Recently, in class we have been reading the book Lord of the Flies, by William Golding. This novel introduced me to the topic of our unit, tribalism. The inquiry question for this unit was;
“What is the role of tribalism in society.”
We focused not only on the plot of Lord of the Flies, but also the symbolism and thematics. Our learning was exemplified in three different ways, multiple reflection/response paragraphs, a keynote presentation, and a literary analysis test. Each of these helped shape our learning for this unit, with many hours in and out of class working to expand our knowledge on LOTF.
The first competency in this unit was Reading and Personal Text Response. This competency also ties into the Understanding Language Construction and Intent competency. Both of these competency’s were connected directly to my understanding of the novel, and how I need to dive deep into the symbolism and tribalism portrayed by the author. I believe I extended on these competency’s, because of my understanding and analysis of the role of the text in LOTF.
One way I completed these competency’s was by researching each chapter and completing each worksheet with a complete personalized, and detailed response. I researched on each of the different examples of symbolism, theme, and aged jargon. In addition to highlighting important quotes on iBooks, I also highlighted unfamiliar words and sentences that included imagery, symbolism, and theme. This helped me when I later came back and analyzed the text.
The second competency I focused on was the Literary Identification and Analysis competency. This competency really stood out to me, because of my wide overall understanding of the novel. I spent a lot of time outside of class researching the novel, and the author learning about the many different LOTF perspectives. The outside knowledge of the authors past history dictated my view of the ideology used to create this book.
I also spent time researching the time period and location this book theoretically took place. In this competency I would include the literary analysis test, which required us to reflect on two separate quotes from the novel. On the test I considered the required task and combined my outside knowledge to create a complete overview of each quote. I also included a brief opinion about the LOTF’s connections to the book coral island. The Coral Island: A Tale of the Pacific Ocean is a novel written by Scottish author R. M. Ballantyne. The Coral Island represents the opposite side of the Lord of the flies, even thought its shares some similarities like the names, Jack, Ralph, and Peter which we assume to be Piggy’s real name. I found facts like these incredibly interesting, because it exemplified William Golding’s influences during the writing of this novel.
The third competency I would like to focus on is the Writing Proses. This was possibly one of the hardest tasks to complete because of wide range of topics we hade to cover. Usually this is one of my strongest fields, but for me there was a lot of confusion going in to some of these assignments. I know I worked really hard on learning about and writing each response/reflection paragraph and the script our my presentation for this project. I believe that my response paragraphs show a slope of improvement ending in a personal, and creative response that exemplifies my learning. On each response/reflection paragraph I included personal thoughts and outside research, even though I felt like some of the effect was lost in translation.
For the second part of this project we created a eight to ten minute presentation on a specific tribe and its connection to LOTF. This part of the project was not as confusing, because in the Prefomance Learning Program we have completed many like it. Most keynote presentations follow a step by by step proses where you research, create, and present. The tribe I picked for this project was the Green Party of Canada. This made the research part of the project a lot easier, because we already knew most of the facts. During the creation of the script I resorted back to previous research and included both factual knowledge and personal opinions that overall exemplified the driving question. We used the same driving question for the entire unit, and because this project took place at the end of the unit I had already culminated a few ideas on how I wanted my answer to sound.
After my research I concluded that, The Green Party of Canada has a big role in our society. In politics it is labeled as the good guys, but doesn’t have a strong short term plan that represents the people. My answer to our driving question was that tribalism can bring people together, and can tare people apart, but overall it represents the glue connecting us as a society, and how without it we would be lost. During the presentation I spoke fluidly, and with confidence, teaching the audience about my topic.
The Green Party Of Canada + TLOTF
Overall, I think that this project was incredibly significant when it come to all of the different projects we have done in the past. It was very interesting and some of the formats were new to me. This was one project that I really felt like I expanded my learning past the guidelines given to me by my teachers. Out of all of the different parts of this project i enjoyed the test the most. Personally, I like testing my knowledge, especially when it comes to a subject I’m confident discussing. Im really proud of the work I have done, and I cant wait for the next one.