Academic, English Learner Profile (ELP)

La Belle Dame sans Merci By John Keats

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d) a sense of tension between imagination and reality, our interior worlds and our public ones?

John Keats’s poem La Belle Dame sans Merci, presents a speaker who comes across a “haggard-looking” knight who reminisces about a wild, and enchanted women who the poet perceives to be imaginary and a figment in the knight’s thoughts. Throughout the poem, Keats creates tension between the knight’s imagination and the reality in which he exists, which exposes the human desire to explore something unnatural and romanticised despite the danger of it being unrealistic and temporary.

The poem envisions a dream the knight had of the “pale kings and princes,” and wakes up still hoping to see the beautiful woman again. Keats shows how despite the “death-pale” appearance of the people in the knight’s dream, he still wishes to escape the reality where “no birds sing,” and relive the memories of the faerieland that he is warned against by the kings and princes. Keats is able to bring his readers back and forth between a secure yet “withered” reality and an inviting yet mysterious imagination whereby one can experience the beauty of a “faery’s child.”

 

 

 

 

 

Academic, English Learner Profile (ELP)

What kind of statement does The Great Gatsby convey?

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The Great Gatsby initially is a representation of the ‘American Dream,’ where extravagant parties, frivolous spending and wild relationships are expected. However, through Fitzgerald’s characterisation of the male and female character, we can see how this novel is instead a representation of everything wrong in this idealised lifestyle and reveals both the cynical and romantic aspects of what it is like to be living in the US during the mid 1920s.

On one had, Fitzgerald presents the characters to be rather dark and selfish through the characterisation of Tom Buchanan and the description of the setting. By presenting Tom as a masculine husband who cheats on his wife with the wife of a a man who he treats poorly, we can see how this character is not sensitive towards the dignity of others and seems to not shy away from making others feel ashamed or unfortunate in comparison to himself. It is this sense of arrogance that characterises Tom as both powerful yet vulnerable, as he, without hesitation, feels the need to prove himself to others as a superior man. The setting of the “alley of ashes,” is described as a an awfully frightening place that is located in the middle of Gatsby and Daisy’s house. Fitzgerald perhaps centres this location to point out the unlikeliness that Gatsby and Daisy’s future relationship will struggle to succeed. This is shown by the ending of the novel where the death of Myrtle Wilson, caused by these two characters, is the abrupt ending of their relationship.

 

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I Guess Everything Reminds You of Something – Discussion Thoughts

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In a brief summary, this story presents a father who finds a story that was written by his son. From this point, his father expresses his amazement of his son’s talent and his ability write so beautifully. However, the tension begins to show when both characters go pigeon shooting. In this moment, the father can see how his son is excelling whilst he is doing badly on his own, and we can see how the father begins to become slightly aggressive in his tone and rather resentful of his son’s success. However, the author allows the readers to question the son’s intentions as his advice to his father is what causes him to miss his shot multiple times. The son appears to be rather boastful and arrogant. What the author exposes is that the father trained his son to be a good shooter, whereas the story the boy had written was a shock to his father, something that he never would have expected. Additionally, as a writer himself, its almost as if the characters are put under competition, constantly making remarks that although sound perfectly normal, instead have contrasting intentions. It is at the end of this short story where the father comes to know that the “prize-winning story” was in fact completely plagiarised by his son. The author reveals that the “boy had never been any good,” and it was not his sickness that made him vile but that he was like this all along.

The story is written in third-person, yet narrated from the father and we can see how between dialogue, the author demonstrates how the father reminisces of past times that he is remembered by as the story progresses. One of the main values that have been embedded in this story and that can be observed is honesty. Throughout the story, the author shows how honesty can be used when a person has either good or bad intentions. Revealing too much information might appear trustworthy and sincere however by doing so, it is easy for one to manipulate another. Without giving enough, a person will clearly be seen as secretive and manipulative.

ToK

Paradigms and Perceptions

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Paradigm Definition – A mental model which helps us organise our reasoning and create knowledge.

Examples Discussed/RLEs:

  • Buzz’s ‘paradigm shift’ in toy story. In the clip shown we could see how as the events unfolded, buzz’s mentality changed throughout as he found himself in new circumstances. A quick summary would be that Buzz initially thought that he could not overcome a challenge and the TV advert showed him that he could. Yet he soon realised that this was not reality. This change in beliefs is a representation of paradigm shifts and how new ideas and perspectives can change our own beliefs.
  • This brings in the idea of how paradigms shifts can occur, which is perspective. In the example shown on slide 14, the zoomed in image offered a view of a man that looked angry and scary. However, when the same image was zoomed out the same man appeared to be frightened and scared for his own life. This shows how in the real world one would always have different perspectives which then affect our paradigms. Being exposed to new perspectives can occur when we experience new things and meet new people and thus look at things with an alternative perspective.
  • In the following slides we discussed how other people from different backgrounds would feel about different things.
  • What I found most striking was the robbery paradigm which shows how as humans we automatically assume things and make generalisations based upon what we have seen before. This shows how we can perhaps never not be bias and that our previous experiences will always, whether subconscious or not, influence the way we form opinions and ideas.

Conceptual Understanding(s):

  • The perspectives we contain, which are determined from our cultural backgrounds, affect the personal knowledge we obtain.
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What We Talk About When We Talk About Love by Raymond Carver

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In this short story, Carver offers several perspectives of love and therefore enables his readers to form interpretations based upon the discussion between the four characters presented in the story. Carver chooses to set the scene of the story with simplicity, which is used in order to allow readers to focus on what is being said and not use the setting and the character’s descriptions to form their interpretations. Instead, the author utilises these characters as a pathway to introduce several points of view, that both interlink as well contradict each other and offer challenging questions.

Carver’s tone in this story varies between characters. As Mel holds most of the dialogue, Carver is able to present Mel with the most distinct voice and the one that dominates the scene.  Thus enabling the readers to  easily note Mel’s actions and words, and thus perhaps finding themselves agreeing with this character’s rather contradictory perspective on love.

Mel is presented as a character who both appears disorderly and pessimistic, as shown by his relationship with Terri, but also perceives Mel to be a character with admiration and optimism, through his attitude towards the elderly couple who appeared to have a fairytale-like relationship. Perhaps this is why Mel progressively becomes more aggressive during this scene, as he realises that his relationship with Terri, which appears to be realistic, is not what he desires and therefore he challenges Terri and offers controversial ideas to the group. Carver indicates that Mel is possibly ashamed of his love with Terri and hence makes conscious decisions to ruin it and create tension, in which no other character responds significantly to. It is this silence, that Carver creates, which produces this idea that love is a mystery, and leaves the question of what is love and what it might look like unanswered.

Carver uses this piece as a form of providing perspectives rather than showing his own through each of the characters. Its this choice that makes the story more complex and allows questions and challenges to arise.

Academic, English Learner Profile (ELP)

Tarot Card Interpretations

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Scythe: Could be a representation for harvesting and the work done to provide something new. This could connect to a fresh start for myself in my own life and the beginning of something pure and new as I move onto later stages in my life. However, it could also act as a warning, and indicate that there may be future danger in my personal life, where I must be careful and observe potential harm.

Mountain: A symbol of an on-going journey and current struggles and obstacles that could be in my way, as I attempt to navigate my way through school and onto later education. The reflection of the mountain may represent the idea of self-awareness and ensuring that one is completely acknowledgeable of themselves and their actions.

Fish: Could represent current and flow. It could be something that is inevitable and that I should allow to happen without interference. Or is could show sharing in a society where ‘schools’ come together to communicate and navigate as one, through any obstacles and challenges that may come their way.

CAS

AMK Minds Progress Reflection 3

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LO5 Collaboration

Due to the transition from season two to season three of activities/service, a group of grade 9s replaced the grade 10s that we had worked with for the first two seasons of the year. We had not worked with the grade 9s before so we made sure to plan out activities and guidance before they came in order to be prepared for the last two seasons of the year. Since, as a group of grade 11s, we had gained experience and learnt how to collaborate and communicate, not only with each other, but also with the clients, this process was a lot easier, and it allowed us to transition smoothly.

It was relatively easy to work together as a large group because we were determined to continue to build a strong relationship with the clients at AMK Minds. However, due to the circumstances of COVID-19, we were not allowed to meet with the clients, but we still continued to prepare activities and brainstorm of better ideas to collaborate with them and enhance their basic hand-eye coordination skills.

In the first two seasons, we learnt a lot from the volunteers, about how we could improve our activities to best suit the clients. We were exposed to new ways of teaching and collaborating which allowed us to step out of our comfort zone, where we initially stuck to simple activities. Due to the weeks of time without meeting up with the client, we were able to develop ideas and turn them into simulations to see how they would work in a large group scenario.

Communication with AMK Minds stayed consistent, and we worked with them to discuss how best we could prepare for the future. After weeks of simulations, it was beginning to feel redundant, which was one of the biggest challenges we faced. Not being able to meet with the clients made it difficult to organise the activities into what worked and what did not.

However, we made sure to have meaningful discussions to ensure that we had the clients best interest, and to use our prior knowledge to come up with engaging and effective activities that could be implemented in the future, even if we were not the group to run them. Conclusively, although we might not be able to continue this service until the start of the next academic year, we have made sure to document our progress and video activities to ensure a smooth transition next year.

In this activity, collaboration is key in order to achieve our group outcome but also to keep in mind our personal goals. From the start of the academic year to know, huge progress has been accomplished by each member of the service. For me, I was initially uncomfortable when we first met with the clients, as it was a group of people that I had no experience working with. I was unsure of how to approach them and interact with them at ease. As a result, I was not able to collaborate effectively with them. However, as the season went on, I became more used to the group and I learnt from the volunteers as well as the other students. Most people were initially out of their comfort zone, so we made sure to have a discussion after each session in order to note where everyone was at and to support each other. It was important to communicate clearly in order to be successful in our outcome.

Activity Simulation

Academic, English Learner Profile (ELP)

Cyrano de Bergerac – Thoughts

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  • Cyrano takes pride in the fact that he is a man with morals and principles and does not require outer beauty to be respected and honoured.
  • Yet is open about the fact that Roxanne will never love him because of the way he looks.
  • He even shames those that only have “the looks” and not the “brains” or “the elegance within” which is hypocritical as he indirectly uses Christian to get closer to Roxanne.
  • Christian might be argued to be a placement character, who only serves to enhance characteristics of Roxanne and Cyrano, yet the ‘friendship’ formed between him and Cyrano help to show that he is a character who is vital in shaping both Roxanne and Cyrano.
  • Although at first it seems that Cyrano has no alternate motive to help Christian, other than being a ‘good friend,’ we can soon see how Cyrano benefits from this alliance.
  • We know that Christian does not have the same mind as Cyrano but he is used as the face of Cyrano’s words, yet when Roxanne is so in love from what she hears from Christian, she realises that looks do not matter.
  • This at first might seem to be beneficial for Cyrano, as he simply has what Roxanne wants, but it is much more complicated than that.
  • Through the system that existed between the three characters, Cyrano was able to love Roxanne from afar, without all the complications. By keeping this secret, he wasn’t “making a sacrifice”, he was being selfish. Without the alliance, he would not have a reason to express all these emotions to her, and by telling her the truth of his love at the beginning, he would risk the friendship they had.
  • Although at the beginning, we are made to place our sympathies with Cyrano, especially in the scene where Christian climbs up to Roxanne’s balcony and kisses her, we soon learn that Cyrano is satisfied with just the fact that his words are consuming Roxanne to all its extent.
  • Just like De Guiche uses his exterior to improve his social status, Cyrano uses the fact that he does not care about such superficial things as a facade to cover the truth that he is a vulnerable, incredibly sensitive man who is insecure about his looks, and also uses others for his benefit.
  • Although De Guiche is a character that is not liked until the end of the play, his honesty makes it easier to understand him, whilst Cyrano plays the role of a complicated man.
  • When Christian dies, I initially thought that Cyrano would disclose the truth, but instead he carried on for years, visiting Roxanne with it hidden.
  • His sudden death is what caused him to reveal the truth, but there was no real satisfaction in doing so.
ToK

Human Sciences – Claim & Analysis

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Knowledge claim: Human behaviour can be influenced by an observer.

Real-life example: Hawthorne Studies – Hawthorne was considered a progressive place to work due to benefits workers received such as paid pension plans and sickness disability pay. An experiment was conducted there on the effects of illumination on worker efficiency. Output increased in general but was not affected by light as both workers working in light and in dim light had an increase in output. The study was ceased due to lack of results. However a similar idea was experimented on women making relays. These women were given rest breaks and different hours were tried. As a result, output increased by 30%. The observers studied workers producing more in less time.

TOK analysis: We must acknowledge that output increased wherever these tests were tried, and thus wherever workers were observed and studied. There is a knowledge issue presented here as the observers did not notice this with the Hawthorne studies. There was a connection found that simply did not exist. The conclusion that was ignored was that human behaviour (in this context, the output produced) changed drastically when these workers were observed. The observers influenced the workers behaviour and resulted in an increase in output. They were now in a more pressured environment where they could not slack in their work and thus were in general more efficient. To avoid this issue, we must consider the effects of the experimental process itself on the results and not just the factor(s) (independent variable) that is tested/changed in the experiment.

Academic, English Learner Profile (ELP)

Is Odysseus a complicated man?

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I agree that to some extent, Odysseus is a complicated character, which can be seen through his naturally deceptive nature. However, by acknowledging the journey that he has undertaken, I find the majority of his decisions reasonable and justifiable. For example, after being sent off by the Phaeacians, Odysseus visits Eumaeus, but disguises himself and creates a story where he has come from Crete. Although Odysseus knows that he is back home in Ithaca, he chooses to lie. I believe that due to his struggle of making his way home, it would be difficult to trust anyone, even those who he knew before the battle of Troy. Perhaps, he believes that everyone and everything is against him, causing him to delay disclosing his true identity to anyone, even those who he used to know so well. Odysseus even questions Penelope’s loyalty and is worried that she might turn against him on his arrival. Odysseus connects this belief with the unfortunate situation that Agamemnon was put in when he arrived back home, where his wife, Clytemnestra took Aegisthus as her lover when he was away. However, when Odysseus reunites with Telemachus at the swineherd’s hurt, he immediately reveals his identity, which contradicts his other decisions where he has chosen to lie until he truly trusts the other person.

The Story of My Learning Starts Here