he was doing what most college freshmen do on summer break: working to make some cash. He loved
the idea of working with Andy. They remained tight friends, even though they had chosen different colleges. Hey. Your
high school ties are the ones that bind, aren't they?
And Michael and Andy had tied it together in high school. They'd done the prom thing with their girlfriends.
They'd hung out in Royal Oak coffee shops. They also took a senior trip to Hilton Head Island, S.C., that was, for both of
them, unforgettable. Each day they would start walking down the beach, and an hour later they'd come back with 40
new friends. There's a photo of them on that beach, all tanned skin and young muscle, surrounded by girls, grinning like
bandits.
Penny loves those photos.
"This bread is good, huh?" her son said that night.
"Mmm," she answered, smiling through her bites.
They stayed there a few more minutes, talking, eating, just another family moment in the kitchen. Then Michael
said they were going over to Andy's and Penny said OK.
She heard the door close behind them.
The lacrosse player
"Hey, Mom, check out your hair!"
Say good-bye to the second innocent victim. Nineteen-year-old Andy Stindt -- they called him Andy, Andrew,
'Drew, whatever fit at the time -- flipped through the pages of Nan Stindt's high school yearbook, as she looked lovingly
over his shoulder. He laughed at the photo of her synchronized swimming team.
"Look at your hair!" he said again.
Andy and Michael had driven back to the Stindts' house in the black Grand Prix that belonged to Andy's father,
John. The task for the evening was to move a futon into Andy's bedroom. But once they'd made the typical college
freshmen mess -- all the furniture pushed out in the hallway -- Michael mentioned that Nan had graduated high school
with a friend of his mother's.
"I can't remember her maiden name," Michael said.
"Hmm," Nan said. "Wait a second . . ."
She dug out her old yearbook. And now she and Andy and Michael sat on the hallway floor, leafing through
pages, sailing through time.
Andy Stindt was a muscular 6-feet-1, strong enough to play defensive line on the Troy Athens football team, fast
enough to be a star defenseman on its lacrosse squad. He had tremendous hand-eye coordination, and could wield a
stick like Zorro's sword. Once, in the high school playoffs, he played an entire game with a fractured leg. He never
complained. His thirst for lacrosse was unquenchable, even in college, and he was likely to be named team captain when
he returned to Albion for his sophomore year.
And yet, like many of his Troy friends, Andy did not seem satisfied with sports success. He was also an
exceptional musician, who played the string bass, of all things, an instrument as big as he was. He pulled the bow across
the strings until the low notes trembled. He loved Tchaikovsky. He even won a scholarship to the prestigious Interlochen
program. Sometimes he and his friends would play music at local coffeehouses -- that is, when they weren't busy
shooting the breeze, entertaining girls.
"Does he ever get mad?" friends would ask of Andy. His disposition was unfailingly upbeat. Maybe he knew how
good he had it, loving parents, older brother, nice house, safe school.
Maybe he knew his time was short.
"We're gonna go get some coffee," he told his mother that night, when they finished with the yearbook.
"But what about all this furniture?"
"Don't worry, Mom. We'll finish tomorrow."
Believing her son's tomorrow was just a few hours away, she smiled and said,"Don't stay out too late. Be home
by 12:30."
"OK."
She heard the door close behind them.
The gymnast
"Mom, Dad, I'm going out."
Say good-bye to the third innocent victim. Ashley Easterbrook, 18, had met Andy and Mike on a ski trip over the
winter. She wasn't expecting them to call that night, but she was happy they did. They wanted to go for coffee, and it
was cool to go out with college guys, especially since she was just five days from graduating high school herself.
She looked especially pretty that night, having dolled up for her brother's sports banquet. Her father, David,
swelled with pride when he watched her pass his table. She had volunteered to go with her parents simply because her
brother, Adam, "is always coming to my things, so I should go to his."
This was a teenager?
Well, if you didn't know Ashley Marie Easterbrook, you might not believe she existed. How could anyone this
young, popular, beautiful and vivacious also be captain of the gymnastics team, a National Honor Society member,
lifeguard at the local aquatics center, founder of a bilingual tutoring program, and holder of a Franklin Planner so stuffed
with activities, it made Bill Gates look like a slacker?
Ashley was a ball of teenage energy, with white teeth, blue eyes and blond highlights on her camel-colored hair.
She was not the best gymnast on the Troy High School team, but she was captain because of how she made everyone
else feel. In the floor routine, her specialty, she scored well, not only because she could ad-lib a flip or a tumble -- or the
move she practiced in her backyard until her muscles ached, a back layout -- but because she had a smile that was hard
to mark down.
She was smiling in the car ride home from the banquet. She commandeered the radio knobs and turned up her
latest favorite country song, LeAnn Rimes' remake of "Unchained Melody."
"Quiet!" she said, urging everyone to listen to the words.
Oh, my love, my darling, I hunger for your touch
A long, lonely time . . .
Ashley hummed along, smiling. As the eldest child of a top-ranking Kmart executive, she had moved 12 times in
her young life. Teens in that situation loathe it or embrace it. Ashley embraced it. She made friends wherever she went.
She was inquisitive and unembarrassed, the kind of kid who, at age 7, asked her father where babies came from, then
stopped him in the middle and said, "I don't want to hear this now."
Four years later, she came back and said, "OK, Dad, I'm ready for the rest."
And now she was ready for one of the best weeks of her life. She was graduating high school! At last! There was
an honors banquet on Thursday. The diploma ceremony on Saturday. A blow-out party at her house Saturday night. And
then summer and the great, big world that lay ahead at the University of Michigan nursing school ...
Time, goes by
so slowly
and time can do so much ...
Ashley's parents, David and Gail, always had trusted their daughter implicitly. So when Mike Jamieson and Andy
Stindt came to the house that evening, they greeted them the way they greeted all of Ashley's friends, with smiles and
handshakes. And when the kids said they were going out for coffee in Royal Oak, David and Gail didn't need to remind
Ashley of her curfew. She knew it. Twelve thirty.
She was never late.
"Bye!" Ashley sang to her parents.
They heard the door close behind her.
The Trans Am
Here is what we know of the other driver that night, the fourth victim, not so innocent. Or, as some of the
parents refer to her, "the murderer."
She was not an evil person. She had no prior arrests. She was 33 years old. Her name was Lori Ann Smith. She
was married, with a child of her own. She worked as a cook at the Northfield Hilton. She had a company softball game
scheduled for that Monday night but it was called off due to the rain. At some point, she and her 11-year-old daughter
went to McDonalds for dinner, then visited a friend. Sometime around 9 p.m., she dropped her daughter at home and
went out again, to a restaurant bar.
And she started drinking.
Whom she was drinking with is still in question. How many drinks she had is also in question. What is not in
question is the effect of those drinks.
She was more than legally drunk when she got behind the wheel of her white Trans Am. And she was traveling
somewhere between 80 and 90 miles an hour when she came to the Crooks and Long Lake intersection, just a few
minutes after midnight.
The light was red.
She did not stop.
Say good-bye.
FROM THE POLICE REPORT: As a result of the impact between the two vehicles, the Pontiac Grand Prix was torn
apart into two large sections ...the front section struck and jumped the median curb ...the rear section also struck and
jumped the curb ...then jumped another curb, crossed the sidewalk, and came to rest in a water saturated area ...
The white Pontiac Tans Am struck and jumped the center median ...then once again struck a curb and jumped the curb...
Two male occupants of the black Grand Prix, Andrew Stindt, the driver, and Michael Jamieson, the right front
seat passenger, were on the curb and the median strip ...
The right rear seat passenger, Ashley Easterbrook, was located just outside the passenger compartment of the
Grand Prix, with an arm still inside the vehicle ...
Writer could find no signs of life in the three victims ...
The horror
Parents who truly know and love their children can always tell when something is wrong. Penny Mapes, Michael
Jamieson's mother, had that feeling the moment she was awakened by a phone call around 2 on that wet summer
morning. It was a friend of Ashley Easterbrook's, trying to locate Ashley. The friend sounded worried.
"I'll go downstairs and check with Michael," Penny said. But she was starting to think Michael wasn't there
either. Just as she reached the first floor, the doorbell rang. Two police officers stood outside.
"Mrs. Jamieson?" one asked when she opened the door. "Is Mr. Jamieson here . .."
At the same time, a few miles away, Nan Stindt woke up and saw the light on in Andy's room. She felt a shiver.
She always left the lights on when the kids were out, so when they came home and went to sleep, she would know by
the darkness that everything was OK.
No darkness.
Everything was not OK.
She ran into Andy's room and saw he wasn't there. She yelled for her husband. Then, remembering Andy had
gone out with Mike, she immediately called Mike's house.
Penny answered. She sounded odd.
"Penny, the kids aren't home. Where are they? What's going on?"
"There was an accident . . ." Penny whispered. "Michael's been killed."
"What?"
There was a stunned silence, the intersection of sympathy and horror.
"Penny . . ." Nan said slowly. "What about Andy?"
Penny couldn't find the words.
"Penny?"
What could she say?
"Penny! What about Andy? You have to tell me!"
"Nan," Penny finally blurted through her tears, "they were all killed. All of them . . ."
A few miles away, David and Gail Easterbrook were also awake and calling the police.
"Yes ...hello ...it's 2:15 a.m. and my daughter isn't home and she's always home, or she always calls. Something's
wrong."
"Sir," the woman from the police department told David, "there's been an accident this evening on Crooks and
Long Lake. Could you please describe your daughter?"
He described Ashley. Her height. Her weight. Her hair. Her face. He saw her childish beauty so clearly in his
mind's eye. Uncharacteristically, she had forgotten her wallet, so she had no ID when investigators arrived.
"Please hold on," the policewoman said.
David waited a minute, maybe two, the world's most unbearable silence, a child in the balance. "Total hell," he
would later call it. How else do you describe it?
"Sir . . ." the woman said upon returning, "it appears that your daughter was involved in the accident."
"Well, what hospital is she in?" David said.
"Sir ...it was a very bad accident."
Gail began to weep. David felt dizzy. He ran out the door and hollered at the night sky, words he never used,
angry words, curse words, words of anguish and agony and disbelief. "NOOOOO! NOOOO!" Neighbors awoke and
looked out the window. Adam, Ashley's brother, heard his father yelling and began to cry. Gail stood beside him, numb
and sobbing.
When a police officer arrived, David raced up to him. And when the officer said the kids had done nothing
wrong, they hadn't been drinking, but "sir, I'm sorry, your daughter is dead," David thought, not his daughter, not his
first-born. She had to graduate from high school this week.
"Punch me! Hit me! I'm dreaming! It's isn't true! There's no way! There's no way! There's no way! THERE'S NO BLEEPING
WAY! . . ."
The farewells
Ashley Easterbrook was buried with her mother's rosary, stuffed animals, varsity letters, and photos of the
gymnastics team.
Andrew Stindt was buried with his lacrosse uniform, a cross from his older brother, and a golden shell souvenir
from Hilton Head.
Michael Jamieson was buried with a Western Michigan flag, a bottle of his favorite cologne, and a baseball
glove.
The funerals were staggered, so that kids from the high schools could attend all three. No one in Troy could
recall bigger gatherings, people spilling into the hallways and vestibules and front steps. No one could recall more tears.
Lori Ann Smith was buried, too. She is also a victim -- her own. She left a weeping child and a grieving husband. She had
never been arrested for driving drunk before. But her blood-alcohol level that night was between .14 and .17, well above
the legal limits, and no one will ever be able to ask her what she was thinking.
In the weeks that followed, as the visitors thinned, the grief grew more acute, and the families yearned for any
signs they could find. There's a light above the shower in John and Nan Stindt's bedroom. Now and then, when one of
them is around, it flickers on inexplicably, just holds the light, then goes off.
"That's Andy," they say, "he's telling us he's all right."
Meanwhile, Randy Mapes, Michael Jamieson's stepfather, wears a watch that Michael had ordered him from
Sports Illustrated. After the accident, the watch alarm began to go off. Randy took it to a repair place, but they said
there was nothing wrong with it. The time when the alarm sounds is always the same: 12:16 a.m. The time their son was
killed.
"That's Michael," they say. "He's sending us a message."
Ashley Easterbrook's father, David, didn't wait for signs. A make-things-happen man in his job as human
resources director for Kmart, he threw himself headfirst into the issue of drunken driving. He wrote to judges. He
collected data. He gave interviews, spoke in public. It made him feel somehow closer to the little girl he lost.
Ten days after his daughter's death, David was in courtrooms, witnessing the way drunken driving cases were
handled. He was flabbergasted. Cases being dismissed, shuffled through, bargained down.
"One time, I sat in a courtroom with a guy who had a .20 blood-alcohol level after a Red Wings game,"
Easterbrook says. "And this attorney stood up and he said, 'Your honor, you gotta understand, the Wings game went
into overtime, and my client was caught up in the excitement. That's why he was drunk. That's why he was stopped. But
the Stanley Cup, judge, it hasn't happened here in 42 years!'
"And I'm sitting in the courtroom and I can't believe what I'm hearing."
Ten weeks after the accident, Easterbrook accompanied police on a special patrol. They arrested nine drunken
drivers in seven hours. One woman was weaving all over the road. When the police handcuffed her and put her in the
back of the squad car, she was livid.
"You guys think you're really big men, don't you?" she hissed. She glared at David, and mistook him for a cop.
"You should be out arresting murderers! ...I hope your mother dies! I hope your wife dies! I hope your daughter dies!"
At the woman's sentencing, David turned and told her, "You were 10 weeks too late."
In each of the family's garages now, there are vehicles with bumper stickers.
"A drunk driver killed my son." "A drunk driver killed my daughter." "A drunk driver killed my brother."
And the stunning thing is, there's a story like this every day.
Tonight is New Year's Eve, a potential disaster for alcohol and vehicles. Last New Year's Eve, 50 Americans were
killed by drunken drivers. Mothers Against Drunk Driving estimates that on a typical Friday or Saturday night, there are
thousands of drunken drivers on Oakland County roads alone. And those are nights without champagne toasts and party
hats.
So tonight, what Michael's family and Andy's family and Ashley's family want you to know, what these weary
mothers and fathers and sisters and brothers want you to know, what these hundreds of cousins and uncles and aunts
and friends and teammates want you to know, is simply this: When you drink and drive, you become a potential killer.
And when you kill, you don't just kill a person. You kill Christmas. You kill New Year's. You kill Sunday dinners and
Saturday picnics. You kill holidays, vacations. You kill summer and winter.
You kill photo albums. You kill home movies.
You kill a popular gymnastics captain, and a smiling baseball pitcher, and a bass-playing lacrosse star.
You stop time in its tracks.
You ruin everything for so many people, hanging an anvil of depression around their necks, and for what? That is
what they ask of you: For what? For a Red Wings celebration? For a New Year's party? For the simple inconvenience of
asking a friend to drive, or calling a cab?
On the morning of the teenagers' funerals, David Easterbrook was searching for something to put in his
daughter's casket. In her bedroom, he discovered a plastic box of diaries that he never knew she kept. He handed one to
Gail, who was sitting on Ashley's bed, crying. She opened to a random page. These are the words she saw: "Dear God -- I
wanted to write and say I just heard the best poem about a girl who didn't drink but got killed by a drunk driver. The
poem is sad but true. It's never the person who drank who gets hurt. It's scary to think of all the people I know who drink
and maybe a friend of mine could injure or kill me and another one of my friends. It scares me to DEATH! Literally! If
something were to happen, and I can't say how I feel, please make sure my parents know that I love them and Adam
with all my heart, even though I don't always show it. I do."
If you drive past Crooks and Long Lake today, you'll see three large wreaths positioned around the intersection,
each bearing a single red ribbon, one for Ashley, one for Michael, one for Andy. They sit precisely where that first young
man discovered their bodies, shortly after midnight, when heaven opened in a gentle summer drizzle, and life met death
in a chilling chorus of why, why, why?
Lessons:
Dramatic moment and Exposition
Even though this is an essay, the format follows that of fiction in many ways. Note how the author alternates
between exposition (background, setting, authorial commentary) and dramatic moments (the action taking place).
NOTE how Albom does this throughout the piece:
Like a lot of kids in Troy, Michael Jamieson blossomed through a bevy
of school activities. He pitched for the Troy Athens team. He played soccer. He
played the viola. He won an $8,000 scholarship to attend Western, and his
plan was to become a history teacher.
For now, he was doing what most college freshmen do on summer
break: working to make some cash. He loved the idea of working with Andy.
They remained tight friends, even though they had chosen different colleges.
Hey. Your high school ties are the ones that bind, aren't they?
And Michael and Andy had tied it together in high school. They'd done
Exposition: provides
background, setting,
tells instead of
shows.
the prom thing with their girlfriends. They'd hung out in Royal Oak coffee
shops. They also took a senior trip to Hilton Head Island, S.C., that was, for
both of them, unforgettable. Each day they would start walking down the
beach, and an hour later they'd come back with 40 new friends. There's a
photo of them on that beach, all tanned skin and young muscle, surrounded
by girls, grinning like bandits.
Penny loves those photos.
"This bread is good, huh?" her son said that night.
"Mmm," she answered, smiling through her bites.
They stayed there a few more minutes, talking, eating, just another
family moment in the kitchen. Then Michael said they were going over to
Andy's and Penny said OK.
She heard the door close behind them.
Your assignment:
Model this style to write by writing an ESSAY that alternates between exposition and
dramatic moment. Use narrative elements to make your point. In other words, use a story
to help you explain or persuade something to your readers.
Dramatic moment:
the action taking
place, often includes
dialogue. Shows
instead of tells
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DICK GREGORY
Shame
white folks' shirt fit me better. I'd run out on the street. If I knew
my place and didn't come too close, she'd wink at me and say
hello. That was a good feeling. Sometimes I'd follow her all the
I never learned hate at home, or shame. I had to go to
way home, and shovel the snow off her walk and try to make
school for that. I was about seven years old when I got my first big
friends with her momma and her aunts. I'd drop money on her
lesson. I was in love with a little girl named Helene Tucker, a
stoop late at night on my way back from shining shoes in the
light-complexioned little girl with pigtails and nice manners. She
taverns. And she had a daddy, and he had a good job. He was a
was always clean and she was smart in school. I think I went to
paperhanger.
school then mostly to look at her. I brushed my hair and even got
I guess I would have gotten over Helene by summertime,
me a little old handkerchief. It was a lady's handkerchief, but I
but something happened in that classroom that made her face hang
didn't want Helene to see me wipe my nose on my hand.
in front of me for the next twenty-two years. When I played the
The pipes were frozen again, there was no water in the
drums in high school, it was for Helene, and when I broke track
house, but I washed my socks and shirt every night. I'd get a pot,
records in college, it was for Helene, and when I started standing
and go over to Mister Ben's grocery store, and stick my pot down
behind microphones and heard applause, I wished Helene could
into his soda machine and scoop out some chopped ice. By evening
hear it too. It wasn't until I was twenty-nine years old and married
the ice melted to water for washing. I got sick a lot that winter
and making money that I finally got her out of my system. Helene
because the fire would go out at night before the clothes were dry.
was sitting in that classroom when I learned to be ashamed of
In the morning I'd put them on, wet or dry, because they were the
myself.
only clothes I had.
Everybody's got a Helene Tucker, a symbol of everything
you want. I loved her for her goodness, her cleanness, her
It was on a Thursday. I was sitting in the back of the room,
in a seat with a chalk circle drawn around it. The idiot's seat, the
troublemaker's seat.
popularity. She'd walk down my street and my brothers and sisters
The teacher thought I was stupid. Couldn't spell, couldn't
would yell, "Here comes Helene," and I'd rub my tennis sneakers
read, couldn't do arithmetic. Just stupid. Teachers were never
on the back of my pants and wish my hair wasn't so nappy and the
interested in finding out that you couldn't concentrate because you
were so hungry, because you hadn't had any breakfast. All you
pledged for her daddy I was going to top it. And I'd hand the
could think about was noontime; would it ever come? Maybe you
money right in. I wasn't going to wait until Monday to buy me a
could sneak into the cloakroom and steal a bite of some kid's lunch
daddy.
out of a coat pocket. A bite of something. Paste. You can't really
I was shaking, scared to death. The teacher opened her
make a meal of paste, or put it on bread for a sandwich, but
book and started calling out names alphabetically: "Helene
sometimes I'd scoop a few spoonfuls out of the big paste jar in the
Tucker?" "My Daddy said he'd give two dollars and fifty cents."
back of the room. Pregnant people get strange tastes. I was
"That's very nice, Helene. Very, very nice indeed."
pregnant with poverty. Pregnant with dirt and pregnant with smells
That made me feel pretty good. It wouldn't take too much
that made people turn away. Pregnant with cold and pregnant with
to top that. I had almost three dollars in dimes and quarters in my
shoes that were never bought for me. Pregnant with five other
pocket. I stuck my hand in my pocket and held on to the money,
people in my bed and no daddy in the next room, and pregnant
waiting for her to call my name. But the teacher closed her book
with hunger. Paste doesn't taste too bad when you're hungry.
after she called everybody else in the class.
The teacher thought I was a troublemaker. All she saw
I stood up and raised my hand. "What is it now?" "You
from the front of the room was a little black boy who squirmed in
forgot me?" She turned toward the blackboard. "I don't have time
his idiot's seat and made noises and poked the kids around him. I
to be playing with you, Richard."
guess she couldn't see a kid who made noises because he wanted
someone to know he was there.
"My daddy said he'd..." "Sit down, Richard, you're
disturbing the class." "My daddy said he'd give...fifteen dollars."
It was on a Thursday, the day before the Negro payday.
She turned around and looked mad. "We are collecting this
The eagle always flew on Friday. The teacher was asking each
money for you and your kind, Richard Gregory. If your daddy can
student how much his father would give to the Community Chest.
give fifteen dollars you have no business being on relief."
On Friday night, each kid would get the money from his father,
and on Monday he would bring it to the school. I decided I was
going to buy a daddy right then. I had money in my pocket from
shining shoes and selling papers, and whatever Helene Tucker
"I got it right now, I got it right now, my Daddy gave it to
me to turn in today, my daddy said. .."
"And furthermore," she said, looking right at me, her
down the street the people could see you were on relief? It was a
nostrils getting big and her lips getting thin and her eyes opening
nice warm mackinaw and it had a hood, and my momma beat me
wide, "We know you don't have a daddy."
and called me a little rat when she found out I stuffed it in the
Helene Tucker turned around, her eyes full of tears. She felt
bottom of a pail full of garbage way over on Cottage Street. There
sorry for me. Then I couldn't see her too well because I was crying,
was shame in running over to Mister Ben's at the end of the day
too.
and asking for his rotten peaches, there was shame in asking Mrs.
"Sit down, Richard." And I always thought the teacher kind
Simmons for a spoonful of sugar, there was shame in running out
of liked me. She always picked me to wash the blackboard on
to meet the relief truck. I hated that truck, full of food for you and
Friday, after school. That was a big thrill; it made me feel
your kind. I ran into the house and hid when it came. And then I
important. If I didn't wash it, come Monday the school might not
started to sneak through alleys, to take the long way home so the
function right.
people going into White's Eat Shop wouldn't see me. Yeah, the
"Where are you going, Richard! "
whole world heard the teacher that day-we all know you don't have
I walked out of school that day, and for a long time I didn't
a Daddy.
go back very often.
There was shame there. Now there was shame everywhere.
It seemed like the whole world had been inside that classroom,
everyone had heard what the teacher had said, everyone had turned
around and felt sorry for me. There was shame in going to the
Worthy Boys Annual Christmas Dinner for you and your kind,
because everybody knew what a worthy boy was. Why couldn't
they just call it the Boys Annual Dinner-why'd they have to give it
a name? There was shame in wearing the brown and orange and
white plaid mackinaw' the welfare gave to three thousand boys.
Why'd it have to be the same for everybody so when you walked
The Use of Force
by William Carlos Williams
They were new patients to me, all I had was the name, Olson. Please come down as soon as you can, my
daughter is very sick.
When I arrived I was met by the mother, a big startled looking woman, very clean and apologetic who
merely said, Is this the doctor? and let me in. In the back, she added. You must excuse us, doctor, we
have her in the kitchen where it is warm. It is very damp here sometimes.
The child was fully dressed and sitting on her father's lap near the kitchen table. He tried to get up, but I
motioned for him not to bother, took off my overcoat and started to look things over. I could see that they
were all very nervous, eyeing me up and down distrustfully. As often, in such cases, they weren't telling
me more than they had to, it was up to me to tell them; that's why they were spending three dollars on
me.
The child was fairly eating me up with her cold, steady eyes, and no expression to her face whatever. She
did not move and seemed, inwardly, quiet; an unusually attractive little thing, and as strong as a heifer in
appearance. But her face was flushed, she was breathing rapidly, and I realized that she had a high fever.
She had magnificent blonde hair, in profusion. One of those picture children often reproduced in
advertising leaflets and the photogravure sections of the Sunday papers.
She's had a fever for three days, began the father and we don't know what it comes from. My wife has
given her things, you know, like people do, but it don't do no good. And there's been a lot of sickness
around. So we tho't you'd better look her over and tell us what is the matter.
As doctors often do I took a trial shot at it as a point of departure. Has she had a sore throat?
Both parents answered me together, No . . . No, she says her throat don't hurt her.
Does your throat hurt you? added the mother to the child. But the little girl's expression didn't change nor
did she move her eyes from my face.
Have you looked?
I tried to, said the mother, but I couldn't see.
As it happens we had been having a number of cases of diphtheria in the school to which this child went
during that month and we were all, quite apparently, thinking of that, though no one had as yet spoken of
the thing.
Well, I said, suppose we take a look at the throat first. I smiled in my best professional manner and
asking for the child's first name I said, come on, Mathilda, open your mouth and let's take a look at your
throat.
Nothing doing.
Aw, come on, I coaxed, just open your mouth wide and let me take a look. Look, I said opening both
hands wide, I haven't anything in my hands. Just open up and let me see.
Such a nice man, put in the mother. Look how kind he is to you. Come on, do what he tells you to. He
won't hurt you.
At that I ground my teeth in disgust. If only they wouldn't use the word "hurt" I might be able to get
somewhere. But I did not allow myself to be hurried or disturbed but speaking quietly and slowly I
approached the child again.
As I moved my chair a little nearer suddenly with one catlike movement both her hands clawed
instinctively for my eyes and she almost reached them too. In fact she knocked my glasses flying and they
fell, though unbroken, several feet away from me on the kitchen floor.
Both the mother and father almost turned themselves inside out in embarrassment and apology. You bad
girl, said the mother, taking her and shaking her by one arm. Look what you've done. The nice man . . .
For heaven's sake, I broke in. Don't call me a nice man to her. I'm here to look at her throat on the
chance that she might have diphtheria and possibly die of it. But that's nothing to her. Look here, I said to
the child, we're going to look at your throat. You're old enough to understand what I'm saying. Will you
open it now by yourself or shall we have to open it for you)
Not a move. Even her expression hadn't changed. Her breaths however were coming faster and faster.
Then the battle began. I had to do it. I had to have a throat culture for her own protection. But first I told
the parents that it was entirely up to them. I explained the danger but said that I would not insist on a
throat examination so long as they would take the responsibility.
If you don't do what the doctor says you'll have to go to the hospital, the mother admonished her
severely.
Oh yeah? I had to smile to myself. After all, I had already fallen in love with the savage brat, the parents
were contemptible to me. In the ensuing struggle they grew more and more abject, crushed, exhausted
while she surely rose to magnificent heights of insane fury of effort bred of her terror of me.
The father tried his best, and he was a big man but the fact that she was his daughter, his shame at her
behavior and his dread of hurting her made him release her just at the critical times when I had almost
achieved success, till I wanted to kill him. But his dread also that she might have diphtheria made him tell
me to go on, go on though he himself was almost fainting, while the mother moved back and forth behind
us raising and lowering her hands in an agony of apprehension.
Put her in front of you on your lap, I ordered, and hold both her wrists.
But as soon as he did the child let out a scream. Don't, you're hurting me. Let go of my hands. Let them
go I tell you. Then she shrieked terrifyingly, hysterically. Stop it! Stop it! You're killing me!
Do you think she can stand it, doctor! said the mother.
You get out, said the husband to his wife. Do you want her to die of diphtheria?
Come on now, hold her, I said.
Then I grasped the child's head with my left hand and tried to get the wooden tongue depressor between
her teeth. She fought, with clenched teeth, desperately! But now I also had grown furious--at a child. I
tried to hold myself down but I couldn't. I know how to expose a throat for inspection. And I did my best.
When finally I got the wooden spatula behind the last teeth and just the point of it into the mouth cavity,
she opened up for an instant but before I could see anything she came down again and gripping the
wooden blade between her molars she reduced it to splinters before I could get it out again.
Aren't you ashamed, the mother yelled at her. Aren't you ashamed to act like that in front of the doctor?
Get me a smooth-handled spoon of some sort, I told the mother. We're going through with this. The
child's mouth was already bleeding. Her tongue was cut and she was screaming in wild hysterical shrieks.
Perhaps I should have desisted and come back in an hour or more. No doubt it would have been better.
But I have seen at least two children lying dead in bed of neglect in such cases, and feeling that I must
get a diagnosis now or never I went at it again. But the worst of it was that I too had got beyond reason. I
could have torn the child apart in my own fury and enjoyed it. It was a pleasure to attack her. My face
was burning with it.
The damned little brat must be protected against her own idiocy, one says to one's self at such times.
Others must be protected against her. It is a social necessity. And all these things are true. But a blind
fury, a feeling of adult shame, bred of a longing for muscular release are the operatives. One goes on to
the end.
In a final unreasoning assault I overpowered the child's neck and jaws. I forced the heavy silver spoon
back of her teeth and down her throat till she gagged. And there it was--both tonsils covered with
membrane. She had fought valiantly to keep me from knowing her secret. She had been hiding that sore
throat for three days at least and lying to her parents in order to escape just such an outcome as this.
Now truly she was furious. She had been on the defensive before but now she attacked. Tried to get off
her father's lap and fly at me while tears of defeat blinded her eyes.
Martin Luther King
I Have a Dream - Address at March on Washington
August 28, 1963. Washington, D.C.
Underline repetitions
Highlight metaphors and similes
Mark other areas of figurative language
(personification, hyperbole, imagery)
Note where there are shifts in focus
(past to present to future)
Look at the length of sentences
I am happy to join with you today in what will go down in history as the greatest
demonstration for freedom in the history of our nation. [Applause]
Five score years ago, a great American, in whose symbolic shadow we stand signed the
Emancipation Proclamation. This momentous decree came as a great beacon light of hope to millions
of Negro slaves who had been seared in the flames of withering injustice. It came as a joyous
daybreak to end the long night of captivity.
But one hundred years later, we must face the tragic fact that the Negro is still not free. One hundred
years later, the life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains
of discrimination. One hundred years later, the Negro lives on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of
a vast ocean of material prosperity. One hundred years later, the Negro is still languishing in the
corners of American society and finds himself an exile in his own land. So we have come here today
to dramatize an appalling condition.
In a sense we have come to our nation's capital to cash a check. When the architects of our republic
wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the declaration of Independence, they were
signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir. This note was a promise that all
men would be guaranteed the inalienable rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
It is obvious today that America has defaulted on this promissory note insofar as her citizens of color
are concerned. Instead of honoring this sacred obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad
check which has come back marked "insufficient funds." But we refuse to believe that the bank of
justice is bankrupt. We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of
opportunity of this nation. So we have come to cash this check -- a check that will give us upon
demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice. We have also come to this hallowed spot to
remind America of the fierce urgency of now. This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or
to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism. Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley
of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice. Now is the time to open the doors of opportunity to
all of God's children. Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksands of racial injustice to the
solid rock of brotherhood.
It would be fatal for the nation to overlook the urgency of the moment and to underestimate the
determination of the Negro. This sweltering summer of the Negro's legitimate discontent will not pass
until there is an invigorating autumn of freedom and equality. Nineteen sixty-three is not an end, but a
beginning. Those who hope that the Negro needed to blow off steam and will now be content will
have a rude awakening if the nation returns to business as usual. There will be neither rest nor
tranquility in America until the Negro is granted his citizenship rights. The whirlwinds of revolt will
continue to shake the foundations of our nation until the bright day of justice emerges.
But there is something that I must say to my people who stand on the warm threshold which leads
into the palace of justice. In the process of gaining our rightful place we must not be guilty of wrongful
deeds. Let us not seek to satisfy our thirst for freedom by drinking from the cup of bitterness and
hatred.
We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow
our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the
majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force. The marvelous new militancy which has
engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to distrust of all white people, for many of our white
brothers, as evidenced by their presence here today, have come to realize that their destiny is tied up
with our destiny and their freedom is inextricably bound to our freedom. We cannot walk alone.
And as we walk, we must make the pledge that we shall march ahead. We cannot turn back. There
are those who are asking the devotees of civil rights, "When will you be satisfied?" We can never be
satisfied as long as our bodies, heavy with the fatigue of travel, cannot gain lodging in the motels of
the highways and the hotels of the cities. We cannot be satisfied as long as the Negro's basic mobility
is from a smaller ghetto to a larger one. We can never be satisfied as long as a Negro in Mississippi
cannot vote and a Negro in New York believes he has nothing for which to vote. No, no, we are not
satisfied, and we will not be satisfied until justice rolls down like waters and righteousness like a
mighty stream.
I am not unmindful that some of you have come here out of great trials and tribulations. Some of you
have come fresh from narrow cells. Some of you have come from areas where your quest for
freedom left you battered by the storms of persecution and staggered by the winds of police brutality.
You have been the veterans of creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned
suffering is redemptive.
Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the
slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be
changed. Let us not wallow in the valley of despair.
I say to you today, my friends, that in spite of the difficulties and frustrations of the moment, I still have
a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.
I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We
hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal."
I have a dream that one day on the red hills of Georgia the sons of former slaves and the sons of
former slave owners will be able to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.
I have a dream that one day even the state of Mississippi, a desert state, sweltering with the heat of
injustice and oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and justice.
I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the
color of their skin but by the content of their character.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day the state of Alabama, whose governor's lips are presently dripping with
the words of interposition and nullification, will be transformed into a situation where little black boys
and black girls will be able to join hands with little white boys and white girls and walk together as
sisters and brothers.
I have a dream today.
I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low,
the rough places will be made plain, and the crooked places will be made straight, and the glory of
the Lord shall be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.
This is our hope. This is the faith with which I return to the South. With this faith we will be able to hew
out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling
discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work
together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together,
knowing that we will be free one day.
This will be the day when all of God's children will be able to sing with a new meaning, "My country,
'tis of thee, sweet land of liberty, of thee I sing. Land where my fathers died, land of the pilgrim's
pride, from every mountainside, let freedom ring."
And if America is to be a great nation this must become true. So let freedom ring from the prodigious
hilltops of New Hampshire. Let freedom ring from the mighty mountains of New York. Let freedom
ring from the heightening Alleghenies of Pennsylvania!
Let freedom ring from the snowcapped Rockies of Colorado!
Let freedom ring from the curvaceous peaks of California!
But not only that; let freedom ring from Stone Mountain of Georgia!
Let freedom ring from Lookout Mountain of Tennessee!
Let freedom ring from every hill and every molehill of Mississippi. From every mountainside, let
freedom ring.
When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state
and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white
men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing in the words of
the old Negro spiritual, "Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!"
Summary and Main Idea Somebody Wants But So
Optional
Somebody
Wants
(character) (goal or motivation)
Literary
Example
CINDERELLA
Nonfiction
Example
Does the
Constitution
have a
heart for
boobies?
The main
character
Cinderella
To achieve a goal
wants to live happily
ever after
But
(conflict)
So
(resolution)
Something or someone
is in the way
How does it get
resolved?
but she has an evil
stepmother and sisters
who don’t let her go to
the ball
her fairy
godmother helps
her
Some stories may need more than one statement because
there are often subplots or several important characters.
But
(conflict)
Something or
someone is in the
way
but has to be back
by midnight
So
(resolution)
How does it get
resolved?
so the prince
finds her with
the class slipper
Somebody
Wants
But
So
But
So
The main
person, people
or thing
involved
Students
want something
Another person, people
or thing is in the way
How does it get
resolved?
Another person,
people or thing is
in the way
How does it get
resolved?
want to wear the I
heart boobies
bracelets
school officials consider
it lewd
they banned
them
students are
fighting for their
constitutional
rights
so a federal
court will make
a decision
Then
the end…
And they live
happily ever
after
Then
Important things to remember about SWBS statements:
• They can be used with almost any text.
• The “Somebody” does not have to be a person, it can be a thing, institution, group of people, etc.
• Some stories can have more than one Somebody Wanted But So statements. Some stories may need more than one statement because
there are often subplots or several important characters.
• When you write your one sentence summary from the SWBS chart, you can connect the pieces with the SWBS words.
Find the Main Idea and Summarize
Somebody
(character)
Literary
Optional
So
(resolution)
Wants
But
(conflict)
So
(resolution)
But
(conflict)
The main
character
To achieve a goal
Something or someone
is in the way
How does it get
resolved?
Something or
someone is in the
way
How does it get
resolved?
the end…
Somebody
Wants
But
So
But
So
Then
The main
person, people
or thing
involved
want something
Another person, people
or thing is in the way
How does it get
resolved?
Another person,
people or thing is
in the way
How does it get
resolved?
(goal or motivation)
Then
Example
Nonfiction
Example
Resources for Students
• Use this template to help summarize an article:
http://www.readwritethink.org/files/resources/lesson_images/lesson29
0/Template.pdf
•
Find interesting articles to practice summarizing on these sites:
http://www.onlinenewspapers.com --links to online newspaper all
over the country and world
•
Use the Learning Network from the NY Times
http://learning.blogs.nytimes.com to find articles preselected as
interesting for teens.
•
Topic The general category or class of ideas, often stated in a
word or phrase, to which the ideas of a text as a whole belong
(e.g., subject matter).
•
Main Idea the most important idea expressed in a piece of writing.
Stated: It may be the central idea of an entire work or a thought
expressed in the topic sentence of a paragraph.
Implied: The implied main idea is the main idea of a passage or an
article that is not directly stated but formed from what is suggested
by an author from the supporting details.
•
Summary A general statement that presents the main points or facts in
condensed form, omitting unimportant details and information.
•
Inference logical conclusions based on premises known or assumed to
be true; the conclusions drawn from this process.
The Type of Questions often used for Main Idea and Details and Summary
• Which statement best expresses the main idea of the article?
• What is the main idea of this article?
• What would be another good title for the article?
• Based on all the information given, how does each piece contribute to
the idea that_______________?
• Which sentence gives the best summary?
• Which statement best describes the lesson/moral of this story?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
What is the primary topic in the article?
What is the essential message in the article/story?
What is the central idea of the article?
What is the main goal of ?
In what ways did ______ experience ______ ?
According to the article, which (person) helped _________ ?
Which sentence best characterizes ‘s attitude toward ?
How does support the idea that ?
How can the reader prove the idea that is the main idea of this text?
From reading the article, the reader can infer that _____ will _______ .
Based on the passage, which action will the narrator most likely take in
the future?
Sample Test Questions
1. Main Idea
Which statement best expresses the main idea of the article?
2. Summary Statement
Which sentence from the essay best summarizes the narrator’s
“lesson in living” from her experience with the client?
3. Relevant Details
According to the article, which musician helped America rediscover swing
music?
4. Predictions
From the information provided in the excerpt and the text links, the reader
can predict
5. Relevant Details
According to the essay, the language of the Earth is
6. Conclusions/Inferences”
From reading the article, the reader can infer that the “world’s roof ” will
7. Predictions
Based on the essay, which action will the narrator most likely take in the
future?
Point of View
Although point of view can be very
complex (peripheral, central, retrospective, etc.), we are going to stick to the
basics. You will understand, recognize,
and write in the following four
perspectives:
Readers don’t care much about point of view;
they’re far more interested in character, plot,
language, theme. The fiction writer cannot
afford to share that disinterest.
--Wayne Ude
First Person
Any story or piece in which the narrator refers to him or herself as “I” is considered
to be the first person point of view. These are often very character-driven stories. A
problem with first person narration is that beginning writers often confuse the
narrator with the author and want the story to be told “Exactly” as it happened. If
it is nonfiction this might be okay, but in fiction the freedom is there, and should be
used, for creativity. When reading stories in the first person, we need to realize that
what the narrator is recounting might not be the objective truth. This is called an
UNRELIABLE narrator and so we should question the trustworthiness of what they say.
Second Person
Rarely used. This point of view uses the word “you” and is best used in small pieces.
An entire novel written in this point of view can get tiresome. Second person is told
from the “you” viewpoint and is most often associated with literary works. Almost
always avoid second person point of view in academic writing.
Third Person
Here the narrator does not participate in the action of the story as one of the characters, but lets us know exactly how the characters feel. We learn about the characters
through this outside voice using “he” or “she.” There are two types of third person
point of view: Omniscient and Limited.
Omniscient --derived from the Latin roots “omni” (all, or everything) and “sciens: (to know), the third person ominiscient point of view is a narrator who is all-knowing. This narrator can get into everyone’s head, explain all their
thoughts and observes all actions. This point of view needs to established
quickly and the different perspectives need clear transitions. Where most
beginning writers fail with this point of view is by jumping around too much,
too often and confusing the reader. This point of view works best in a story
with a complicated plot and multiple characters. Most of popular author
Stephen King’s works are written in third person omniscient.
Limited: Just as it says, the third person limited point of view is limited to one person. It is almost like first-person except the narrator says “he” or “she” instead of “I” and it is written in past tense with phrases such as “he said” or “he thought.” But the narrator is very close to one person in the story and cannot be in the heads of others. There are no shifts at any other time to other character’s thoughts or emotions. Many detective novels are written in this
simple, straightforward tense. This perspective is used in many easy to read works of fiction.
QUESTION GENERATOR
Name: ______________________________________ Date: ___________
Topic: _______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________
_______________________________________________________
What are four great questions that could show how much we understand
about this topic?
Initial Understanding
Developing An Interpretation
Making Connections
Critical Stance
Topic: _______________________________________________________
Name: ______________________________________ Date: ___________
TAKING A CRITICAL STANCE FOR FICTION: Making and supporting a
judgment about how an author used a literary devise/literary devices to accomplish
an element of a story.
TAKING A CRITICAL STANCE FOR NON-FICTION: Making a judgment
about the quality of an information source for your research.
Write three very interesting questions about this topic using a different verb from
this list as the basis for each question.
critique, evaluate, extend, identify inconsistency or error, judge, rank, rate, (others
with teacher’s permission)
Underline the best question and explain why it is the best.
Topic: ____________________________________________________________
Name: ___________________________________Date: ____________
MAKING CONNECTIONS: Going beyond the “surface level” to process the
information from two or more sources such as two books, a book and a video, and
a book and life experience.
Write three very interesting questions about this topic using a different verb from
this list as the basis for each question.
categorize, classify, compare similarities, contrast differences, construct, describe
patterns and relationships, discover cause and effects, explain, generalize,
hypothesize, illustrate, infer, integrate, interpret, paraphrase, predict, synthesize
(others with teacher’s permission)
Underline the best question and explain why it is the best.
Topic: ____________________________________________________________
Name: ___________________________________Date: ____________
DEVELOPING AN INTERPRETATION: Going beyond the “surface level” to
process the information from one source.
Write three very interesting questions about this topic using a different verb from
this list as the basis of each question.
categorize, classify, compare similarities, contrast differences, construct, describe
patterns and relationships, discover cause and effects, explain, generalize,
hypothesize, illustrate, infer, integrate, interpret, paraphrase, predict, synthesize
(others with teacher’s permission)
Underline the best question and explain why it is the best.
Topic: ____________________________________________________________
Name: __________________________________Date: _____________
INITIAL UNDERSTANDING: A literal interpretation of information in one
information source.
Write three very interesting questions about this topic using a different verb from
this list as the basis for each question.
describe, identify, list, illustrate, sequence, show, summarize (others with teacher’s
permission)
Underline the best question and explain why it is the best.
Name:
Period:
Essential Question:
TEXT CONNECTIONS
Text
Jot down ideas from the text
that relate to the essential
question
Jot down ideas that
connect ideas from the
text and events in the
world
Jot down ideas that
connect ideas from the
text and events from
your own experience
Jot down ideas that connect
the text, events in the world,
and your own experience to
the essential question
Jot down ideas from your
own experience that relate
to the essential question
Jot down ideas in the world
around you that relate to the
essential question
Jot down ideas that
connect your experience
and events in the world
around you
World
Self
Name:
Period:
Essential Question:
TEXT CONNECTIONS
Text
World
Self
Name:
Period:
Essential Question:
TEXT CONNECTIONS
Directions: Use the chart below to make text-to-self, text-to-world, and world-to-self connections to the essential question
Text
Self
World
Text-to-Self
Text-toWorld
World-toSelf
Text-SelfWorld
Division of Interdisciplinary
& International Studies at
Ithaca College
KEY QUESTIONS TO ASK WHEN ANALYZING MEDIA MESSAGES
www.projectlooksharp.org
www.namle.net
AUTHORSHIP
Who made this message?
Why was this made?
PURPOSE
Who is the target audience (and how do you know)?
AUDIENCE &
AUTHORSHIP
ECONOMICS
Who paid for this?
IMPACT
Who might benefit from this message?
Who might be harmed by it?
Why might this message matter to me?
RESPONSE
What kinds of actions might I take in response to this message?
What is this about (and what makes you think that)?
CONTENT
What ideas, values, information, and/or points of view are overt?
Implied?
What is left out of this message that might be important to know?
MESSAGES &
MEANINGS
TECHNIQUES
What techniques are used?
Why were those techniques used?
How do they communicate the message?
How might different people understand this message differently?
INTERPRETATIONS
What is my interpretation of this and what do I learn about myself
from my reaction or interpretation?
When was this made?
CONTEXT
Where or how was it shared with the public?
REPRESENTATIONS
& REALITY
Is this fact, opinion, or something else?
CREDIBILITY
How credible is this (and what makes you think that)?
What are the sources of the information, ideas, or assertions?
Non-fiction Analysis: Helping students read between the lines
More than ever our students need to be able to critically assess the endless supply of
information bombarding them. Our 24-hour news cycle as well as print and online
sources are filled with bias and spin. This lesson is a general guideline to analyzing
non-fiction text and it is adaptable each time you want to study non-fiction.
Decide a topic: _______________________________________
This can be a current event or a connection to what you are reading/discussing at the time.
Assign homework
Ask students to go home and print a copy of an article about the topic. They can copy it from the
newspaper, a magazine, or print it from the internet. Make sure the topic is narrow enough so
that they will find articles that discuss the same things. For instance, if you want them to learn
more about censorship in schools they would need to type in more specific searches than just
censorship.
Summarize
Students are to summarize their articles in two to three sentences. They should also highlight
key points on the text. Teach or refer to the Definitions to Consider. (see page 2)
Comparison chart
Place students in groups of 4-5 and ask them to read their summaries. Once they have all read
them, they discuss any differences or similarities and mark it down on the Comparison paper.
(see page 3)
Consider the Source
Next, students will complete the Consider the Source page.(see page 4) This might require
further research. If so, the homework is for them to find out more about the “source.”
Choosing the Best
When students return, allow them to get into groups again and discuss their sources. As a
group, decide on the best article that provides the most accurate information. Turn it in.
Follow up
With questions about the role of media, and/or continue one more round with different groups or
in pairs.
Make Copies
Of the articles from each group so that you have a packet of 3-5 articles. Put students in pairs
and go through the process again so that they narrow it down to the best of the best articles.
Reflection
At the end of this assignment, in addition to using the information for research purposes,
consider having the students complete a reflection about what they learned by doing this
activity.
Repeat throughout the year.
Non-fiction Analysis: Reading between the lines
Name________________
Topic: __________________________________
Homework: Bring in an article about the topic. The article can be photocopied from a
magazine or paper, or it can be printed from online.
Some definitions to consider:
Logical fallacy –a misleading or false argument, one that does not follow logically
Bias – describes a preference toward a certain perspective and therefore removes objectivity.
Spin – a heavily biased argument
Objectivity – not influenced by prejudice or bias
Evidence – something that proves or disproves
Validity – legally sound
Arguments – a process for reasoning
Paradox – a statement that could be seen as true but also untrue
Contradiction – a direct opposition between things compared; inconsistency
Deductive reasoning – reasoning from general to the particular (or cause to effect)
Inductive reasoning – reasoning from detailed to the general
Inference – to make assumptions or guess based on evidence
Accuracy – free from error; fact; truth
Summarize:
Make notes while you read your article, then summarize here.
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Share your summaries in groups and complete this comparison chart.
Group Member One
Group Member Two
Articles state the same facts about…
Group Member Three
Group Member Four
Consider the Source
What is the source of your article? _____________________________________________
Is this a primary source? _____________________________________________________
Does your source have a specific agenda or bias? Is it associated with certain beliefs or
opinions? What are they? This might require homework. Often you can go to the About Us page
to learn more about the particular site where you are researching.
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Now that everyone has shared their articles, compared summaries, and determined the source,
comment on whether you believe this source is accurate, biased, incomplete, etc. and why.
Note examples.
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Discussion Questions/Reflection
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What are the positive and/or negative effects of the media presenting bias?
Has the ease of information distribution harmed or strengthened the ability to get news?
What are the benefits and drawbacks to the easy access of information?
How did your understanding of this topic change as you analyzed the sources?
How important is it that the public become informed readers? What are the
consequences of not having media literacy?