The Immigration Connection

Today we discussed the PowerPoint homework. Since I hadn’t given you very much information on the terminology used in the slides, I was very impressed that everyone was able to educate themselves by using the links provided. The answers that you came up with exhibited proof that you took time reflecting on the illustration you chose from Section II of The Arrival. Learning to be visually literate is a challenge, but we are certainly learning to hone those skills.

We discussed any questions that you still had on some of the terminology, which can be a little hard to define with words. This makes sense, though, since the terms used are very connected with the visual realm of thinking rather than the verbal realm of thinking.

We had discussed the fact that Shaun’ Tan’s book, The Arrival, is about many things, but is largely the story of a man who leaves his family to go to a strange new place. The man in an immigrant.

In real life, people immigrate to new countries for many reasons. Some people come alone, and immigrate with their families.

In America, immigrants have been coming to our country ever since the United States was officially founded via the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776 (and before then, actually, to some extent).

In pairs, I asked you all to explore a ThinkQuest Website on Immigration (located at http://library.thinkquest.org/20619/Intro.html). This activity was to be exploratory, but I did ask that you pay particular attention to the visuals provided and use the visual literacy skills we’ve been practicing. We spent about half an hour navigating the Immigration ThinkQuest, and I was there to answer any questions you might have during your exploration.

For your homework tonight:

1. I’ve asked you to listen to 30 minute interview that Grant Stone (from the Australian comics website, Ozcomics.com) conducted with Shaun Tan in November of 2006. You can access this podcast here: http://www.ozcomics.com/podcast/OzComics_ShaunTan20061109.mp3.
2. Comment on the interview below. You can make an observation. You can post a question you would like to ask Shaun Tan. You can do a bit of research on one of the topics that came up during the interview and post a link for us to check out. Feel free to be creative, as there is no right or wrong way to comment on the interview. Please don’t spend a lot of time on this, however. 10-15 minutes should be sufficient.
   
3. Refer back to the in-class activity we did today with the Immigration ThinkQuest. Re-visit one of the images you explored. Below, post 2 questions you asked yourself while using your visual literacy skills. Please only spend about 5-10 minutes on this part of the homework.

Until next time,

Silver Lisa

◊◊◊◊Note: The image used in this blog entry is digital reproduction of a cartoon penned by J.A. Wales that was published in a publication called Puck on August 10, 1881. The caption of this cartoon read “Extremes Meet: Crowded by Choice. Packed by Necessity.” This image may be accessed directly through the Michigan State University Museum’s Online Exhibit, “Immigration and Caricature: Ethnic Images from the Appel Collection” at the following link: http://museum.msu.edu/Exhibitions/Virtual/ImmigrationandCaricature/7572-128.html.

According to the MSU Museum website, “An accompanying editorial [to this cartoon] argues that middle-class Americans crowded into resort hotels are no better off than the immigrants of the period, crowded into their tenements.”◊◊◊◊

Getting More Connected

I hadn’t tried the warm-up exercise that we performed today before. What we did was kind of like the “telephone game,” but involved verbal (spoken messages), auditory (messages as they are heard), and visual literacy skills.

One of the many, many artists that have influenced Shaun Tan is the American artist, Edward Hopper. As we all now know, the painting below is called, “Boy and Moon.”

Before sharing this painting with the class, and without letting anyone know what was going on, I asked for 5 volunteers (Thanks, Abby, Shane, DaSharra, Keltney, and Devon).

I asked Abby to stay in the classroom while the other 4 volunteers went out to the hall. Next, I showed the class and Abby “Boy and Moon” on the projector screen. I asked Abby to study this painting very closely so that she could describe the painting to Shane next.

Once Shane returned to the classroom, Abby described the painting aloud to Shane, who was not shown the painting. Next, DaSharra returned to the classroom, and Shane described aloud what he knew of the painting to her, but still I did not reveal the actual painting to them. DaSharra proceeded to describe the painting out loud to Keltney, and then Keltney did the same with Devon–still the 4 volunteers who had been in the hallway had not seen the painting.

Devon was the lucky one who was asked to draw the painting on the board and to offer an explanation for what he drew.

Finally, I showed the “Boy and Moon” to the volunteers.

As a class, we discussed how the image changed throughout the activity, and possible reasons for such changes.

We observed that a lot of the details from the painting were lost in the descriptions and often other details were added or altered.

When descriptive language is used, we get pictures in our heads; that is, we think visually. However, each person has had different life experiences, which can alter the visual image we form in our head, and the way we describe the visual image in our own words.

We CONNECT the visual images by using our past experiences and knowledge.

While reading The Arrival, the way we read the visual images provided by Shaun Tan will be influenced by our past experiences and knowledge.

For much of the story, the man is alone. He seems to feel very isolated.

For your homework:

1. Read Section II of The Arrival. Take your time reading, and read it more than once if you feel like you might have missed something. Ask yourself questions as you go along, using the “Bank of Questions” at http://www.arhu.umd.edu/vislit/bank_content.php if you need inspiration.
2. Choose a page or a framed image depicting the man feeling lonely in Section II.
3. Open the PowerPoint file at http://www.box.net/shared/r1sd7et112. This is a tool for reading visual images.
4. For the picture you have chosen, answer the questions on each slide by typing your answer on the lined “paper” provided on the slide. Do the best you can, and use the links to learn about any new terminology you come across. While answering the questions, reflect on experiences you’ve had when you were feeling lonely or isolated. In other words, try to CONNECT your own experiences with those of the man in The Arrival.
5. Save your file on your Homework USB Memory Stick.
6. We’ll go over this in class tomorrow.

Until then,

–Silver Lisa

◊◊◊◊Note: The image used in this blog entry is digital reproduction of Edward Hopper’s Painting, “Boy and Moon”. You may access it at Museumsyndicate.com by visiting the link at http://www.museumsyndicate.com/item.php?item=9413.◊◊◊◊

More Questions than Answers, but That’s the Point!

What an enlightening day we had today!

Before we read The Arrival, we practiced our visual literacy skills with the online activity, “Scrutinize a Bearden” (http://tinyurl.com/35o53d).  In this activity, we examined a collage painting by the artist Romare Bearden entitled, “Tomorrow I May Be Far Away.”  Besides exploring the questions posed on the webpage containing the activity, we spent some time coming up with our own questions such as “How is color used in this painting?” (Misti’s questions) and “What do you think the seated man was doing on this particular day?” (Austin’s question).

After this warm-up activity, we finally read The Arrival in its entirety.  It was a real challenge to read this engaging book without talking too much so everyone could read the story in their own words without being influenced by me or by your classmates.

Once we finished The Arrival, we talked about the letters that you had written a few days ago, describing one page of the book.  From the letters, we compared the predictions that were made about the story.

In The Arrival, the man has decided to leave his family to travel to a foreign place that unlike anything he had experienced before.  We spent some time discussing the question, “When you travel to a foreign place, what should you learn about the place?”

When a person leave a home country for another country with the intention of living there, there is a name for this kind of person.  Most everyone raised their hand when I asked what to call this kind of person…An “immigrant“.

In The Arrival, the main character is an immigrant.  We re-read the story to see if there were other immigrants in the story.   We discussed ways that Shaun Tan might make a distinction between natives to this land the man travels to versus immigrants.  At this point, we are still deciding on how (or even if) there is a visual distinction.

We also spent some time discussion the symbolism of using a monochromatic color scheme for the illustrations. Why might this method have been used by Shaun Tan? What is the significance of the particular colors used? Would someone 50 or 60 years ago think the color scheme was peculiar? These were some of the questions we explored.

Several people caught on to the fact that Shaun Tan divided The Arrival into sections or chapters.  We went back and confirmed that there were 5 sections.

For homework tonight:

1. You will be reading Section I at home.  Read it a few times.  Spend time looking at the pictures and asking yourself questions.  If you get stuck and can’t think of questions, try using this link for a “Bank of Questions”:  http://www.arhu.umd.edu/vislit/bank_content.php.   Not all of the questions are directly applicable to The Arrival, but they should help you get your creative juices flowing.
2. Post 2 questions you asked yourself (no need to post the answers here–we can discuss the questions in class) and 2 ideas for a title for this “chapter” of The Arrival in the comments section of this blog post.